The Newsmagazine of Long Beach Island and Southern Ocean County

By Gina G. Scala | on July 20, 2022

When it comes to offshore wind, homeowners along roughly 100 miles of the Jersey Shore have made their concerns about shoreline visibility, coastal community economies and tourism clear while also demanding more time to review the draft environmental impact statement of New Jersey’s first offshore wind farm project.

During the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management’s first public hearing on Ocean Wind 1 on July 14, homeowners stated their concerns while labor union representatives talked about the benefits of bringing offshore wind industry jobs to New Jersey, and Clean Ocean Action representatives addressed a plethora of material related to the ocean and climate change. Nearly 200 attendees logged into the hearing, held via the Zoom platform.

Ocean Wind 1 is a joint venture between Ørsted and Public Service Enterprise Group. It is expected to be operational in 2024 and would produce enough electricity to power more than 500,000 homes. Engineering, procurement and construction contracts for New Jersey’s first offshore wind farm have already been awarded.

As proposed, the scope of the project includes up to 98 wind turbine generators, up to three offshore high voltage alternating current substations, inter-array cables linking the individual turbines to the offshore substations, substation interconnector cables linking the substations to each other, offshore export cables, an onshore export cable system, two onshore substations, and connections to the existing electrical grid in New Jersey.

The wind turbine generators, offshore substation and substation interconnector cables would be located in New Jersey’s Outer Continental Shelf, roughly 13 nautical miles (15 statute miles) southeast of Atlantic City. The offshore export cables would be buried below the seabed in the Outer Continental Shelf and state of New Jersey-owned submerged lands. The onshore export cables, substations and grid connections would be located in Ocean and Cape May counties.

By far, the question that demanded the most attention from homeowners was shoreline visibility, including how BOEM selected the lease area for Ocean Wind 1. 

The lease areas for Ocean Wind 1 were selected with the intent to protect ecologically sensitive areas while also minimizing space-use conflict in an appropriate area for wind development that took technology trends into account, according to BOEM.

Among considerations in 2009 were depth limitations, foundation types, and distance limitations on transmission lines.

“Furthermore, looking at some of those use conflicts, we had issues with vessel traffic,” a BOEM representative said in addressing a question during the agency’s first public hearing on Ocean Wind 1’s draft environmental impact statement. “There are the two very large ports to the north and south in terms of Delaware.”

The selection process for the lease area was just the tip of the iceberg on the issue of visibility during the four-hour hearing.

“It’s just the impact is going to be massive. If this was on land, can you imagine 1 million acres of land? A lot of people would have a lot to say about it,” said Jacqueline Wailing, chair of the environmental committee of the Women’s Club of Brielle in Monmouth County. “What about the migrating birds? We know that our animals are going to be impacted. We have got to slow down.”

Wailing said she knows there is no one answer to address the growing need for more electricity generation, but she’s concerned about the fish, animals and the water temperature rising.

“What happens when we have water temperatures that get too warm? Hurricanes? I lived through (Superstorm) Sandy. I had 5 feet (of water) downstairs and 3 feet upstairs,” Wailing said. “It’s not easy, I know, but destroying something that will take the carbon and temperature out of our environment – Jacques Cousteau is turning over in his grave.”

Ocean City homeowner Joan Marie Ebert said she and her husband just happened upon information about Ocean Wind 1 during a Google search after they purchased an electric car.

“Since then, talking to my neighbors and talking to people outside on the beach, nobody knows about Ocean Wind,” she said. “It’s alarming to me that a project of this scale, scope and size with impact to our coastal communities is being pushed through so aggressively, especially when we just came out of a pandemic period where any communications, if they were sent, were sent during that time.”

Still, Ebert said she and her husband are not opposed to wind energy overall.

“However, 900-foot turbines, 98 of them with Ocean Wind 1 placed 15 miles off the coast and three substations, will produce a dominant impact on the beach view,” she said. “I use the words ‘dominant impact’ because this is actually what BOEM concluded in an earlier study when assessing 600-foot turbines. In fact, the fairway lease area, which was planned for 12 miles off the coast near the Hamptons, was determined to be too close, posing a threat to navigation, fishing and marine mammals by New York and BOEM. What makes Ocean City, N.J. different?”

In her research, Ebert found Ocean Wind 1 would be larger in scale than the current largest ocean wind farm, Hornsea One, which is located off the Yorkshire coast of England. It spans approximately 157 square miles, with each turbine standing about 623 feet high.

Hornsea One, according to Ebert, is 75 miles offshore. It was built by Ørsted.

“I appeal to BOEM to discontinue the approval and planning of Ocean Wind 1 and 2, and actually any large-scale wind farm projects close to shore,” she said. “Wind farms should not be planned within 40 miles off the coastal communities, ensuring no visual impact and the devastating impact to tourism and economies of the coastal communities.”

On Long Beach Island, the Surf City Borough Council voted July 13, one day before the public hearing, to request that BOEM re-notice the draft environmental impact statement for Ocean Wind 1, providing a 120-day comment period beginning from the date of the republication in the Federal Registry.

In adopting the resolution, Surf City officials acknowledged the DEIS “is a two-volume, 1,400-page technical document. The time period established by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management of 45 days for public comment is woefully insufficient, does not provide the public with adequate time to properly read, analyze and develop a response to the DEIS and in doing so limits public participation in BOEM’s decision making process and adversely affects the public’s right to due process.”

You must be logged in to post a comment.

The SandPaper 1816 Long Beach Boulevard, Surf City, NJ 08008-5461 Phone Number: (609) 494-5900 • Fax Number: (609) 494-1437

Our Hometown DMCA Notices Newspaper web site content management software and services