Owen Klinsky
Contributor
Residents of Nantucket, Massachusetts, spoke out on Wednesday at a town hall against a wind power company for a “turbine blade failure incident” that resulted in debris washing up along the beach.
Officials of the small island town located 30 miles off the coast of Cape Cod were forced to shut down beaches on the south shore on Tuesday due to “large floating debris and sharp fiberglass shards,” according to a statement posted to Facebook by the Nantucket Harbormaster’s office. During the town hall, locals accused Vineyard Wind — an offshore wind development company that operates near the island — of taking too long to notify the community and clean up the site, according to videos of the event posted on X by the Nantucket Current.
“This happened Saturday night… There was no notice to mariners until Monday; that’s unacceptable. The town wasn’t informed until Monday,” Nantucket charter boat captain Bobby DeCosta said during the town hall. “There’s nobody in this room that’s been to that sight. I guarantee it. We’ve got a bunch of suits here trying to cover their tracks,” DeCosta continued, gesturing towards the Vineyard Wind representatives present at the meeting.
DeCosta also said that the cleanup response should have occurred much sooner, stating that anyone with prior knowledge of the prevailing winds in the area knew the wind would ultimately reach Nantucket’s shores. (RELATED: Major Enviro Orgs Shack Up With Foreign Oil Giants To Industrialize The Ocean)
“Anyone with any kind of water knowledge knows that the tide out there around this wind farm goes northeast/southwest and the prevailing wind in the summer is southwest, and this stuff was going to end up on the beach,” DeCosta said. “They had to do a tide analysis before they even started this project, so this is a bunch of crap when they say, ‘Oh, we had to do a [National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration] study to see where this stuff was going to go’… They were hoping it wasn’t going to go on the beaches so they wouldn’t have to deal with it as much.”
Local lobsterman Dan Pronk lamented the effects the debris has had on his business and the environment during the town hall meeting while holding a piece of fiberglass that had washed up on the beach, while also addressing Vineyard Wind CEO Klaus Moeller personally, according to another video posted on X by the Nantucket Current.
“I fish 800 lobster traps right where you’re putting these tombstones, which is also the end of my business… When you apply [fiberglass]… you have to wear respirators. For what reason? Because it’s toxic. If you breathe those fumes… you’ll get higher than a rat,” he continued. “So, it is toxic. What do you have to say about that, Klaus?”
Following the incident, Vineyard Wind’s operations were “shut down until further notice,” a spokesperson for the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement told NBC Boston on Tuesday.
The town of Nantucket on Thursday referred to the turbine debris as a “crisis” and stated that “Vineyard Wind vessels are collecting fiberglass pieces on the site; a very large piece of debris is below the surface, in the water column,” according to a post from the Nantucket Current on X.
The Biden administration has pushed for greater construction and utilization of offshore wind farms as part of his broader green agenda in order to reduce the use of fossil fuels. Recent wind farm projects have been plagued with issues and delays due to high costs and component failures as the industry rapidly develops.
Vineyard Wind did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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Can we get an on-scene report (read that as non-media; no MSM reports) of fiberglass and glass shards noted along the seashore?
Check out the Nantucket Current — local paper. It has been covering the story closely
But of course the virtue signaling value always offsets any real damage?
Welcome to the famous, beautiful beaches along Nantucket Island . . . please excuse our de-construction debris.
Correction (bolded) to quote that’s given in the third paragraph of the above article:
“There’s nobody in this room that’s been to that site.”
Also, I recommend the following correction to this sentence is the second-to-last paragraph of the article:
“Recent wind farm projects have been plagued with issues and delays due to high costs and component failures as the industry
rapidly developsresorts to trial-and-error engineering and materials application.”I noticed that typo too. However it accurately quotes https://dailycaller.com/2024/07/18/nantucket-locals-slam-offshore-wind-developer/ .
Perhaps you should have suggested WUWT change it to “… sight [sic] …”
As for your second comment, take that up with the Daily Caller. Misquoting sources here is misinformation of the worst sort.
Ric, I’m in complete agreement with that statement. I should have appended my second recommended correction with “/sarc” since that intention, in hindsight, was apparently not evident.
My apologies.
Pretty sure that all of the boats those lobstermen, fishermen, and pleasure boaters use are also made of fiberglass. Apparently the irony of that fact escaped the notice of the complainers and those who applauded them.
Fiberglass isn’t toxic once it cures (which all fiberglass used in any industrial product or consumer product is).
As to having a cow over some pieces of fiberglass washing ashore after a failure, Nantucket is the site of something like 800 shipwrecks. Debris washing ashore pretty much happens with every shipwreck. And that doesn’t include the hundreds, perhaps thousands of sunken or damaged small fishing craft or pleasure craft that have resulted in debris washing ashore.
Frankly, pieces of fiberglass are vastly less toxic and polluting to the environment than a single small powered boat going down or catching fire, due to all the hydrocarbons and other pollutants released into the water.
I get it that the people there in that community object to the offshore wind farm, as do most of the readers here at WUWT, but this is just hyperbolic NIMBYism that you get every time anything new is built in or near any existing community, whether a wind turbine, building, park, gas station, etc. etc.
Sure, shipwrecks happen. But the public hasn’t been informed just how flimsy these wind turbines are. Really big storms hit this coastline. It’s possible that a number of wind turbines could all fail at the same time. It’s not just about the mess on coast- but also about a failure of electric power. I had a big outage here in central Wokeachusetts for almost 24 hours last week. And had another, shorter one about 3 weeks ago. Hardly have any before these for many years. I attribute the failure due to insufficient maintenance since the power companies are too busy and focused on “the transition”.
Wind turbine failure as an environmental pollution event is simply non-existent. If you want to ban wind turbines because they can fail, then you have to ban our entire energy production, distribution, and consumption infrastucture. Hydrocarbons, nuclear, hydropower, geothermal power, all of it, every bit of it. Which of course would be ridiculous.
I worked for years in the Permian Basin, and oil and gas production infrastructure there failed all the time, oftentimes producing massive pollution events, costly infrastructure damage, worker injuries, and even fatalities. And that’s just one part of the hydrocarbon cycle. Refineries catch fire, spring leaks, get damaged in hurricanes and tornadoes. Pipelines burst and spill massive amounts of pollutants into the environment. Tanker trucks get in accidents and shut down freeways for hours at a time, oftentimes causing fatalities. Ditto with oil tankers getting involved in groundings or accidents … and whenever that happens the environmental damage is monstrous. But that’s the cost of having this very useful and convenient source of energy. We collectively accept that risk.
There are valid reasons to oppose windfarm expansion, but “pollution” and “failure” are not part of those reasons.
If we’re heavily subsidizing it- we have a right to complain because we’ll have to pay for the fixes.
“Wind turbine failure as an environmental pollution event is simply non-existent.”
why did they close the beaches? Was it just to hype the ‘non-problem’?
You’re pretending to be oilfield. You’re not. Get lost.
“pollution” and “failure” are not part of those reasons.
Now you are talking arrant gibberish.
There are a large number cases of massive pollution from wind turbine failure.
Of course a failure of the type shown below to an off-shore turbine, doesn’t matter to the “environmentalists”
Word games. Failures of useful energy sources is different from failures of useless energy garbage like offshore wind. There is no upside
that is difference.
It is estimated to cost $US200 trillion to stop warming by 2050.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-07-05/-200-trillion-is-needed-to-stop-global-warming-that-s-a-bargain
Figuring there are 2 billion households in the world and ninety percent can’t afford anything additional, so the 200 million that can pay will have to pay.
That means $1 million per household in developed countries.
Most if not almost all households would rather have an extra million in the bank and a degree or two of warming.
