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It strikes me as odd that there is such concern over the potential (but limited) impacts of offshore wind on the fishing industry in Maine, but little concern about the potential and much more widespread impacts of unmitigated climate change on the industry. We don’t know if there will be any long-term impacts from offshore wind, but we do know there are already impacts from a warming Gulf of Maine. Impacts that will quickly get much worse if we do not abate our use of fossil fuels and do not invest in technologies such as offshore wind that could greatly reduce our emissions.
The gulf is warming 99 percent faster than the world’s oceans. This is causing commercially important species like clams and lobsters to migrate farther north and offshore to deeper, colder waters. It’s also resulting in lobsters being more vulnerable to shell disease and predatory fish, and in invasives, such as green crabs, moving in and threatening existing species.
Offshore wind may have an impact to be sure, but that impact would be very limited in scope and would be much less impactful than the climate change it could help to prevent.
Rowan Smith
Orono
