Nantucket Officials Blast Vineyard Wind, Deliver List Of Demands

Nantucket officials called Vineyard Wind on the carpet Tuesday, claiming the offshore wind developer had failed to live up to its agreements with the town, and telling the company to "lead or leave."

In a press conference Tuesday morning held on Zoom, the Nantucket Select Board made 15 demands of Vineyard Wind, setting a two-week deadline for the offshore wind company to reply. If no reply is forthcoming, or if the Select Board deems Vineyard Wind’s responses inadequate, the town is leaving all of its options open -including legal action.

The statements by town officials marked the strongest rebuke yet of Vineyard Wind since the July 2024 blade failure that littered Nantucket's beaches with fiberglass and foam debris, and prompted federal authorities to shut down the project for nearly six months.

“This is not the first time that Vineyard Wind has seen many of these demands, so we expect two weeks is plenty of time for them to confirm their agreement, or to explain publicly why they should not be held accountable in these basic ways,” said Select Board member Brooke Mohr, who was the board’s chair during the July 2024 blade failure.

The demands fall into three broad categories: adequate communication, lighting, and emergency response planning. The Select Board alleges that Vineyard Wind has failed to live up to its commitments in the so-called “Good Neighbor Agreement” signed by both the company and the Town of Nantucket in all three areas.

“When confronted about these failures, Vineyard Wind has pointed a finger at everyone but themselves,” Mohr said. “They even blame Nantucket and the ocean. That is not leadership. Nantucket provided Vineyard Wind with half a dozen opportunities to adopt protocols for greater accountability, and they have failed to step up.”

The demands include immediate communication of all emergencies to town officials, regular project updates, implementing a public emergency response planning process within two months, and establishing a $10 million escrow fund to cover any potential future cleanup costs. The town demanded that violations of the communication protocols come with a $250,000 payment. The town also demanded $25,000 per turbine for each day that the turbine lights are on without an aircraft detection lighting system (ADLS) active.

The ADLS, which would allow the turbines’ aircraft warning lights to remain off unless a plane is detected overhead, was supposed to be fully operational when Vineyard Wind started producing power, but has been significantly delayed.

“Since January of 2024, Nantucket residents have dealt with dozens and dozens of red lights constantly blinking throughout the night sky,” said Greg Werkheiser, an attorney for Cultural Heritage Partners, the town’s special counsel for offshore wind matters. “The problem we have is that Vineyard Wind’s explanations for the delays…have been convoluted, inconsistent, and unsatisfactory. They have not met multiple targets for activation.”

Mohr claimed that Vineyard Wind had "gone into hiding" since President Donald Trump was inaugurated in January, out of fear of drawing attention from his administration, which has vowed to put a halt to offshore wind development.

"Since the immediate aftermath of the blade failure and since the last presidential election, Vineyard Wind leadership has essentially gone into hiding," Mohr said. "We believe that they are concerned about the change in policy at the federal level, and drawing scrutiny from the new administration, which has ordered a review of offshore wind permitting practices. However, hiding is not the solution to their problems, nor is it the solution to our problems. In fact, as evidenced today by this press conference, it has the opposite intended effect. We are, and have had no choice but to go public."

The town also demanded that Vineyard Wind permanently suspend new projects if any future incident forces beach closures or shellfish harvesting bans for seven consecutive days or 14 total days in any six-month period.

“If they don’t agree, they should explain to the community just how much of a negative impact on Nantucket - its enjoyment of its beaches, its critical shellfish industry - is to be tolerated before suspension of the project is appropriate,” Werkheiser said.

At this point, it is not clear exactly how the Select Board plans to respond if Vineyard Wind does not agree to the demands, as Werkheiser evaded several questions on the topic.

Despite airing their grievances and outlining how Vineyard Wind had not lived up to its contractual obligations to the town, Select Board members reiterated their commitment to the Good Neighbor Agreement, claiming that withdrawing from the contentious contract would eliminate their legal leverage and negotiating power.

“The value of the [Good Neighbor Agreement] has been a hotly debated topic in our community,” Mohr said, “At this time, we believe that withdrawal from the [Good Neighbor Agreement] would actually weaken our town’s position in terms of making these assertions and demands to Vineyard Wind today, and keeping the [Good Neighbor Agreement] in place for the moment is the most effective legal tool we have, and we believe that walking away from this agreement would prove to be a symbolic gesture only.”

The Good Neighbor Agreement is one of the town’s primary legal recourses should the Select Board ultimately choose to sue. If Vineyard Wind has failed to live up to the terms of the agreement, the town could take legal action, alleging a breach of contract.

However, both of the members of the Select Board who were on the board that originally signed the Good Neighbor Agreement in 2020 admitted that if they knew what they know now, they would not have signed.

“If I [knew] exactly what I know today, I would amend it, or I wouldn’t sign it,” Matt Fee said. “But that’s not reality.”

The other remaining Select Board member who signed the Good Neighbor Agreement, Dawn Hill, has previously stated she felt misled by Vineyard Wind's initial presentations about the size, scale, and impact of the turbines off Nantucket. She reiterated those concerns on Tuesday.

"When we negotiated the Good Neighbor Agreement in good faith, we were really led to believe that this would have a much lesser impact on an island that is a historic landmark, is a fragile place, and is completely reliant on tourism for our economy," Hill said. "These wind turbines are bigger, brighter, and much more impactful than we ever thought, and not to mention the environmental hazard from failures. But my choice would be with our new, federal administration to really wake up and try and put an end to these things, because they're not worth it to the coast of the United States."

At the press conference and the weeks leading up to it, the town has been hinting at possible legal action against Vineyard Wind, ever since announcing a $10.5 million settlement with turbine blade manufacturer GE Vernova, which Vineyard Wind was not party to.

While the settlement protects Vineyard Wind from lawsuits specifically related to the fallout of the blade failure, it does not prevent legal action or enforcement efforts related to the other communication, lighting, and emergency response planning failures outlined by Werkheiser and the Select Board on Tuesday.

At the press conference, the Select Board touched on a number of the concerns they have emphasized repeatedly in the last few months, including Vineyard Wind’s failure to communicate about a lightning strike on the damaged turbine blade last February, the continued lack of the ADLS, and what the Select Board alleges to be inaccurate representations of what the turbines would look like during the initial negotiation process.

Here is the complete list of the Select Board’s demands to Vineyard Wind:

1. Text emergency notifications to designated Town officials within 1 hour.
2. Alert the same officials when blade monitors detect anomalies.
3. Share with Nantucket the content of any written communications with or from federal agencies regarding project failures that have impacts on Nantucket.
4. Email detailed monthly project updates to the Select Board and Town Manager.
5. Present updates and take public questions at Select Board meetings upon request and no less than quarterly.
6. Respond to written questions from the Select Board within three business days.
7. Provide relevant project reports within 1 week of submission to any agency.
8. Share all studies or data reports on adverse effects within five business days of receipt.
9. Disclose correspondence with regulatory agencies within 15 business days.
10. Notify the Town if the company is asserting any confidentiality claims to shield public disclosure of reports or data in regulatory filings.
11. Pay liquidated damages ($250,000) per violation of the above communication protocols.
12. Pay liquidated damages ($25,000) per turbine per day) for each day that turbine lights are on without the Aircraft Detection and Lighting System (ADLS) being active.
13. Within 2 months, initiate a process to seek public input on new emergency response plans—including blade failure scenarios.
14. Establish and maintain a $10 million escrow fund to ensure coverage of cleanup costs from future failures.
15. Permanently suspend new projects if any future incident forces beach closures or shellfish harvesting bans for seven consecutive days or 14 total days in any 6-month period.