It was a rare moment in Congress this week when a purely political maneuver to halt the wind farm off Cape Cod was stopped.
This was a bipartisan power play involving Democratic Sen. Edward M. Kennedy and Republican Governor Mitt Romney. The plan, included in a Coast Guard appropriation bill and never discussed in public - as befits such back-door dealing - would have given the governor veto power over a wind farm. And Romney would have used it.
But powerful senators from the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee were joined last month by the Bush administration in opposing the move, on grounds it would likely stall future alternative energy projects. They were right, and this week a compromise emerged, giving the Coast Guard the final word on offshore wind turbines and their effect on navigation.
The Cape Wind project in Nantucket Sound, which envisions 130 wind turbines, is the most controversial wind farm under consideration, in large part because of the firepower of the opposition. However, for five years, the proposal has passed each governmental review it’s been subjected to.
Read the rest of today's Patriot Ledger Editorial here, and comment below.