3 Wind Farms Proposed for Jersey Shore

This offshore wind farm is near Copenhagen.

Photo: Wikimedia Commons

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The New Jersey Shore, where people from New York City, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and elsewhere go to vacation in the summertime, could be in for some changes.

Three entities filed proposals with the state seeking to build wind farms offshore of Cape May or Atlantic counties, the two southernmost coastal counties, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Wind farms of this kind have been hugely controversial in Massachusetts, where some rich and powerful landowners have objected to the prospect of tiny scars of Cape Wind on the blue horizon as seen from Cape Cod.

Besides any concerns about scenery, the developers would have to convince biologists that their turbines won't harm migrating birds. The Atlantic coast is a major flyway, and Cape May a major spot for counting migratory birds and butterflies.

In either of the three cases, dozens of turbines would be built in federal waters more than three miles offshore, so they would be barely visible on the horizon on clear days.

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