The “Third” Koch Brother Struggles To Block Wind Farm

By now the names David and Charles Koch should be familiar to every political junkie and business wonk on the Web. The “third” Koch brother, William, has managed somehow to keep a far lower profile – but it got kicked up a notch or two when the New York Times revealed that, like his more notorious brothers, he’s not exactly a fan of clean energy when it’s in his elitist backyard:

¶ OSTERVILLE, Mass. — If the vast wind farm proposed for Nantucket Sound is ever built, William I. Koch will have a spectacular view of it.
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A rally last month in support of Cape Wind, a huge offshore wind farm proposed for Nantucket Sound.

Of course, that is the last thing he wants. Mr. Koch, a billionaire industrialist who made his fortune in fossil fuels and whose better-known brothers underwrite conservative political causes, has been fighting the wind farm, called Cape Wind, for more than a decade, donating about $5 million and leading an adversarial group against it. He believes that Cape Wind’s 130 industrial turbines would not only create what he calls “visual pollution” but also increase the cost of electricity for everyone.

Now, as if placing a bet on the outcome of the battle, Mr. Koch, 73, who has owned an exclusive summer compound here for years, has acquired an even grander one — Rachel Mellon’s 26-acre waterfront estate in the gated community of Oyster Harbors, for $19.5 million. He has also bought the nearby 12-plus-acre Dupont estate. All of this adds up to a prime perch over Nantucket Sound.

“I love the area,” Mr. Koch said in an e-mail. “The ability to acquire a special property where I can create a family compound for my children and extended family was and is very meaningful to me.” (His current home, in the same gated community, is on the market for $15 million.)

At one time, Cape Wind — which would produce 75 percent of the power for Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket — was expected to be the first offshore wind farm in the country, and supporters hoped it would serve as a catalyst for other offshore wind projects like those that ring Europe. But after more than a dozen years, the $2.6 billion proposal remains on the drawing board, thanks in large part to the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound, of which Mr. Koch is chairman.

Still, Jim Gordon, Cape Wind’s developer, who has spent $70 million of his own money on the project since 2001, vows that it will go forward. He said that he would qualify for certain federal tax credits by the end of the year and that the necessary financing would be in place, but he declined to disclose details, saying he did not want to give Mr. Koch a “road map” of his plans.

Having summered and vacationed on Nantucket, I can let you in on a dirty little secret that the locals do not want to admit: the island’s economy is driven by tourism, and there’s always been friction between the ultra-rich who treat the place as their enclave and the hard-working entrepreneurs whose well-being relies on seasonal tourism. And if this development in Michigan is any indication, the wind farm will do more than just provide clean energy:

They have been called an eyesore, accused of lowering property values and blamed for a wide variety of ailments from dizziness to insomnia. Not until very recently, however, has anyone called wind turbines a tourist attraction.

In Michigan, well over 900 wind turbines, many taller than the Statue of Liberty, are doing their part to help the state reach its renewable portfolio standard (RPS) of ten percent renewable energy by 2015. They are also turning into a must-see stop for visitors to the Great Lakes.

This summer, there were waiting lists for bus tours of the Lake Winds Energy Park in Ludington, in Michigan. The park is located in the western part of the state, right next to U.S. hwy 31, and the tour was created in response to the sheer number of people who would stop their cars and take pictures of the energy park’s 56 industrial sized pinwheels.

You can’t really miss them when you go through town,” Sarah Kronlein, administrative coordinator at the Ludington and Scottville Area Chamber of Commerce told Livingston Daily Press. “A lot of people are curious about how they are made and how they work.”

On the tours offered at Lake Winds, visitors are shown a short video about wind energy and then taken on a one-hour tour of the park, during which they are able to get out of the bus and stand underneath the giants of clean energy.

Michigan isn’t the only place where visitors are paying to see turbines, either. In North Palm Springs, California, tourists pay up to $35 to see one of the country’s oldest wind farms. In Atlantic City, New Jersey, wind turbines at the city’s waste water treatment plant attract an average of 15,000 visitors every year. Even in Cape Cod, where the offshore wind project has seemed to cause nothing but controversy for years, Hy-line Cruises is preparing to offer tours of the first-of-its-kind site.

By: dave-dr-gonzo

David Hirsch, a.k.a. Dave "Doctor" Gonzo*, is a renegade record producer, video producer, writer, reformed corporate shill, and still-registered lobbyist for non-one-percenter performing artists and musicians. He lives in a heavily fortified compound in one of Manhattan's less trendy neighborhoods.

* Hirsch is the third person to use the pseudonym, a not-so-veiled tribute to journalist and author Hunter S. Thompson, with the permission of his predecessors Gene Gaudette of American Politics Journal (currently webmaster and chief bottlewasher at Liberaland) and Stephen Meese at Smashmouth Politics.