Abstract
Water, environment and energy conflicts are particularly complex—easy to distort and difficult to resolve. The Cape Wind conflict, which began in 2001 over plans to develop the first offshore wind farm in the United States (US), has been complicated by the incompatible interests and power dynamics of multiple parties, scientific uncertainty, and the requirements of national, state and local government jurisdictions. This paper analyses the first phase of the protracted negotiations. It draws lessons from the author’s book project on the Cape Wind conflict (upcoming 2015). The research objective is to develop user-friendly techniques and tools for mapping not only the power dynamics of environmental negotiations over time but also the “turning point” influences of high power stakeholders and external factors, such as environmental catastrophes, political outcomes and technical innovations.
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Notes
- 1.
Pursuant to Proclamation No. 5030, the US federal government has jurisdiction over the living and non-living resources from three to 200 nautical miles off US coastal shores.
- 2.
By law, private property on the coasts of MA extend to the mean low-tide mark, as opposed to the high-tide mark applied in most US jurisdictions.
- 3.
In environmental negotiations, “flexibility” is defined as the stakeholders’ willingness and ability to adapt to changes within subsystems and the ecological system as a whole. Integrative relationships, such as collaboration, cooperation, coordination and competition are indicators of flexibility. Aggression and avoidance are indicators of inflexibility (Larson 2003).
- 4.
Sustainable development is “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” Definition crafted by World Commission on Environment and Development (Brundtland Commission 1987).
- 5.
U.S. Department of Energy: Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy works are public domain (http://www1.eere.energy.gov/webpolicies/#copyright) For a PDF color copy of the map see: http://apps2.eere.energy.gov/wind/windexchange/maps_template.asp?stateab=ma.
- 6.
Mark Twain is the pen name of US author Samuel Langhorne Clemens, (1835–1910).
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Larson, M.J. (2015). CAPE WIND: Offshore Renewable Energy Conflict. In: Hipel, K., Fang, L., Cullmann, J., Bristow, M. (eds) Conflict Resolution in Water Resources and Environmental Management. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-14215-9_13
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