Monhegan and the Ivory Windtower

Monhegan and the Ivory Windtower
http://www.workingwaterfront.com/online-exclusives/Site-off-Monhegan-picked-for-UMaine-offshore-wind-testing/13590/

Working Water Front, the Rockland-based tabloid of coastal Maine science, fish and sociology has just published an article on the state's at-last pick of waters off Monhegan Island  to host a UMaine-led offshore wind test project.

University officials say they seek to install one 100-kilowatt turbine and one 10-killowatt turbine at this site,  the WW reports.   The site is located less than two miles south of Monhegan's Lobster Cove. Click here to see map of Monhegan test site.

Haibib Dagher of U Maine Advanced Structures and Composites Cente, is is longtime advocate for Maine to be the site of future R&D of deepwater offshore wind facilities. He has equated the Gulf of Maine’s wind capacity to that of Saudi Arabia for oil production. (as have the boosters of wind in nearly every other state of the union, though this may be the first Saudi Arabia-comparison of an American territorial waters to a desert land.

Dagher gave testimony last summer about wind energy in front of Congress stating that Maine has the potential to produce about 130 gigawatts of power in deep water — 60 to 900 meters deep — within 50 nautical miles of the coast.

Maine's Sea Wind Liberation bill: final action Monday

It has been positively Prufrockian in Maine's capital city if you care about the Wild Wind.

LD 1810 is a  bill offering the Dawn State the opportunity to lead America either into a confused beach head of fractured local economics and social unrest, or else divert the ocean wind farm wannabes further offshore.  That depends on whether on Monday April 5th the Maine Legislature finally  denies Maine's territorial tidal waters to intrusive, over-subsidized wind turbo farms like those set up on peaks and ridges of the Maine Woods.


Many more are planned  by  an alliance of utility investment groups, & high end compromise-prone state & New England eco-yuppy outfits, milking trickle-down gold from the Wind Giants. 


Then on March 24, 2010 this  ENGO/corporate hydra had its many heads handed to itselves,  for trying to wade out onto Maine's territorial sea mounts and ledges with similar "dumb growth" designs as they'd foisted on up lands.


The plan to infest Maine state  waters with  bladed towers has been left:

 "spread out against the sky / like a patient etherized upon a table.'   

 Yet similarly, final action on historic Wind Liberation legislation  too, continues to crawl glacially  toward the finish line. This time the final vote has been delayed to Monday - the very last day of the 2010 legislative session. And what amazing changes  the bill has gone through in the month since it first appeared! 

 An Act To Implement the Recommendations of the Governor's Ocean Energy Task Force" came out of that task force ready to force open every square mile of Maine state waters to industrial scale ocean windfarming.  But from the would-be invasion's beginning on March 11th,  Maine's two give-no-ground lobstermens associations held firm, letting wave after wave of windvaders, blades glittering above their briefcased ranks like sarissas, break futilely against their Ancient  Rights.   

But even granite becomes sand under repeated waves. At a major engagement  on March 18th,  Maine's lobstermen's 1st Legion, the MLA, was, to their everlasting ignominy, on the verge of giving up ground,  when a wild charge roaring in on shrimper, scalloper and groundfish boats savaged the invaders'  initiative, driving the windbaggers back mile after mile with their furious onset!  

Completely out of Maine state waters! Then, on March 23rd, as the Windies tried to reform, across the Line in federal waters, they were shocked to find Maine's oceanic cavalry  pouring from Bar Harbor  and other coastal towns in  coordinated small group forays through the three mile gate after them. This would be no Gettysburg, with the southern invaders again allowed to escape after their crushing defeat....

But escape they did, after being chased ten miles from shore, and vanishing, tails tucked,  into venture capital warrens - where no sensible fishermen goes.

Magnanimous in victory, Maine's fishing industry's terms were merciful: a ten mile no-windfarms buffer stretching out from Maine's shore, beyond which the Windies could practise their extraction industry - as long as (1)  the University of Maine held a controlling interest in those operations and not Wall Street, and (2) Maine electricity users had optional first dibs on the juice coming ashore in Maine from those offshore operations. 

Permission, too, was granted to test prototype offshore floating windsnatcher technology at  three tiny border sites off Midcoast Maine, to the relief of Bath Iron Works and Prock Marine, which would build the experimental wind-gathering machines, and even the mighty offshore behemoths that would be taken  by the University of Maine deep into the Gulf over the horizon.

Treaty terms made, it is up to the maine legislature and the Governor to ratify them. Bureaucratic dawdling has delayed the final signing of the agreement  by Govenor Baldacci, but  Monday is the final day of the legislative session, and already, witnesses have "heard the mermaids singing, each to each" and the governor grumbles "I do not think that they will sing to me."

* Quotes from "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock." by T.S. Eliot

No windfarms to be allowed in Maine state waters, state legislative committee decides

Augusta.  There will be no windfarms in Maine state waters, a state legislative committee has decided. By unanimous vote, the Legislature's Utilities and Energy Committee sent a final version of LD 1810."An Act To Implement the Recommendations of the Governor's Ocean Energy Task Force", to the full legislature, where passage is deemed likely.

Maine will be the first state in the Union to ban windmills from its coastal waters. Listen to the March 24th final Work session on the bill The decision to keep state waters free of windfarming came as a result of pressure by members of Maine's commercial fishing industry,including  lobstermen, groundfishermen, shrimpers and scallopers, who intensive ply their trade in every square mile of Maine's marine waters. See a petition about LD 1810 submitted by Bar Harbor fishermen

The 40 and 50 year windfarm leases that would have been offered  under the earlier form of LD 1810  would have, due to wind farm insurance policies, barred groundfishing and scalloping and other fishing. This would be "closing the commons" of Maine's Territorial Sea that the fishermen share with windjammers recreational fishers and other water users. The Committee also heard from the coastal resort industry, which similarly feared loss of business if windmills began flapping near the shore in Maine state waters

While the  radically altered bill bars windfarms from state waters, it promotes their development a minimum of ten miles from shore, including from the shore of any inhabited Maine island.  The bill no longer strips coastal towns of the power to regulate structures in municipal waters, and drops a proposal to bar the Maine Board of Environmental Protection from hearing appeals of windfarm permits. Instead,  the bill allows for prototype wave and tidal power generators in state waters, with test locations to be identified using a process similar to the one used to identify three test sites for prototype deepwater floating turbines.  The bureau of Parks and Lands, which will license wave or tidal projects in maine setate waters, will be required to notify commercial fishermen via the state's Marine Resources Advisory Council and the state's lobster zone councils.

But central to the bill is setting up a competitive solicitation process for building, transporting and operating a 25 megawatt deepwater floating wind system  that by 2015 would supply 87,000 megawatt hours of electricity per year  to Maine consumers, with hopes for greater expansion in decades to come.Under the bill, the state will "brand" power from its over-the-horizon wind generation as  "Ocean Wind Green Standard Offer"  Though power from the offshore wind facility will cost more than land-generated electricity, the state hopes consumers and industry will be attracted by the idea of purchasing "Ocean Wind Green" power, that does not interfere with fishermen or other already existing businesses and communities like land -based turbines, and does not degrade Maine's scenic assets.

Kudos to the Maine Legislature's Utilities and Energy Committee for learning from the mistakes made several years ago when they legislated a fast track approach to wind farming in Maine's mountainous areas. In the case of the ocean, the committee put coastal Maine's existing ocean-dependent, scenery dependent economy first.

3/18/10 Maine ocean wind bill: Legislative worksession Listen to speakers

Listen to speakers at the March 18, 2010 work session of the Maine legislature's Utility and Energy Committee on LD 1810, Implementing the findings of the Governor's Task Force on Ocean Energy   Listen to March 11th public hearing on LD 1810 Mp3s   

