Cape & Islands News

Turbine squabble at 4Cs

Community college stymied by Old Kings Highway District committee
Turbine would have powered college's electric needs

By Gerald Rogovin

Just days before Cape Cod Community College was to tie its 242-foot-high wind turbine in West Barnstable to its campus-wide energy system, the project was stopped in its tracks.

"It is so frustrating for the college. Massachusetts Maritime Academy in Bourne and we have been moving together in this direction for a few years. They have turned on their system. It is serving them well. But we're stuck."
             - Michael Gross, 4Cs.

The turbine would have powered the college's energy system with 600 kilowatts of electricity, and integrated it into 4C's new environmental technology program as a teaching tool. It had been long anticipated.

A letter from the Old Kings Highway Historic District stopped the project. A collection of town committees from Sandwich to Orleans along Route 6A, the district monitors and regulates matters of historic preservation in the vicinity of the road.

"We're still waiting for a decision on how to proceed," Michael Gross, the college communications director said.

"We're working toward some sort of solution. We're reviewing the matter with attorneys from the state government," said Kevin Flanagan, a spokesman for the state's Division of Capital Asset Management. It is responsible for construction projects on state-managed property.

The letter was requested by the historic district and sent to the college by the Town of Barnstable's building commission.

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Gross reported that the project was about two weeks behind schedule when construction was halted. But the college administration had anticipated that the students in its environmental technology curriculum would have begun familiarizing themselves with the turbine before the end of November. Electricity would have begun to flow by about the middle of the month.

The college's enewable energy effort includes a solar hot water system that was built
next to its cafeteria last spring. It has already produced substantial savings in energy
costs, Gross said.

"It is so frustrating for the college," Gross said. "Massachusetts Maritime Academy in
Bourne and we have been moving together in this direction for a few years. They have
turned on their system. It is serving them well. But we're stuck."

Same height as previous turbine

The academy turned on its 660-kilowatt turbine 28 months ago. It is about the same
height as the one on the college's Route 132 campus. The 1,084 cadets attending the
academy enjoy its benefits as a teaching tool and are warmed by the energy it produces,
according to Kathy Driscoll, Environmental Health and Safety Officer.

"We offrer degrees in marine and facilities engineering in our Engineering Management
curriculum," she disclosed. "The turbine has become integral to these courses, offering
students an almost "hands-on" experience in learning about alternate and renewable
energies.

"Some students organized a 'green' club. They examine the range of green technologies. The club was their own idea, to get a better handle on what's happening in energy. They've had speakers come to the campus to share their expertise. Jim Gordon, president of Cape Wind, was one," Driscoll said.

The academy administration, acknowledging the students' increased savvy about green technologies, invited two cadets to sit on the academy sustainability committee.

Its turbine is connected to the national electricity grid via NStar. It has been crediting back
to its electricity bill 5-18 percent of the power flowing from the academy, Driscoll noted.
NStar will probably make similar arrangements with 4Cs.

But those negotiations were also held up by the letter, according to Dixie Norris, the college's vice president for administration and finance. She predicted that the student body, more than four times the size of the Academy's will get similar benefits in the cost of energy consumed.

"It is insensitive (of the district) to stop our local college from being environmentally proactive..." - Denise Atwood.

" We have encountered a significant public groundswell of support for the college in the matter," Gross said. "It's really far more important than a matter of jurisdiction."

Denise Atwood, chair of the Dennis Alternate Energy Committee, said of the historic district's action, "It is insensitive (of the district) to stop our local college from being environmentally proactive... A wind turbine visible from Route 6 has no historic relevance. The savings in energy dollars are our tax dollars.

"We need these efforts to make a sustainable way of life on Cape Cod," she declared.

But today, the only evidence of the 4Cs environmental proactivity are piles of dirt surrounding a large hole and inside a fence on the college's Route 132 campus.

R ead earlier story here

Gerald Rogovin began as a journalist in 1948 in dailies, weeklies, radio and magazines; and in the past 9 years back to weeklies and magazines. In between, for 36 years, he headed his own public relations firm in Boston. He lives in Yarmouth Port with a skepticism confirmed by 60 years in the inky trade, and he also blogs for us on Rog's Gallery.