NJ Republicans want wind farm construction halted for 60 days amid surge in whale deaths
New Jersey Republicans want wind farm construction off the Garden State’s coast halted for up to two months, citing concerns over growing numbers of whale deaths.
GOP lawmakers said during a Wednesday hearing that the state should stop efforts to build offshore wind turbines and track whether the number of whale deaths decreases during that time.
“We heard from experts yesterday how the surge in whale deaths in recent months along the Jersey Shore coincided with the start of wind farm survey work in our waters,” Sen. Michael Testa (R-Cape May) told The Post.
“We also heard how the ‘unusual mortality event’ that NOAA [National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration] has been tracking along the East Coast since 2016 has coincided with work on the wind farms off the coast of Rhode Island. There certainly seems to be enough evidence to warrant a pause in the wind farm development to conduct a more thorough investigation.”
At least 32 deceased whales have washed up on the East Coast since December, according to the NOAA, though the agency has denied the deaths are attributable to the growth of wind farms offshore.
However, Trisha DeVoe, a conservation biologist who appeared as a witness Wednesday, countered: “You can’t find evidence if you don’t look for it.”
Seven dead humpback whales have floated onto beaches in New Jersey since the start of this year — the highest number of any state between Florida and Maine.
The agency often declares such incidents an “unexplained mortality event,” while also noting that some deaths are caused by boat strikes. Construction of wind farms increases the number of ships passing through whale habitats.
Wind farm developers also can’t be held liable for injuring or killing whales as long as they observe mitigation protocols and reporting procedures.
The uptick in whale deaths has alarmed activists, who have pressed New Jersey lawmakers to allow time for an investigation. Republican senators at yesterday’s hearing have urged for a 30-to-60 day review.
Tax incentives in President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act spurred the immense development on the coast, where more than 3,000 wind turbines and roughly 10,000 miles of cable will be put in place, ProPublica reported.
But Cindy Zipf, executive director of Clean Ocean Action, told lawmakers at the hearing that construction had “gone too far, too fast.”
“We’re only beginning with the pre-construction now, and already, we’ve started seeing whales dying and washing up on our beaches.”
In January, her organization called out the Biden administration and officials in New York and New Jersey for ignoring the crisis, citing an “alarming” surge in marine fatalities.
Conservative groups also ran ads on the Jersey Shore to coincide with Earth Day that drew attention to the surge in whale deaths.
New Jersey Democrats last week held a similar hearing but attributed the death of whales to climate change rather than offshore wind development. In February, the Democrat-controlled state Senate even blocked an earlier attempt at a 30-day moratorium for wind farm development.
“The hypocrisy of Democrat leaders and organizations like Greenpeace and the Sierra Club who believe in green energy at any cost and are willing to turn a blind eye is shocking,” Testa told The Post. “If similar numbers of whales were dying due to exploration for offshore drilling, they would be surrounding whale carcasses, holding hands, tears streaming down their face, singing Kumbaya.”
As the hearing proceeded Wednesday, state Senate President Steve Sweeney (D-Gloucester and Cumberland) held a competing event to highlight the economic benefits of wind farms.
Other witnesses, however, noted that the development is destroying the commercial fishing industry.
“Offshore wind is the single greatest existential threat to commercial fishing in the United States right now,” said Meghan Lapp, a representative for the Rhode Island-based seafood company Seafreeze.
Jim Hutchinson, who attended Wednesday’s hearing and is the managing editor of The Fisherman, said he had “been labeled a climate change denier and a tin-foil hat wearer” for voicing his concern about the effects of wind turbine development on recreational fishing as well.
“We’re defamed, denied, discarded and disparaged at every step along the way,” he added.
Jerry Leeman, a commercial fishing captain and executive director of the New England Fishermen Stewardship Association, told The Post the work is also harming fish.
“Turbines and survey work block our access to productive fishing grounds — we just can’t work around them,” he said. “And studies show HVAC cables running inland from offshore turbines are a dire threat to species like haddock, a big piece of our business.”
Trenton Republicans introduced a bill proposing a blanket moratorium on all wind farm development in March.
A spokeswoman for Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-NJ) said the congressman supports the New Jersey Republicans for pushing for the wind development moratorium.
Van Drew, who switched his party affiliation from Democrat to Republican in 2019, has also introduced federal legislation to halt East Coast wind turbine construction.