* Introduction to the Worksession 4min
* MDEP's Beth Nagusky describes proposed changes to Bill Part A 17 minutes
* MDEP's Nagusky Q&A session 11 minutes
* Patrice Farrell, Maine Lobstermen's Association 3 & 1/2 minutes (Read MLAs Letter on LD 1810)
* MDEP's Beth Nagusky describes proposed changes to Part B of LD 1811
* Suzanne Sayre 2 minutes
* John Ferland Ocean Renewable Energy Corp 1 minutes
* Dianne Messer, advocate, Liberty Maine 2 minutes
* Chris O'Neill, Friends of Maine Mountains 1 minutes
* Todd Rousette (sp?) Preti Flaherty lawfirm 2 minutes
* MDEP's Beth Nagusky describes more changes to Part B
* MDEPs Beth Nagusky on changes to Part C of bill
* MDEP's Beth Nagusky on changes to Part D of bill
* MDEP Beth Nagusky on Changed to Part E of Bill
* MDEP Beth Nagusky questioned on Part E 7 min
 * MDEP Beth Nagusky questioned more 10 minutes
 * University of Maine Dr Dagher 12 minutes
 * Final stakeholders and close of meeting  11 minutes

Legislature's work session held 3/18/10 on Maine ocean wind bill: Listen to speakers

Listen to speakers at the March 18, 2010 worksession of the Maine legislature's Utility and Energy Committee on LD 1810, Implementing the findings of the Governor's Task Force on Ocean Energy.
* Introduction to the Worksession 4min
* MDEP's Beth Nagusky describes proposed changes to Bill  **  Part A 17 min
* MDEP's Nagusky Q&A session 11 minutes
* Patrice Farrell, Maine Lobstermen's Association 3 & 1/2 minutes
* MDEP's Beth Nagusky describes proposed changes to Part B of LD 1811
* Suzanne Sayre 2 minutes
* John Ferland Ocean Renewable Energy Corp 1 minutes * Dianne Messer, advocate, Liberty Maine 2 minutes
* Chris O'Neill, Friends of Maine Mountains 1 minutes
* Todd Rousette (sp?) Preti Flaherty lawfirm 2 minutes
* MDEP's Beth Nagusky describes more changes to Part B
* MDEPs Beth Nagusky on changes to Part C of bill
* MDEP's Beth Nagusky on changes to Part D of bill

More to come - refresh page for update.

The End of Lobstering? Big Wind twisting legislative arms to open ALL Maine saltwater to windmills

The DeepCWind Consortium  is a loose confederation of  entrepeneurs, general contractors, windmill companies, investment bankers, eco-yuppies, engineering firms and others, hunkered down around the multimillion dollar pile of stimulus money that got earmarked to Maine for wind energy R&D.
Listen to Jake Ward of the DeepCwind Consortium visiting Monhegan on Feb 16th describe the newstate  legislation  Click Here (2 minute mp3)

That's right. Representatives of the  DeepCwind Consortium  who came to Monhegan that day  to do a powerpoint presentation on their plans for a brace of R&D windmills off that fair isle, let slip the fact that there is a bill  being bandied about by the Maine legislature - but not yet "released" into public view- that would formally open ALL of Maine's territorial Sea to offshore wind extraction and tide extraction.
But they are restless. The state of Maine has granted them a measly 3,200 acres out of Maine's millions upon millions of  acres of  territorial coastal waters, to snatch wind from.  Filling the view off Monhegan (photo) won't be enough. More Monhegan views at risk . A mere appetizer! They hunger for more.

LOTS MORE

As you read this, the DeepCWind Consortium is busy in Augusta. That unholy choir is singing $weet nothing$ into the ears of  Maine legislative leaders, asking for nothing less than unbridled access to all of Maine's coastal waters.  






Trailing behind them - Canadian salmon farm interests, eager to fill in the spaces between wind turbines and tidecatchers with millions of their genetically engineered little darlings. Following them: feather collectors, for the great number of seabirds that will be attracted by the penned fish and by the wild fishes drawn to the giant floating wind and tide structures will have to fly the gauntlet of those blades as they dive on the fishes, and many shall sadly fail the blade-spotting challenge.

Just as Big Aquaculture tried (and failed, thanks to vigorous defense by small Not In My BaY groups, especially Friends of Blue Hill Bay and East Penobscot Bay Environmental Alliance), the burgeoning windpower industry will try to slowly force lobstering out, square mile by square mile, from wind-suitable Maine state waters. Divide and conquer being their usual tactic, expect Lobster Zone Councils to be pitted against each other. Expect attempts to pit the Down East Lobstermens' Association against the Maine Lobstermen's Association

Towns will be forced to accept "Community Benefit Agreements"  Lobstermen will be put on the PILL : "Payment In Lieu of Lobstering". Forced to give up their heritage "for the greater good" of the investors.  They will be pressured by paid-off ex-politicians, hand in cash-sticky hand with the sold-out "practical" enviros of Sierra Club, NRCM, Island Institute and the ENGO like, who, once the POWER money appeared, seem to have lost any qualms about throwing their friends in the fishing industry under the clean energy bus.

Can this be stopped?  Only if the Legislature's Utilities and Energy Committee sees the light. You can illuminate them by dropping a few words to the committee. Email your words to Kristen Gottlieb, the Committee's hardworking clerk, and ask her to distribute them to committee members.



Be brief and to the point: Opening up any of Maine's coastal waters to commercial wind extraction before any R&D is carried out in the small experimental locations already permitted would be foolishly,  dangerously premature.  


Tell them the industry wants to rush in and take leasehold possession of  100s of square miles of Maine's coastal waters, NOW, so they are grandfathered against responsible regulation is not yet close to completion -  as litigation presently before the court shows. 


Tell them not to allow fast talking energy entrepeneurs, investment bankers, and their surrogates to push through  legislatnio allowing such an outrageous Gulf of Maine-grab to happen

News: Windpower opponent seeks to keep corporate consortium out of legal review.

UPDATE: The DeepC Wind Consortium is Off the Bus.
According to their lawyer he will drop their request to intervene.

 "Wind power opponent?"  Have I joined that not terribly exalted roster?

I would rather say  "Supporter of birds and beauty", and "Supporter of siting the windfarm R&D site where it is wanted and needed, not where it's most convenient for lazy wind entrepeneurs that would rather not have to trek to the "Other Maine".

But  reporter/editor Steve Betts of the Herald Gazette, who WILL write  about me without ever telephoning or emailing,  makes me out as "opponent", because I informed the court on February 5th  that I would rather keep the corporations out of the case, so I must be one.


The "DeepCwind Consortium" an unincorporated vague mass of corporations, ex-politicians and others, is run by the University of Maine. It hopes to profit by forcing windmills into Maine's public lands and state waters.

But the Consortium would only join the case to cloud the air and  muddy the waters.

For the information the judge needs to make his decision  is entirely within the existing public record.  The consortium would add nothing but hype to the process. They should be kept out and I hope the judge  agrees.

I have no problem with the University ITSELF intervening  in the case, however. Just not that pack of hungry corporate wolf fish calling itself the DeepCwind Consortium.

Hot air in the pursuit of power: Island Institute chief lashes out at wind-injured Maine islanders

One can tell Phil Conkling's  been running his Island Institute for too long.  Again flush with cash, (MBNA's self immolation burned a big hole in the II's wallet for a few years), this time enriched by the electricity industry bucket-brigading the long green his direction, Conking's turned his back on the islands and islanders he once so earnestly swore to protect, back in the mists of time when he began his organization, decades ago, working out of a little white frame house on the Rockland waterfront - with CLF's fishery lawyers laboring quietly downstairs.  (MBNA smashed this icon years ago when it took over and took down Fisher Plow's old digs nearby).

Having  staked his fortune on joining in the Windrush with Angus King  - and shortly, John Baldacci , who's likewise discovered his future to be filled with wind -  Phil  is committed to aiding and abetting the  extraction of gigawatts of energy from the winds of the Gulf of Maine - enough to not only be used for lighting and electronics, but  also to use for the brute force use of electricity for heating residential and business buildings through Maine winters.

Now Phil Conkling is driven to distraction by residents of  islands like Vinalhaven and Monhegan complaining that their traditional way of life is being threatened by or already hammered by his literal pursuit of power. How dare they!

But rather than admit the crusty old islanders, the ones whose anecdotes and sturdy workboats  fill the pages of the Island Institute's monthly tabloid andits coffee table books,  have a right to their point of view, Phil has decided that the complaining  fishermen and other islanders are a minority on the wrong side of, if not history, at least II's revenue stream, and must yield or be shoved out of the way. Ditto for journalists who fail to swallow the II's spin.

Perhaps Phil should 'graduate' from the Institute and take a nice relaxing long rest on his laurels.

Maine's 'Offshore Wind Rush' challenged in Maine Superior Court

Bay activist's lawsuit calls for orderly growth of Maine offshore wind energy research and development.

Court asked to temporarily suspend recent decision by state submerged lands chief authorizing wind energy test center off Monhegan.

A Rockland man has filed suit in Knox County Superior Court, seeking suspension of a  December 14th decision by the Bureau of Parks and Lands that designated two square miles of ocean south of Monhegan as the Maine Offshore Wind Energy Research Center.

Media Coverage: MPBN   &  Herald Gazette

Calling the bureau action "woefully premature" and "part of a Gulf of Maine Wind Rush" fostered by New England's burgeoning ocean wind energy industry, conservation activist Ron Huber has asked the court to rule on whether  two recently passed state laws, 12 MRSA 1868  "Identification of Offshore Wind test areas and  MRSA  35-A, Chapter  34-A: Expedited Permitting of Grid scale Wind Energy Development were followed by Parks & Lands Director Willard Harris when he authorized the test area, one of three in Midcoast and southern Maine waters. The Bureau of Parks and Lands manages submerged lands usage in Maine's territorial sea.

"Maine is wasting a marvelous chance to do ocean energy projects in state waters right the first time. Instead  it is assuring investors their projects will be subject to minimal review." said Huber.  He said that although meaningful rules and regulations for offshore windmill site selection and management don't exist yet, the state is racing ahead anyway to parcel out its portion of the Gulf of Maine.   "I'm awarding the DeepCwind consortium a C-minus," he said.

"We've seen what the Gold Rush did to California's salmon streams. What rushing ahead on bailing out Wall Street has accomplished for our economy. What rushing into the Patriot Act has done to the structure and integrity of our security agencies. Why is the Department of Conservation rushing so blindly  forward on authorizing the  state's ocean wind energy research center off Monhegan?  Do it right!  The wind's not going anywhere."

The State of Maine could thoughtlessly degrade irreplaceable scenic and ecological natural assets of state and national significance there, by fast tracking  offshore wind plan without consulting most Monheganites, without calculating the dollar value of the damage such projects could have on Monhegan's thriving tourism industry. Without calculating, using standard metrics, the visual and sonic impacts windmill operations day and night could have on Monhegan visitors and island residents. On its fish and fishermen. Its lobsters and lobstermen.

"Why is ignorance bliss for the Bureau of Parks and Lands? Our state doesn't need to become part of a Gulf of Maine Wind Rush.   As shown at conference after conference, the industry has shown it has the smarts, the talent and the ability to gain a tremendous amount of environmental and social impact data before, during and after the experimental deployments at the Maine Offshore Energy Test Center.  The Bureau of Parks and lands should make gaining that critical data part of the deal with the University.

Rushing the birds. Huber noted to the court the non-evaluation by the state of the chance, small or large, that  indivduals of the dozens of bird species that visit Monhegan or live there year round will fall prey to a bladestrike. Maine Audubon's Monhegan surveys, and the visits of numerous other birders familiar with Monhegan reveal with great detail how Monhegan and its surrounding waters are the haunts of  Canada Geese, Wood Ducks, Black Ducks, Mallards,Green-winged Teal , Eiders, Scoters, Loons, Shearwaters,  Storm-Petrels, Gannets, Herons, Osprey, Sharp-shinned Hawks, Cooper's Hawks, American Kestrel, Merlins,  Peregrine Falcons and Bald Eagles. And many others!

Bird strikes WILL happen" Huber said. "Its a fact of life with offshore wind. Maine Department of Conservation should acknowledge this regrettable truth and work to minimize it right from the start. That's what Research and Development means, not only figuring out the best wind blades, but also figuring out the least damaging methods of  using them.

