01:00 AM EST on Thursday, February 23, 2006

Cape Wind, the touted project to bring clean energy to our region, is in grave danger in Congress. The powerful Rep. Don Young (R.-Alaska) is using deceptive arguments to try to kill, behind closed doors, the proposed Nantucket Sound wind farm.

Mr. Young (who brought taxpayers the Alaska "bridge to nowhere") is pitching an amendment to the Coast Guard reauthorization bill -- now being considered by a closed-door Senate-House conference committee -- that would essentially kill Cape Wind, by prohibiting turbines within 1 1/2 miles of shipping and ferry lanes.

By swaying the committee, Mr. Young could avoid an open debate and public hearings on the merits of wind power. He has good reason to fear such a debate: Wind projects enjoy strong support from citizens who care about the environment and want to cut U.S. dependence on Mideast oil.

Moreover, a bill reported out by a conference committee must be voted up or down; it cannot be amended. And there would be strong pressure to vote for a bill to fund the Coast Guard even if the legislation contained a poison pill for Cape Wind.

As in the case of many Capitol Hill struggles, powerful interests rather than the public good seem to be behind the effort. Among those who have lined up against Cape Wind's project is Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D.-Mass.), who might on a clear day be able to see the wind turbines from his family's Hyannisport compound, and Sen. John Warner (R.-Va.), whose daughters have summer houses in Osterville, a Cape Cod hotbed of opposition. Other opponents have connections to oil and natural-gas interests.

Mr. Young argues, in a letter to colleagues, that a British study finds wind turbines a threat to safe navigation. But he neglects to mention that the study is predicated on a buffer of only one-third of a mile!

If there are concerns about turbines and safe navigation, they should be discussed in the open, before congressional committees, with the public in attendance -- not behind closed doors. Cape Wind and similar projects are too important to our country's energy security to be thus disposed of.