Off-Shore Oil and Wind

Hello Reader,

This week I turned in my last piece of non-dissertation coursework, so I thought that it might be a good time for some guilt-free blog writing time. In order to keep up with some news-worthy issues, I thought I would point to two articles from last week. The first article discusses recent a step forward in the approval process for the Cape Cod off-shore wind farm and some of the public backlash that has accompanied the news. The second article announced that Florida Governor Crist has removed his support from off-shore oil drilling projects after witnessing the devastation caused by the recent BP off-shore oil volcano. The juxtaposition of these two articles makes me wonder which is the better off-shore option: oil drilling or wind farms.

Given the recent awareness raising that the BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico has been able to offer as an argument against off-shore drilling, it seems hard to believe that there will be much public support remaining by the time this catastrophe plays out. At the very least, it seems likely that new and current drilling projects will be under much closer scrutiny regarding their safety procedures and "fail-safe" devises. After this disaster it seems reasonable to say that if off-shore drilling projects are going to continue, additional safety measures will have to be part of the minimum price of doing business.

The next question in this discussion has to be what are the concerns surrounding off-shore wind farms. It seems that the primary concern for any wind turbine project, which is echoed in the first article, is the aesthetic interference with the natural landscape. In the article, one of the more ethically credible of those arguments is that of the "coastal Wampanoag tribe, which requires unobstructed views of the sunrise for sacred ceremonies". (As a note, I consider this more ethically credible than financially-based arguments such as the detriment to tourism.) It seems reasonable that wind farm projects should try to avoid impinging upon religious ceremonies. However, I would like to question where the ethical balance lies. The main group of protesters seem to be pointing to non-religious arguments. In my mind, this raises the question: Is it ethical to refuse environmentally non-threatening energy from wind turbines, but live a lifestyle that demands the consumption of fossil fuels?

This is an especially interesting question when you consider that the protesters must (or at least should) have some idea of the damage that is caused by the extraction, transportation, and use of those fuels. Whether it is the damage associated with the essentially inevitable oil spills, the death of coal miners, the removal of mountain tops, or the indirect damage caused by emissions, leading a fossil fuel based lifestyle results in tangible damages to the environment and human lives. Admittedly, it is unlikely that all of these damages can be avoided in every case. Furthermore, I understand that even believing and understanding the damages caused by such a lifestyle does not mean that individuals can change their lifestyles alone. However, in a case such as the Cape Wind project where an obvious solution has been presented, is it ethical to protest and obstruct the process beyond ensuring that due diligence has been pursued?

Along the same lines, I have to question if forced to make the choice, whether Cape Wind protesters would choose to have an oil rig 40 miles off their coast or a wind farm a few miles off their coast. While it is unlikely that the protesters will ever have to make that decision, it raises another interesting ethical notion. That is, by refusing the wind farm, protesters are making a commitment to use other energy sources (assuming that they are not planning on going off the grid), which invariably means that the environment will need to be damaged off some other coast or mountain range. That does not seem fair when they have a different option.

Thus, when it comes down to a choice between the tangible damages caused by off-shore oil and the artificial damages caused by off-shore wind, I assert that off-shore wind is the ethically superior choice. Thank you for your time.

Sean Diamond