Energy Musings contains articles and analyses dealing with important issues and developments within the energy industry, including historical perspective, with potentially significant implications for executives planning their companies’ future.
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June 10, 2023
Our Next Open Border Courtesy Of Offshore Wind?
While the focus of national security has been on the illegal crossings of our southern border by terrorists and others, the East Coast may become vulnerable because of radar interference from offshore wind turbines. The issue of radar interference from onshore wind turbines has been known for years, but offshore turbines are more challenging. They are larger and there are no solutions for radar interference caused by them even after two decades of searching. Regardless, the Biden administration is racing ahead with building offshore wind farms, even over the objections of the Department of Defense because of their concern about radar interference. READ MORE
Our Next Open Border Courtesy Of Offshore Wind?
“The border is not open,” declares Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas as the media shows video of thousands of illegal migrants crossing our southern border with Mexico. Do not worry, nothing bad is going to happen. But many unsavory people, including some on the terrorist watch list, have crossed, let alone the drugs and sex trafficking.
Is it possible the Biden administration will open another border? I am not talking about our Canadian border. I am focused on the East Coast where offshore wind turbines can interfere with our long-range radar (LRR) and short-term radar (SRR) which are key to our national defense. Only recently has the Department of Defense expressed serious concern about offshore wind impacting its ability to execute its mission, but they have been worried for years. Radar interference from offshore wind turbine generators (WTG) is a serious issue with no apparent solution.
Exhibit 1. Schematic For Cape Wind Farm Off Massachusetts Coast
Source: Getty Image
We first delved into the radar interference issue when writing about the Cape Wind offshore wind farm in the early 2000s and its struggles for approval. The 468 megawatts (MW) wind farm would have been the first U.S. offshore wind farm. The power was to come from 130 3.6 MW WTGs installed in a 25-square mile section of Horseshoe Shoal in the federal waters of Nantucket Sound bounded by Cape Cod, Nantucket Island, and Martha’s Vineyard. Fierce political opposition from Massachusetts Senator Edward Kennedy (D), former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney (R), conservative industrialist William Koch, and philanthropist Rachel “Bunny” Mellon helped kill the project.
One issue that emerged during Cape Wind’s approval process was concern about radar interference by WTGs expressed by the Coast Guard and U.S. Navy. They were concerned about the impact on their operations and training. During the approval process, two radar interference studies were “submitted that attempt to assess the impact of the proposed wind turbines on typical marine radars used in the Nantucket Sound area.” Because “(n)either of the two documents fully evaluated the impact of the actual wind turbines proposed for the Cape Wind project,” the Coast Guard commissioned a third study, the results of which were reported in January 2009. A key conclusion of the study conducted by Technology Service Corporation (TSC) was: