Nantucket residents seek to freeze offshore wind projects following Vineyard Wind failure

A group of Nantucket residents is calling for a moratorium on all offshore wind development while the feds say there’s no timeline for when construction will proceed on Vineyard Wind following last month’s turbine blade failure.

The call from ACK4Whales, a nonpartisan community group, comes as debris continues to wash ashore on Nantucket, and the “small, popcorn-sized pieces of foam” and fiberglass shards spread to Martha’s Vineyard, Falmouth and elsewhere.

ACK4Whales is also preparing to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to hear an appeal on its lawsuit that looks to block the Vineyard Wind project.

A federal judge in April rejected the group’s arguments that the federal agencies that permitted the 62-turbine, 806-megawatt wind farm violated the Endangered Species Act, with construction threatening to “decimate” the endangered North Atlantic right whale.

ACK4Whales has also argued that the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management – the federal agency responsible for leasing offshore wind energy projects – relied on a “flawed analysis from the National Marine Fisheries Service, violating the National Environmental Policy Act.

“Until we know more not only about the blade failure and other potential disasters—not to mention the specific, measurable effects on the whale population, it makes no sense to proceed with offshore wind,” ACK4Whales President Vallorie Oliver said in a statement Thursday afternoon.

This comes after the feds and state officials met with the Nantucket Select Board on Wednesday to discuss further updates and ramifications from the July 13 blade failure that continues to take a toll on the island.

ACK4Whales’ call for a moratorium follows one earlier this week from Green Oceans, an advocacy group fighting wind farm projects in Rhode Island. The group connected the request to the Nantucket disaster.

The Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement, the federal agency responsible for investigating offshore wind activities, is evaluating a preliminary assessment conducted by GE Vernova that found a “manufacturing deviation” and “insufficient bonding” caused the mishap.

Cheri Hunter, BSEE’s renewables energy operations director, told the Select Board that there’s no timeline for when inspections on the other 351-foot-long blades will be complete. The agency is conducting its respective investigation.

“We will not allow the project to move forward until we are certain that the path forward meets the threshold for safe operations,” Hunter said.

GE Vernova has installed 24 turbines to date. The remainder of the broken blade was anticipated to be removed on Thursday.

As Tropical Storm Debby barrels up the East Coast, Roger Martella, GE Vernova’s head of government affairs, expressed a “high confidence” that the turbines will remain stable.

Select Board Chairwoman Brooke Mohr is demanding transparency from the feds around whether safety plans and requirements relative to Vineyard Wind will be revised.

The town did not learn about the blade failure until two days later, with debris starting to float on the ocean’s waters before it washed ashore the following day.

“Our community wants to know that there is a concrete response to what happened before this project moves forward, assuming it is,” Mohr said.

An initial environmental analysis of the disaster conducted by Arcadis, an environmental engineering consultant hired by GE Vernova, found that debris from the blade was “inert, non-soluble, stable and non-toxic.”

Chemicals from the debris are “highly unlikely” to pose “significant risks” to people and aquatic organisms who come in direct contact, said Wendy Heiger-Bernays, chief of research for the state Department of Environmental Protection. She added that hazardous materials from the turbine would also unlikely be detectable in the ocean.

Chrissy Petitpas, assistant deputy director of shellfish for the state Department of Marine Fisheries, said the agency is not advising behavioral changes in consuming shellfish.

The state is consulting with federal specialists as it tries to get guidance on risks around plastics and fiberglass in shellfish, with research in the early stages, Petitpas said. Microplastics are being found “everywhere,” she added.

“We don’t have a good understanding of what those human health impacts could be,” Petitpas said. “The science is evolving.”

Originally Published: August 8, 2024 at 6:38 p.m.

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