Save Long Beach Island Coalition Responds to Federal Agency Decision Approving the Atlantic Shores South Offshore Wind Project
July 3, 2024 – Save Long Beach Island, the coalition of citizens dedicated to protecting our oceans and New Jersey Shore communities, today denounced a federal agency’s decision to approve the Atlantic Shores South project as misguided and vowed to continue its fight against the destructive impact of placing hundreds of wind turbines in the ocean in close proximity to Long Beach Island (LBI) and other
shore communities.
“The project approved yesterday by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) for the construction of up to 195 Wind Turbine Generators and up to 10 Offshore Substations’ off the southern coast of New Jersey is an aberration, no other country in the world is considering a wind turbine project of this turbine size and number within 9 miles off their coastline,” said Bob Stern, president and founder
of Save LBI. ”The project violates a number of statutes and must be stopped, which is why we are challenging it in court. We have one lawsuit pending and will be pursuing at least seven other avenues of legal intervention”.
The Atlantic Shores South project will be destructive on numerous levels, and even BOEM admits in its environmental impact statement that it would have a “negligible” impact on climate change. As an intermittent source of energy, It will not , by itself, power a single home in New Jersey throughout the year.
Destructive impacts of the Atlantic Shores South project include, but are by no means limited to, the following:
- The shore experience from Long Beach Island and nearby coastal communities will be irrevocably destroyed on several levels. 1) Highly visible, haphazard rows of spinning wind turbines will forever decimate the natural beauty of the horizon. In its construction and operating plan, Atlantic Shores describes the field of turbines as “creating an increased sense of visual clutter and ultimately negatively impacting the quality of the view.” 2) The disorienting effect of hundreds of rotating blades will compel people to look the other way. 3) Airborne noise from the thunderous impact of pile driving during construction as well as operation of the turbines will be audible at the shore. 4) The field of turbines will extract wind energy, resulting in a significant reduction in the natural shore breeze.
- Degradation of the shore experience will be permanent because once those turbines are embedded in the ocean floor, removal is not practical.
- The taxpayer-subsidized project will also require significantly increased electric bills statewide, but does virtually nothing to mitigate sea level rise or climate change. It will not reduce future sea level rise at all, only delay whatever is coming by about one week.
- It will create some temporary higher paying jobs at the expense of thousands of lower paying jobs in the tourism sector. Considering its multibillion capital investment, any other air-quality benefits are miniscule.
- The Atlantic Shores South project and the Atlantic Shores North project (currently under review) are both situated within and adjacent to a major migration corridor of the critically endangered North Atlantic right whale. Underwater noise from these large turbines will seriously impede and potentially block the whales’ essential migration.
- The combined effect of this project and other planned offshore wind projects farther out will force East Coast commercial, military, and fishing vessel traffic into a narrow 11-mile-wide corridor, creating safety concerns for both the vessels and the whales that will try to migrate through that same corridor.
- The turbine field will interfere with and degrade onshore military air radar that looks out to sea for unwanted aircraft.
“This is a project in search of a purpose. The Atlantic Shores South project is sheer folly, predicated only on clean and green slogans,” Stern said. “The agency has never seriously considered any alternative to it, but fortunately we do have laws that discourage such arbitrary agency action”.
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Contact: Bob Stern, President
Organization: Save Long Beach Island, Inc.
Email: info@savelbi.org
Phone: 917-952-5016
About Save LBI
Save Long Beach Island (Save LBI) is a coalition of citizens working together to protect the ocean and Long Beach Island and neighboring communities from the destructive impact of offshore wind projects. We are a not-for-profit, non-partisan organization and do not endorse any candidates or politicians, but we do aggressively pursue programs, policies, and actions to protect the Island and surrounding
communities. The coalition is led by Beach Haven resident Dr. Bob Stern, an engineer with experience in environmental law who previously managed the office in the U.S. Department of Energy that oversees the protection of the environment as it relates to energy programs and projects. Visit www.SaveLBI.org to see our fact-based research and find out how you can help.
