After nine years of regulatory review, the federal government gave the green light Wednesday to the nation’s first offshore wind farm, a highly contested project off the coast of Cape Cod.
The full article is here. But wait, whoops!, I left out one part:
Several regulatory hurdles remain, and opponents of the wind farm have vowed to go to court, potentially stalling Cape Wind for several more years.
Regulation is the same reason why all the money for high speed rail isn’t going to do anything any time soon.
NC got a lot of money simply because NCDOT has been working on the two tier EIS for a Richmond-Raleigh line for ten or fifteen years. They’re almost done.
Deregulation of siting of large wind energy facilities? Never going to happen.
John Thacker,
What will be the highest speed of that high speed line?
Not quite Bill. You can put as much carbon in the atmosphere as you can afford to burn, which may not be “all you want”.
You can always take down the windmills. You can’t put the CO2 back in the ground. At least not without nuclear power.
I understand these windmills can affect the migratory patterns of birds, which is why some groups are suing, but from an environmental/ecological point of view is that not the lesser evil? I would think at this stage in the game finding any alternative power that doesn’t spew carbon would be welcome news to anyone concerned with the environment.
Josh, Just jokin’.
But, it is strange that we can talk about regulation of alternatives but not of the nuisance: carbon, or even think about creating a carbon market.
Which raises the question: whichis more restricted: a nine year project to get a windmill, or a project to establish a carbon market?
Which will come first: the windmill or the market.
Bet on the windmill.
I sense a business opportunity- The Seabird Grill.
Hey, all we need is a jack boot government planner that designates who gets screwed on property rights.
Your pristine white sand beach must be sacrificed to drill baby drill.
That fishery is soon to be fished out, so quite whining about pollution from oil tanker and coal carrier ballast water.
That $10M you paid for that ocean view was just a bubble and the view of oil rigs or wind farms isn’t to blame at all.
The river front porch where you fish isn’t a birthright and the river water is better used for dams and nuclear power plant cooling – if the dead fish bother you, close the door and turn on the A/C and use the plentiful electricity to cool.
Government serves the corporations and it is their right to profit that is more important than the individual rights some imagine – the greatest good for the greatest number is what is most profitable, and government much remove the obstacles thrown up by the whining minority.
>>Government serves the corporations
I love this.
Every day, a bored Senator calls up a CEO and says something like: “Dave! Guess what? I’m staring at a bill here that will put you out of business. You’d pay double for rent, payroll, and equipment while spending years in court before you can sell anything. I’m torn about how to vote on it… what’s that? You want to make a million-dollar donation to the charity my daughter runs, hire my nephew, buy lifetime passes to all my fundraisers, and save me a spot on the Board for when I retire? You’re very kind Dave. You know, I think this bill is unfair to Native Americans and I’m voting no. And I’ll talk to you again next week.”
Yeah, those corporations really have government on a short leash, I’ll tell ya.
The deregulation or a least lax regulation of the coal mining and petroleum industries has done a great deal to promote the pursuit of energy based on something other than fossil fuels.
If there were any time when the fossil fuel industry should be especially focused on safety, now would be the time. If there were any time when industry should be very determined to solve the problems of individual firms in the industry, now would be the time.
Instead we have the industry failing to fix their problems so that the government must bail them out.
Why didn’t Exxon, Shell, Conoco, Total sweeping into the Gulf and hiring all the available boats and recruiting them to contain and clean up the spill? Money?? Damaging the business of others because preventing the damage costs money seems certain to bring on regulation.
And government take overs.
Great article written on my life, help, Thank you for your article, hope to become friends.
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