Our view: Wind power, Fenwick and the Hamptons

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Hello everyone,

Dan’s Papers, a media outlet in the  Hamptons of Long Island took a wry look at the brouhaha over offshore wind in the Fenwick Island area, after reading through a  story in Delaware’s Coastal Point website.

As you  know,  Danish wind power giant Ørsted wants to build off the coast of Fenwick Island and Ocean City It’s one of two projects that are planned off  in that area

 It would be less expensive for the Danish company to bring the powerlines from its wind farm to a substation on a tiny portion of 300-plus-acre  Fenwick Island State Park.

In return, Ørsted would turn over $18 million for improvements to one of the state’s most popular state parks.

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Some Fenwickers are worried the wind turbines, which are far taller than first announced, would spoil their views. They also have offered gloom and doom views in bringing the powerlines to a small portion of the park.

While chances of the towers being  a dot or less on the horizon from about 20 miles away are good, residents are worried that aircraft warning lights would spoil night time gazing off their homes and condos.

Dan’s Papers is interested in the project because some folks in the exclusive area of Long Island are worried about a project that would be 30 miles off the coast.

Most of the opposition to the Maryland-Delaware projects would evaporate if the turbines were moved into the 30-mile zone. The same should be true in the Hamptons. The aircraft lights are another matter, although the flashers would be faint.

Since the wind turbines would be around for a quarter of a century and perhaps much longer  it is highly likely that guidance systems in future aircraft would be able to account for  the towers at some point and make the flashers obsolete.

But Dan’s Papers put things in perspective in a couple of sentences.

I wonder what a town meeting might have been like when electricity was first proposed for the East End. You want to build tall wooden poles like porcupine quills with wires attached down every street in America? And do you realize how many gas lamp operators will get put out of business?”

Exactly.

Any thoughts pro or con? Let me know. Simply hit return and type away. If this newsletter was passed along,  sign up here  to get your own five-day-a-week email report at no charge. –Doug Rainey, chief content officer.

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