Ditto for the Monhegan Inner Sou' Sou'west Ground, a  rocky three square mile fishing ground in deep waters SSW of Monhegan. The offshore wind R&D center will encompass part of  this  300 foot deep ground which hosts hake and cusk in early spring, cod and pollock from May until July, and halibut in the autumn. 

"The state needs to exhaustively survey the existing state of  Monhegan's deepwater fishery environment, before moving ahead with this necessary exploration of ocean energy extraction."  Huber said. The addition of high relief vertical habitat in the form of floating windmill structures will also attract species not typically seen in the area, to exploit the new habitat.  These non-indigenous organisms may be benign or troublesome to the existing marine fisheries."

"But who's checking?" Huber asked. "Judge Jeffrey Hjelm needs to pull Parks and Lands director Willard's head out of the sand," he said.  "The state must  face the inconvenient truths of ocean wind extraction,that come with the incontrovertible pluses of generating electricity that way.  Willard's December decision is woefully premature."

Rockland resident Ron Huber has acted on behalf of natural Maine since the early 90's. This is his second petition asking Maine Superior Court to turn back agency decisions affecting Penobscot Bay. The first, filed one year ago and still pending, asks the court to overturn Maine DOT's  January 2009 decision to split publically owned Sears Island  in upper Penobscot Bay into an industrial containerport zone and a private conservation easement zone run by Maine Coast Heritage Trust, without following requirements of the Sensible Transportation Policy Act. There is a certain symmetry, he says,  to now trying to protect nature at the opposite end of Penobscot Bay.

Huber admits to a spiritual dimension to his activism.  Describing his efforts as  "faith-based stewardship over the wild places and wild marine life of Penobscot Bay" he informed the court that  his "wild marine congregation of Penobscot Bay organisms" may be at risk from the diversion of hundreds of kilowatts of wind energy from its traditional natural uses in the outer bay marine ecosystem to electricity generation. The ability of the larval young of many members of his flock to carry out the sea surface feeding and respiration necessary to their survival could be badly hampered. 

We must not crucify Penobscot Bay on a Cross of Wind." Huber declared.

Additional Information on offshore wind energy &  Maine state waters Click Here
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Windiness Jan 2010 at Maine Legislature's Energy Committee

Listen to NRCM, First Wind & others testify to and be questioned on LD 1504 An Act To Require That Expedited Wind Energy Development Projects Provide a Tangible Benefit to Maine Ratepayers in the Form of Discounts to Future Electric Rates by the Legislature's Utilities & Energy Committee.

AUDIO
Senator Mills Chief sponsor. Recording begins, hearing already in progress...
Dave Willby, First Wind
Pete Didisheim, NRCM
Jeremy Payne, Maine Renewable Energy Ass'n
Representative Adams
Representative Russell
Shawn Mahaney, CLF
Dick Davies, PUC Public Advocate
John Cooney, Reed and Reed. R&R's memo on tangible benefits

Question: Should  companies that "take"  the scenic beauty and audio soundscape of our state on behalf of their shareholders be required to provide a special benefit to Maine ratepayers? Industry says: no way!

Monhegan & the Ivory windTower

Will it be Town vs Gown, there in the chilly waters off Monhegan?

Depending on who you listen to or read, there are many answers to that question.


What's known is:

  * November 7, 2008  Governor Baldacci signed Executive Order 20 FY 08/09, establishing  the Ocean Energy Task Force

* The State Planning Office's Special Projects Office 

implemented. the order and set up the Task Force meetings. 

* The Task Force delivered an 87 page Final Report (pdf)  on strategies to: meet  the goals established in the Maine Wind Energy Act, Title 35-A, section 3404(2)(B) :  install at least 2,000 megawatts of wind capacity by 2015 and at least 3,000 megawatts by 2020, 300 of which could be located in coastal waters.  

* LD  1465 An Act To Facilitate Testing and Demonstration of Renewable Ocean Energy Technology is passed by the Maine Legislature and signed byGovernor Baldacci. It becomes 38 MRSA 480HH  in state law.

* Summer 2009  the U.S. Department of Energy awarded an $8 million grant to  Dr. Habib Dagher and his team at the University of Maine. The team includes more than 30 partners from outside of academia, including private companies interested in offshore wind development. Dagher testifies before Congress  that Maine has the potential to produce about 130 gigawatts of power in deep water — 60 to 900 meters deep — within 50 nautical miles of the coast.

