The Maryland Public Service Commission on Thursday approved a request from a power company to build Ocean City wind turbines that are more than 200 feet higher than originally allowed.
The Maryland Public Service Commission on Thursday approved a request from a power company to build Ocean City wind turbines that are more than 200 feet higher than originally allowed.
The decision came after Ocean City officials, including Mayor Rick Meehan, testified that the new, larger turbine design chosen by Skipjack Offshore Energy for the wind projects would destroy the views of the beach horizon, and thus the affect important tourist sector of the city.
She added that the new turbines, three times taller than the tallest building in Ocean City, would navigate airborne hazard requirements, which the previous turbines did not have, and argued that values of properties on the beach would be adversely affected.
City officials wanted the commission to order Skipjack to move the turbines 33 miles offshore, citing a wind farm development off Long Island, New York, that is so far out, and therefore out of sight.
Skipjack claimed that the higher turbines would actually help the view, because they are more efficient and thus can allow them to build less than originally planned, and place them further in the water – between 21.5 and 22.7 miles out, in contrast to the original 19.5.
They also said that the argument that they have to build so far to be invisible from the coast would require them to change the approved parameters where they have been working since 2017, and would fall outside the area they were given to participate in. work.
The commission sat down with Skipjack, adding that the agreement with the energy company never specified a particular turbine. The plan originally submitted with the application in 2016 uses the most technologically advanced turbine at the moment, the commission said in its decision, and since then the modern model has changed.
The new turbines will be 492 feet long at the hub, up from 374 feet of the previously approved turbine; the diameter of the rotor will be 721 feet, up from 590, and the height of the tip will grow to 853 feet, up from 641.
The commission said the new turbines would mean 12 or fewer turbines would be built, down from the previous 15.
Meehan also claimed that although the company told the commission about the new turbines in June 2019, Ocean City officials had not heard from Skipjack for nearly six months before the new turbine design was unveiled at a public hearing in January.
The commission ordered Skipjack to stay in better contact with the city about its plans.
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