And IT WON’T BE A DEGREE OR TWO of warming. It is so small that it is impossible to measure.
I’ll keep my million, thanks.
A trawler can easily be sunk if its nets catch a large chunk of blade beneath the surface.
As one who has worked with fibreglass, fragments are as sharp as glass and can inflict nasty damage.
Historically fiberglass has been very flammable and they call it fiberglass for a reason. We did this wind experiment on a much smaller scale half a century ago and found out that it had limited use. Of course, it has been long known what happens when the wind dies and about the forces of the ocean.
As for the toxicity of hydrocarbons you need to do some homework. Messy yes and does cause problems but we are more scared of it than it deserves.
No. It’s fiber, not fire.
After seeing Holborn Viaduct power station, I don’t think coal powerplants can really be improved…
“I don’t think coal powerplants can really be improved…”
Again your juvenile ignorance drips from every comment you make.
Modern coal fired power stations are a far cry from the 1880s.
And wind power half a century ago is also a far cry from modern ones.
No actually, It is still totally dependant on the weather.
It is still highly erratic, and if you want usable electricity 24/7, then you need 100% back-up by something reliable.
Of course is you want to only have electricity when there is enough wind blowing.. It’s great.
But most people want 24/7 electricity….. don’t you?
“No. It’s fiber, not fire.”
What does that even mean !
Totally meaningless gibberish.
It’s called “fiberglass” because it is made of up fiber reinforcement (typically a woven fabric) and a glass like binder. Fiberglass is THE boat making material of choice for the last 70 years, boats of all kinds. If you have a problem with fiberglass, then you have a problem with boats.
Fiberglass will not burn, it is not “flammable”, which is defined as having a flash point of less than 100 deg F (generally only applies to liquids and gases or vapors). Fiberglass will melt in the face of extreme high temperatures (above 1,000 deg F). Wood, which was the primary boat making material until fiberglass came along, burns at anything over 700 deg F.
Of course, pretty much the only thing that would cause fiberglass to melt would be .. ummm … a hydrocarbon fuel fire. And whatever doesn’t burn up ends up in the water when that happens. And THAT is a pollution problem.
Fibreglass boat hulls largely stay intact except in the most extreme of circumstances. I’d imagine that turbine blades are not ‘fibreglass’ but carbon fibre, you have to be very careful with carbon fibre as it is incredibly sharp.
Your ignorance is showing. Fiberglass consist of a fabric made with fine strands of glass and bound with an epoxy like resin. The process involves first applying a release agent to the form to reduce sticking. Apply the paint next if used. Lay down the glass mat then cover everything with the resin. My father was doing this in the 60s and I hated being around it because fibers from the glass mat make you itchy. If they needed a light weight structure, they would use a paper honey comb coated with the resin sandwiched between fiberglass mats. Very strong and light weight unless you used it for a corvette body and the car was in an accident.
The resin will burn but it would produce some nasty emissions so it’s difficult to get rid of old fiberglass.
“Pretty sure that all of the boats those lobstermen, fishermen, and pleasure boaters use are also made of fiberglass”
There are two types of resin used in fiberglass construction. The common cheap type
is polyester and the better is epoxy. The amount of hardener used to the poly is
a couple of oz per gallon and the epoxy is a 50-50 mixture. The epoxy is what is used
on an offshore racing type boat and the poly is what is used for say a commercial speed
boat. I wonder what type of resin is used in the turbine blades, I’d say it’s the cheap stuff.
All the lobster craft I watched leaving port at Memensha were all heavy duty metal
with diesel inboards. Those guys don’t mess around..
I saw a piece about some geoengineering project in that area the morning===>
https://www.mvtimes.com/2024/07/18/climate-change-lye-possible-solution-near-vineyard/
I have some connections on the Vineyard and I’ll have to send a text later this week
and see what the story is..
