A fleet of 25 fishing boats off the coast of Nantucket, Massachusetts, rallied together on Sunday to protest Vineyard Wind, an offshore wind turbine project under scrutiny after a turbine blade broke off, sending shards of sharp fiberglass into the ocean.
“Vineyard Wind is a menace to our fisheries,” Jerry Leeman, CEO of the New England Fishermen’s Stewardship Association (NEFSA), told Fox News Digital. Leeman joined the flotilla of New England fishermen protesting the wind project.
“Floating fiberglass shards remain a navigation and safety risk for mariners over a month after the blade disaster. We have no idea what effects this industrial litter will have on local food chains. Worse still, we have no idea whether this could happen again,” Leeman said.
“Fishermen understand the volatility of the North Atlantic better than anyone, and we are not confident these turbines and blade components will survive a winter squall or a hurricane in light of July’s catastrophe,” he continued.
New England fishermen rally to protest Vineyard Wind. (New England Fishermen’s Stewardship Association)
“The Vineyard Wind project is proof that offshore wind will crush fishermen and maritime communities,” he added.
The fleet included boats that catch lobster, tuna, squid and scallops. The fishermen were from Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut and New Jersey.
Vineyard Wind did not respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
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Last month, the Nantucket harbormaster announced that six of the town’s beaches would be temporarily closed after pieces of fiberglass washed ashore and said anyone walking the beach should wear footwear to protect themselves from the sharp debris.
Vineyard Wind, a joint venture between foreign entities Avangrid and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, which built wind farms off the coast of Massachusetts, said on July 18 that a blade from a turbine had snapped and that power production from the turbines was stopped immediately.
In October, Vineyard Wind boasted of a $1.2 billion “first-of-its-kind tax equity package” for commercial scale offshore wind with three U.S.-based banks, calling it “the largest single asset tax equity financing and the first for a commercial scale offshore wind project.”
Vineyard Wind 1 began on-site construction in late 2021 and completed the nation’s first offshore substation in July 2023. It is an 800 megawatts project located 15 miles off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard and is the first commercial scale offshore wind project in the United States.
When the blade fell last month, Leeman said, “the scariest thing” about it is that “it could happen again.”
“The cause of the breakage is unknown at this time. GE, as the project’s turbine and blade manufacturer and installation contractor, will now be conducting the analysis into the root cause of the incident,” Vineyard Wind said at the time.
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Last month, the Nantucket harbormaster temporarily closed six of the Massachusetts town’s beaches after pieces of sharp fiberglass washed ashore. (New England Fishermen’s Stewardship Association)
Vineyard Wind also said that, upon ceasing power production, the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE) issued a work suspension order.
“Vineyard Wind is in full compliance with the order, and is working in collaboration with BSEE to support its assessment and advance critical safety response and debris recovery efforts,” the company said.
“Our primary focus continues to be removing the parts of the blade that pose any risk of contributing further debris into the ocean,” GE Vernova chief sustainability officer Roger Martella said in an Aug. 13 statement. “We are thankful for our stakeholders, partners, and the skilled professionals at the site and behind the scenes for their unrelenting commitment to safe execution of these plans and the progress and risk mitigation of the last few days.”
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Offshore wind farming has been a contentious push by the Biden administration, which aims to hit aggressive green energy goals by 2030. Agencies within the Biden administration have been accused of moving too fast to approve wind projects at the expense of both environmental and marine life.
Cindy Zipf, executive director of Clean Ocean Action, testified in March last year before a House Committee that “[w]hile some offshore wind may hold promise, federal and state levels have moved forward without transparency, robust and sound science, or good governance.”
Zipf testified that the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) previously found that offshore wind can increase ocean noise, which can affect behaviors of whales; introduce electromagnetic fields that impact their navigation, predator detection and communication; and change species composition and survival rates, among other things.
The University of Maine’s first prototype of an offshore wind turbine is seen in this Sept. 20, 2013, file photo, near Castine, Maine. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty, files)
“The NMFS concludes with, ‘Offshore wind is the new use of our marine waters, requiring substation scientific and regulatory review,’” Zipf testified. “So, where is the substantial review? Where is the commitment to the precautionary principle?”
Clean Ocean Action noted last February following the ninth whale death in the Northeast that the “alarming number of [whale] deaths is unprecedented in the last half century.” The only unique factor from previous years is the excessive scope, scale and magnitude of offshore wind power plant activity in the region, the group noted.
Zipf emphasized that “climate change is real” and “living resources on the planet are in crisis,” but offshore wind projects should only be approved after pilot-scale projects are proven to be successful and when science supports industrial-scale plants.
In April, NEFSA, a fishing advocacy group that represents wild harvesters in fisheries across New England, criticized the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management’s (BOEM) recently unveiled plans to lease 2 million acres of ocean in Maine for more offshore wind development – an unprecedented leasing area that would allow for construction of enough wind turbines to produce 32 gigawatts of energy.
NEFSA, along with Responsible Offshore Development Alliance, said the administration is “rushing” to “political-proof” a green energy plan insulated from a possible administration change in November.
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BOEM told Fox News Digital in July that it will conduct a “phased leasing approach, and that BOEM does not intend to lease the entire final WEA (wind energy area)… but rather, BOEM will now consider proposed lease areas from within the final WEA based on certain criteria.”
They said the WEA was finalized “after extensive engagement with lobster fishermen in fishing communities” and “avoids several other important fishing areas and habitats, including important groundfish areas.”