The nation’s first offshore wind farm is ready to go, despite critics’ blowback
Source: Washington Post
BLOCK ISLAND, R.I. — The turbines stand like sentinels off the coast of this tiny island, each rising twice as high as the Statue of Liberty. Workers attached the final 240-foot-long blades just days ago, turning the nation’s first offshore wind farm into a reality.
When residents look out at the altered horizon from their gray-shingled houses, some see progress, the birth of a promising industry, a way to ditch the 1 million gallons of diesel fuel that Block Island burns each year for power.
Others see an expensive eyesore, a boondoggle that they contend will enrich private investors while burdening the state’s ratepayers and doing little to improve daily life here. One group went to federal court in an unsuccessful effort to stall the project.
The country’s inaugural foray into offshore wind power is modest compared with the sprawling developments that have existed in Europe for decades. The five-turbine, 30-megawatt project, which is set to start operating this fall, will feed into New England’s electrical grid via underwater cables and provide enough energy to power about 17,000 homes.
But here’s what makes it momentous: It exists.
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/the-nations-first-offshore-wind-farm-is-ready-to-go-despite-critics-blow-back/2016/08/27/7a43c6d6-693f-11e6-99bf-f0cf3a6449a6_story.html
The article did not mention a key reason that this is the first place to have off-shore wind power.
The price of electricity on Block Island is about 58 cents a kilowatt!
This is probably due to the fact that most of the power comes from diesel generators on the island. The article did mention that the average price nation wide is 12 1/3 cents per kilowatt. Well with high prices like that on Block island, paying the operator of the windmill 24 cents a kilowatt is a real bargain.
As you can see from this entry on Wikipedia, off shore power is more expensive at present, but like solar and on-shore wind power it will continue to get cheaper with time.
On a trip to Acadia park up in Maine, I did see some of those little stinky diesel generators, spewing out smoke 24/7. I assume that they are smaller versions of the ones on Block Island, but I don't know for sure.
http://energypolicyupdate.blogspot.com/2010/09/september-8-2010-maine-ocean-energy-rfp.html
In any case, let's hope that this first installation of off shore wind power is followed by many more...................
Burfman...........
= new reply since forum marked as read
Good one. 
Then they tried to claim they were noisy, they kill birds, people near them suffer health problems, etc, etc, etc....
There's another argument they use claiming it puts coal miners out of work and an entire way of life will be lost.
We used to romanticize another profession that lit our homes and provided numerous products.
Sailing the open sea with a harpoon or crawling around in a hole in the ground and getting black lung is much more macho than this:
[hr][font color="blue"][center]There is nothing you can't do if you put your mind to it.
Nothing.[/center][/font][hr]