Metal boat hulls and other fittings can also fail, just as can fiberglass. Like fiberglass, metal doesn’t burn, but it will melt at high enough temperatures. Virtually all pleasure boats for the last 70 years have been made of fiberglass. I don’t recall anyone claiming that the fiberglass itself can be a pollutant. Abandoned boats can present a problem – we had a lot of those here in SW Florida as a result of Hurricane Ian. But not because fiberglass itself is a problem
I’m a yachtsman of +60 years, fibreglass only became prevalent in the 70s and its technology was crap. A fg hull back then was a 10 year proposition as the flexing through poor resins and workmanship caused the material to absorb water and lose rigidity. Nowadays carbon fibre prevails.
Yes, but, these are really special people. Really you must see that. These people cannot be expected to be inconvenienced in the fight to Save the Planet, although they all would swear out loud that is a terribly important goal.
Something new that is intermittent, toxic, diffuse, useless, and enriches billionaires is not hyperbolic NIMBYism. Go troll somewhere else.
Thing is, sharp segments are being washed ashore.
Large, very sharp resin shards, bands of fiberglass with sharp edges.
The fabrication looks very shoddy and the resin work poor
Also some of the pieces being washed ashore a large enough to need a front-end-loader to move them.
Who knows how many smaller pieces of sharp fiberglass and resin crap are there waiting to claim people’s feet !
Fibreglass can cause long term effects. That is why they have a new gel coat applied periodically. Having broken up the fibres are freed.
The fact that fiberglass has no toxicity due to chemicals used in its formation into shape may be true. As far as inhaling or consuming broken fiberglass pieces, I’ve not found any information as to its chemical toxicity.
I do know that broken fiberglass shards can be extremely sharp. The fiberglass cloth mixed with resin is inflexible where a break occurs and can cut and penetrate. I would expect that is the main danger to water denizens. Fish, whales, lobsters, etc. swallowing these sharp shreds could easily suffer penetrating wounds in the digestive track.
These small shards from turbine blades will wash ashore and are a puncture danger to beach goers. Cleanup to remove these dangers from beach sand will be difficult.
Let me add that fiberglass boats that sink are seldom fractured into small shards dangerous to creatures in the ocean. If they capsize, debris from on board the boats will be what washes ashore, not fiberglass shards.
Hi, I claim no expertise on these matters but I note that you refer to “fiberglass”. I understand that the *core* of these (350 foot) turbine blades is PVC foam. Do you understand that PVC foam in the ocean is also no problem?
Which will be larger, electrical output or ecological destruction? It seems the Net-Zero push is all about public funds paying private elites to destroy nature.
with the full support of the enviro groups!
Probably funded by those hoping to make trillions in profit from “climate change” spending.
In Wokeachusetts, the state has stepped up buying more land for “permanent protection”. They tie this is with their fight to “save the planet” with net zero and other such energy plans- so the enviro groups are thrilled to get more land locked up- so they play along with the climate thing. So there’s now a huge land battle going on here. There’s a push for more solar “farms”- and a push to lock up land for conservation- and a push to build more housing, partly due to a flood of illegals. There just isn’t enough land- a tiny state with 8 M people.
All getting to clip the subsidy ticket on the way through.
Yes it made a mess, but the hazardous nature of the plastic and glass is being somewhat exaggerated, and it’s easily picked up.
The oceans are already full of smashed up plastic and fibreglass.
Obviously the raw resin and hardener are rather unpleasant, but once set that no longer applies, so a silly point.
Nevertheless, it should be remembered that offshore wind turbine blades wear considerably during their lifetime and are constantly shedding microplastic particles into the environment, which the greens themselves are always making hysterical claims about, when it’s from any other source.
They closed the beaches because of sharp shards from the blade. I don’t think that’s the same as a plastic water bottle and the microplastics the bottle sheds. If you haven’t been to the site, you shouldn’t make statements about how easy it is to clean up.
