This Is What The Wind Farms Will Look Like From the Delaware Beaches

There has been a lot of posts and chatter online about how Orsted’s Skipjack wind farm will look from the beaches in Delaware and Maryland.

The Mayor of Ocean City, MD said at the Indian River High School meeting last week, “It will look like Star Wars out there” . I’m not sure he has seen the movies, I mean which one is he referring too? We will get to that later. Recently I posted some articles about the wind turbines off Rhode Island at Block Island specifically about the new fishery up there, as well as some facts that people wanted answered related to the Skipjack wind farm project.

A friend of mine, Erik Vamos, asked me how big are these turbines? I sent him the link to the ones that are going to be built off the coast of Maryland and Delaware in the Skipjack wind farm lease area by Orsted. These are the Haliade-X 12 MW offshore wind turbine platforms. The largest wind turbines in the world right now.
He did some math and sent me a rendering. It is pretty much as I figured based on what else I have seen from Orsted themselves. The wind turbines are going to look about a quarter inch tall on a dead clear day. For the most part you will never be able to see them. How do I know this?

When we surf fish Cape Henlopen State park at the point, you can barely, on most days, see Cape May, NJ or the ferry headed to there after a while once it passes by the beach. On the days you can see Cape May it is hard to make out, on a crystal clear day you can see it well, those are rare days and usually only in the winter and fall. Cape May is only 11.5 miles away from the point in Cape henlopen State Park. In the summer you can barely see the firewatch towers in Cape Henlopen State Park from Dewey Beach due to the summer haze, you can see them in the winter.

The other day I was on a boat excursion to observe and help retrieve data from acoustic fish tag receivers. The farthest out we were was 12.5 miles from Rehoboth beach. The Charles W Cullen Bridge, locally known as the Indian River inlet Bridge and the Indian River Power plant were tiny on the horizon and you could barely see them on this crystal clear “ish” day.

I think people are too hyped up on something they will never really be able to see, especially in the summer. As for the red lights on top of the towers seen at night. FAA rules state that the red warning lights can only be seen from about three to four miles away per regulations, I am told. Which makes sense. You can’t see the red lights on many of the radio towers around here until you are closer to them. If you are worried about beach front property values dropping, get real this is the beach. Property values never go down, they will probably plateau one day, but not anytime soon. People complaining about a three story building along the highway, there are plenty of McMansions there as well as condos that are that tall if not taller.

Do some actual research and decide for yourself, don’t listen to the hyped up internet trolls on social media. I could name a few but if you are following certain pages they are obvious.
The Caesar Rodney “study” we keep hearing about seems to be based off a different study and not their own. I can’t confirm that because no one will directly answer that question.
Check Orsted’s website and do a google search about Block Island as well as wind farm projects in Europe. The ones we have done are listed below.
Video Of The Block Island Wind Turbine Fishing
Facts About Orsteds Wind Farm Project Off The Coast Of Delaware