Vineyard Wind tests on-off light for wind turbines: Nantucket responds

Vineyard Wind is testing devices on some offshore turbines this week to resolve nighttime lighting concerns that have frustrated Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard residents for months.

Nantucket Select Board Chairwoman Brooke Mohr said Vineyard Wind planned to activate switches on 12 turbines and to use a helicopter to ensure the technology is in working order. The switches, known together as an aircraft detection lighting system, are meant to turn on safety lights atop wind turbines when aircraft are approaching, and turn them off when they've passed.

After the initial tests, the switches will be expanded to other turbines. When announcing the plans at the board's Feb. 19 meeting, Mohr reported that the company expects to install more during March so that all 24 turbines that have been installed have the devices.

"And I was told that every new turbine will have the ADLS come on when it’s commissioned, so as they’re building new turbines they will have the ADLS functioning," Mohr said.

The lights on the installed turbines have been a point of contention for islanders for more than a year. While the effort to get the lighting system working marks progress, local leaders are frustrated that the problem was not resolved sooner. The system was part of the 2020 Good Neighbor Agreement, which promised to reduce the visibility of the turbines at night by employing an ALDS.

In reality, Mohr said by email on Thursday, "the lights have been on 24/7 since the first turbine was installed." That first turbine was completed in October 2023.

Selectwoman Dawn Holdgate took Vineyard Wind to task at the Feb. 19 board meeting, saying, "we as a board and the community at large even more vehemently really feel misled by the representations that were given back in 2020."

"The visual simulations that we were given were not accurate," she said and "the promises on the lighting" not forthcoming. "They’ve been fully lit for quite a long time now. That never should have happened.”

Now, "there is a big outcry for us to exit the Good Neighbor agreement. We have not at this point been advised that that will actually help us," she said. "We continue to discuss this in executive session what our options are."

State Sen. Julian Cyr, D-Provincetown, and Rep. Thomas Moakley, D-Falmouth, who were both present at the Nantucket Select Board meeting on Feb. 19, said they understand and share the frustrations.

"We want to be a resource to make sure that those who signed the Good Neighbor Agreement are actually a good neighbor to the island,” said Moakley.

"I think folks are right to be quite upset," Cyr added. "I can’t believe these lights are still on. This is the most simple, relatively simple, technology that should be implemented."

Vineyard Wind did not respond Thursday, Feb. 27, to a request for a statement or an update about plans for the ADLS as the Vineyard Wind project moves forward.

The ADLS uses primary horizontal and vertical radar to detect approaching aircraft within a 3-mile horizontal range and up to 1,000 feet vertically above the turbines. According to Federal Aviation Administration flight data, fewer than 50 flights per year are expected to interact with Vineyard Wind's ADLS airspace. Vineyard Wind has calculated that the lighting "would likely be triggered only a few times a month, resulting in less than five hours of lighting per year, assuming normal flight patterns and weather conditions."

“Based on FAA flight data, the typical aircraft likely to interact with the ADLS is a fixed-wing, single-engine aircraft traveling at typical flight speeds,” according to the Vineyard Wind website. “Under clear conditions, the lighting will likely only be triggered for short periods, especially when weather conditions such as fog, haze, and clouds reduce visibility.”

A real-time simulation video shows the safety lights coming on as an aircraft approaches and staying on for about six minutes.

Mohr said in her Thursday email that the simulation of the lights at night "is not accurate to our experience because the ADLS system had not been activated."

"It remains to be seen what it will look like when that has happened on all the turbines," she said.

Meanwhile, Vineyard Wind continues to remove defective turbine blades that were produced at its manufacturing facility in Gaspe, Canada. One blade failed last summer, sending tons of debris into the ocean and washing up on shores around the region.

Vineyard Wind was ordered by the federal government to remove 66 previously installed blades. So far, Mohr reported, four sets have been removed.

"They’ve removed four complete sets to date, and they are expecting to have a new vessel that can transport five sets of blades at a time that will be dedicated to blade removal," so removal of the blades "should move forward faster," she said.

The work is "all weather dependent" and the company is awaiting delivery of the new vessel, so there are "no concrete timelines," she said, "but this is new progress that just got reported to me."

Out of the 24 turbines currently installed, two have blades from France that are deemed sound and were not ordered for removal.

Heather McCarron writes about climate change, environment, energy, science and the natural world, in addition to news and features in Barnstable and Brewster. Reach her at [email protected].

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