After more than a year of failing to find a scandal in the Obama administration's loan to bankrupt solar company Solyndra, House Oversight Committee Chair Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) is now probing whether the Federal Aviation Administration's approval of the Cape Wind project was "politically based."
Issa and Transportation Committee Chair John Mica (R-Fla.) sent a letter to FAA chief Michael Huerta last week saying that they have "significant questions" about the project's approval, based on emails among staff that noted that the project consideration was "political." The letter strongly indicates that the White House might have pressured the FAA to approve the offshore wind project, which would be the first in the nation, as part of its green energy agenda. "A politically based determination of the Cape Wind project by FAA is an unacceptable use of federal authority, contravenes FAA’s statutory mandate, and raises significant safety concerns for aviation in Nantucket Sound," they wrote.
The top-ranking Republicans requested any communication regarding Cape Wind between the FAA, the project developers, and the White House for the last three and a half years by the end of the month. The FAA's approval was necessary to ensure that the 130 turbines in the ...
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Blue Marble is the Mother Jones Environment Blog.
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