After a week being tossed around in the ocean they won’t be sharp any more.
Again, false alarm.
WRONG!
Large sharp shards and ribbons have been washing up.
And who knows how much smaller sharp resin and glass shards not attached to large foam pieces there is.
Feel free to go walking barefoot on that beach, any time you want.
There’s 100% more chance of cutting your foot on one of those shards than there is of all the windmills and solar panels doing anything for the climate. Dumbsh1t.
In California the beach sand shifts with every wave, covering and uncovering debris all the time. Finding all the fiberglass will require more than walking the beach and picking up pieces – it will require raking – if they do a careful job.
If not, getting your feet cut up is just part of the beach experience. Normally those cuts come from rocks that are mostly submerged. Nantucket has just added additional hazard.
It doesn’t represent any significant risk.
It doesn’t need to be cleared up, other than aesthetics. If it gets buried it’s no problem is it. The ocean can smooth glass fibres in no time at all. Most of the glass fibres will be encased. Any loose ones won’t slice feet open, that’s just ridiculous. Most of it was in big sections attached to bright coloured internal forming foam. Buoyant and highly visible.
As shown above, with sharp bits of resin and fibreglass attached.
And those are the big bits you can easily see.
Bound to be other smaller shards everywhere.
Dare you to go swimming and walking barefoot, only a complete idiot would think that was safe.
Not every day I hear that we might as well dump some more smashed up plastic in the ocean.
The earlier post, https://wattsupwiththat.com/2024/07/17/vineyard-wind-turbine-failure-incident-details-regulatory-response-and-industry-implications/ is far more useful than this one.
The articles in the Nantucket Current are much better than this one and far more informative than this quote:
And that does not fairly quote the speaker in the X video. Sigh.
Sorry, but I don’t think this Daily Caller article deserves to be a WUWT post.
Once it was the Nantucket sleigh ride now it’s the Nantucket blade ride – with added fibreglass
Hey, Nantucket –
You. Voted. For. This.
O/T. Gimme the money
Sadiq Khan is now demanding a jaw-dropping £25 billion from the new Labour government to cover the promises he made to secure his re-election.
Neil Garratt AM slammed his calls:
https://order-order.com/
Making uncosted promises to the electorate is easy. Actually implementing them is extremely difficult. The Labour Party under Starmer is now discovering that there is no Magical Money Tree in Britain.
According to the MMT idiots, they can print all the £s they want.
Yes like our home grown idiot in the USA, Occasional Cortex. Complete with an ECONOMICS DEGREE that illustrates how the “university” that awarded it should be stripped of its accreditation.
The “education” being offered at today’s “universities” is clearly becoming as worthless as “green energy.”
Make an omelet, break some eggs. Build an offshore wind farm, destroy the environment. It’s all progress, innit?
Looks like NIMBY’s going to get a new lease on life.
Very nice Owen. Wind and solar are not a substitute for fossil fuel and nuclear. Fire up all fossil fuel and nuclear generators. Build new fossil fuel and nuclear generators. Remove all wind and solar from the grid. Maintain the grid.
Nantucket folks talking to a bunch of suits of their own-
Nantucket town looks to sue energy company after turbine mishap had chunks of windmills washing up on beaches (msn.com)
Shocked they are…shocked I tell you! Just like they were with sleepy Joe.
I find fiberglass debris the worst part of the decommisioning and repowering processes of onshore windfarms too. It is also an issue when there is an accident. The cheapest way to bring abandoned turbines down is blasting. Fiberglass parts not removed prior to blasting shatter upon hitting the ground. Then the blades are chopped up with saws. I have no idea if there is any attempt to mitigate the fiberglass debris all this causes. I do know that the budgets for decommissioning, which lead to bonding to guarantee it, are far too small to do a clean job and an application may in fact say explicitly that blasting is intended.
Should all turbine blades made at the same time from the same facility be qa’ed properly?