The maker of a wind turbine blade that broke apart off Nantucket Island and washed onto beaches last summer has agreed to a $10 million settlement. Officials announced Friday that the settlement will pay local businesses for economic losses caused by fiberglass debris washing ashore. Parts from the wind turbine blade began falling into the Atlantic Ocean in July 2024 during peak tourist season. GE Vernova blamed a production issue and reinspected all blades from the factory. Crews and volunteers collected truckloads of fiberglass fragments from Nantucket’s beaches last summer.
NANTUCKET, Mass. (AP) — The maker of a massive wind turbine blade that broke apart off Nantucket Island and washed up on beaches for months has agreed to a $10.5 million settlement to pay local businesses for their economic losses, officials said Friday.
Fiberglass fragments of the blade began washing ashore last summer during the peak of tourist season after pieces of the wind turbine at the Vineyard Wind project began falling into the Atlantic Ocean in July 2024.
GE Vernova, which agreed to the settlement, blamed a manufacturing problem at one of its factories in Canada and said there was no indication of a design flaw. It reinspected all blades made at the factory and removed other blades made there from the Vineyard Wind location.
Crews in boats and on beaches, along with volunteers, collected truckloads of debris. The company said the debris was nontoxic fiberglass fragments and that the pieces were one square foot or smaller.
The settlement calls for establishing a fund along with a process to evaluate claims from businesses and distribute payments, Nantucket officials said.
The development’s massive wind turbines with blades more than 328 feet (100 meters) long began sending electricity to the grid at the beginning of 2024.