 

* December 15, 2009 Maine State Planning office designates a 2 and 1/3 square mile area south of Monhegan as the  Maine Offshore Wind Energy Research Center

* January 2010. The University receives 12.4 million more in stimulus money for offshore wind development

 

* University  proposes to install one 100-kilowatt floating wind turbine and one 10-kilowatt floating wind  turbine.  A maximum of two offshore wind turbines is allowed at any given time in the wind energy test area.

* Media Coverage Suzanne Pude, the Island Institute's Wind energy point person  wrote an article recently, detailing the above.  As did Alice McFadden, publisher of the Free Press in "Monhegan Site Chosen as UMaine's Offshore Wind Research Facility"

LOCATION LOCATION LOCATION

The Monhegan wind test area lies in deep water tucked between two  important fishing grounds: the  Monhegan Inner Sou'Sou'west Ground and the Monhegan Western Ground. As described in "Fishing Grounds of the Gulf of Maine"   See clickable map here. Monhegan is lowest green spot on map

Monhegan Inner Sou'Sou'west Ground. "This ground takes its name from its bearing, lying SSW from Monhegan Light, distant 5 miles. Its width is 1 1/2 miles, its length NNE and SSW is 1 1/4 miles. It has a sharp, broken, rocky bottom, including a small shoal of 20 fathoms and some hummocks of rather greater depths. The deepest water is in the neighborhood of 50 fathoms. Fishing here is from May until July for codfish and pollock: hake and cusk are in the deep water in the spring months and halibut on the shoal in July and September. This ground is principally fished by trawls, but there is considerable hand lining in September and October. Gillnetting, too, has become more common of later years"


Monhegan Western Ground." This is a somewhat extensive ground lying about 4 1/2 miles WSW from Monhegan Island. The depths range from 22 to 45 fathoms. The bottom is rocky and gravelly and in places much broken. This is a good spring ground for cod and a summer ground for hake and cusk in 40 to 50 fathoms. Pollock are found here in September and October. Its length is 4 or 5 miles, and its greatest breadth is 2 miles on the eastern portion, gradually narrowing westward to about 1 mile. The ground runs SE, and NW. It is fished by hand lines, trawls, and gill nets. Marks: Bring houses on New Harbor over the white cliff on Pemaquid 6 miles from New Harbor."

Coming Up Next Time: What problems could these windmills bring off the mouth of Penobscot Bay?

Maine offshore wind farms to be R&D only - State

On September 29th, the Maine Geological Survey and Maine Coastal Program hosted a public info meeting at the Samoset on the state plan to establish sites in Maine state waters for research on offshore deepwater windfarming. Media coverage  Here and Here  Listen below  to a  presentation by State Geologist Bob Marvinney describing the proposed windfarm areas off our coast, and to the lively question and answer period that followed. The state also issued maps marked off in 1 mile squares showing proposed windfarm areas offshore, and now asks the public for info on these locations.

AUDIOS OF THE MEETING
Introduction by Paul Anderson, Maine SeaGrant (6.5 min)
Presentation by Bob Marvinney, Maine Geological Survey (32 min)
Questions and Answers I Bob West, Rockport; Sid Quarrier, Appleton; (9min)
Q&As 2 Ron Huber (9min)
Q&As 3 Dana Hutchins
Q&As 4 Richard Warner, St George; a person from Edgecomb, (13 min)
Q&As 5 Becky Bartovics (8 min)
Q&As 6. Liz Dickerson (8min)
Q&As 7. Richard Podolski; Ken Shule.(5.5min)
Q&As 8 Metinic Lobsterman (12 min)
Q&As 9 Jim Hayes, Rockport (6.5min)
Q&As 10 Ragged Island lobsterman (5min)
Q&As 11 Diane Rector, Liberty (6.5min)
Q&As 12 Jim Wadsworth, Warren. (5min)
Q&A 13 Metinic lobsterman Post 2 (15 min)
Q&A 14 Diane Rector(2) to Meeting End (9.5min)