Nearly 30 years after towering turbine began crop up in European waters , the United States is finally create its first drops of seaward current of air power . As of this calendar week , Rhode Island ’s Block Island Wind Farm is officially online and get carbon - complimentary succus for the New England power system .
Offshore farting company Deepwater Wind announced on Monday that the Block Island Wind Farm — five turbine located a few international nautical mile off the sea-coast of Block Island — has complete its commissioning and prove phases and commenced commercial-grade operations . The wind farm is rated to produce 30 megawatts of power at prime capability , which is enough to light up 17,000 habitation . Electricity generated by the turbines is routed via submarine cables to the 1,000 - strong community of Block Island , and back into Rhode Island ’s power power grid .
As the first offshore idle words farm in US piss , the hope is that this archetype project will institutionalise up an industry — one that experts say is open of supplying all the electric needs of coastal states from Massachusetts to North Carolina , with none of the climate - warming glasshouse flatulence emissions of natural gas or coal .
“ We ’re more confident than ever that this is just the start of a unexampled U.S. renewable energy industry that will put thousands of Americans to work and power communities up and down the East Coast for decades to issue forth , ” Deepwater lead CEO Jeffrey Grybowski suppose in a statement .
But Grybowski ’s sunny outlook dismiss the fact that it claim year of Department of State and federal policy - making , environmental impact assessments and town hall meetings for the Block Island Wind Farm to fare to fruition — and not everybody ’s happy that it did . Some residents of Block Island see the twist farm as a $ 300 million boondoggle , one that ’s keep electricity prices artificially high while baffle their otherwise pristine view of the sea .
What ’s more , the not - in - my - backyarders who oppose offshore steer labor in New England may find an ally in President - elect Trump , who has called the jazz turbine being built within eyeshot of one of his Scottish golf game courses “ ugly ” and “ a disaster for Scotland”on equivalence with the Lockerbie bombardment . There are legitimate debates to be had about the merits of offshore wind power versus other types of clean Department of Energy , but many of Trump ’s griping with the nothingness manufacture have little foundation in world , whether he ’s talking aboutturbines sending brand “ into the atmosphere”or turbinesdecimating America ’s bald eagle population . ( As you ’ve probably venture , neither of these claims is genuine . )
It ’s possible that Trump ’s administration wo n’t hoist up being as hostile to the nascent offshore wind instrument industry as hisTwitter historywould suggest . But now more than ever , it seems , that industry ’s future is function to bet on how the winds blow at Block Island .
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