Williams, Wendy 1950-

PERSONAL:

Born 1950.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Cape Cod, MA. E-mail—wesuwi@comcast.net.

CAREER:

Author and journalist, c. 1996—. Duke University, Hastings Center for Medical Ethics, journalist-in-residence. University of Colorado Center for Environmental Journalism, fellow; Marine Biological Laboratory, fellow.

WRITINGS:

The Best Bike Paths of New England: Safe, Scenic, and Traffic-Free Bicycling, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 1996.

The Best Bike Paths of the Southwest: Safe, Scenic, and Traffic-Free Bicycling, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 1996.

Cape Wind: Money, Celebrity, Class, Politics, and the Battle for America's Energy Future on Nantucket Sound, PublicAffairs (New York, NY), 2007.

Also contributor to periodicals, including Scientific American, Christian Science Monitor, Boston Globe, Providence Journal, and Baltimore Sun.

SIDELIGHTS:

In the book Cape Wind: Money, Celebrity, Class, Politics, and the Battle for America's Energy Future on Nantucket Sound, Wendy Williams and coauthor Robert Whitcomb look at an environmental struggle from an innovative angle: through the eyes of an energy developer, opposed by monied interests who want to keep the shorelines of Cape Cod pristine. Cape Wind is set, stated New York Times contributor Robert Sullivan, on "Horseshoe Shoal, about five miles off the coast of Cape Cod, where, in 2001, an energy developer named Jim Gordon proposed what he still hopes will be America's first offshore wind farm, an array of 130 turbines, 440 feet tall, that would create 468 megawatts of electrical energy." "Offshore wind farming is not a particularly radical endeavor; … offshore wind farms have been successfully implemented in Europe," Sullivan continued. "In March [2007], Spain managed to get twenty-seven percent of its total energy supply from wind." The problem is some of the wealthiest and most famous individuals in the United States, including Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, historian David McCullough, mining executive Douglas Yearley, and Catherine Mellon and her mother Bunny Mellon, heirs to a banking fortune. "Why? One word: NIMBY," explained a reviewer for the PopMatters Web site. "Well, five words: Not In My Back Yard."

Critics praised the job the two journalists did with the Cape Wind story. "Williams and Whitcomb, both with good Cape Cod credentials, are open in their advocacy for Gordon's vision of a Nantucket Sound full of offshore windmills, noiselessly whirring," stated Gregory McNamee in the St. Petersburg Times. "The story the two writers deliver, laden with enough political intrigue to keep a John Grisham fan happy, is a real curiosity, for in it the true environmentalists wear business suits, while the in-name-only ones wear deck shoes and yacht caps." "As a satire of class conflict and the political system in general," declared a reviewer for the Bostonist, "Cape Wind is excellent. The authors find the juice in endless council meetings and lawsuits. Some of the real-life characters are reduced to cardboard cutouts to serve the author's purposes, but that doesn't mean the book isn't entertaining and informative. If anything, it should get you to learn more about the project and make up your own mind because the need for renewable energy is only going to grow." "In all," concluded Laura Vanderkam in the American Magazine, "Cape Wind is a fun read, and a fun way to learn about renewable energy. If all the stories on this usually dry topic featured tales of meat hook accidents and characters with comic names, more Americans might pay attention."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

American Magazine, May 11, 2007, Laura Vanderkam, "On Nantucket Sound, Environmentalists Find an Alternative Use for Their Energy."

Boston Globe, July 5, 2007, Nan Goldberg, "An Entertaining Look at Power and Hypocrisy."

Bostonist, May 29, 2007, review of Cape Wind: Money, Celebrity, Class, Politics, and the Battle for America's Energy Future on Nantucket Sound.

E, September 1, 2007, Jim Motavalli, "Mighty Winds," p. 58.

Huntington News, May 29, 2007, David M. Kinchen, review of Cape Wind.

Library Journal, March 15, 2007, Eva Lautemann, review of Cape Wind, p. 91.

New York Times, May 28, 2007, William Grimes, review of Cape Wind; June 17, 2007, Robert Sullivan, "Air Power."

Publishers Weekly, March 12, 2007, review of Cape Wind, p. 47.

St. Petersburg Times (St. Petersburg, FL), June 10, 2007, Gregory McNamee, "Hypocrisy, Blowin' in the Wind: Clean, Green Wind Power Seems Like a Natural for Nantucket Sound, but a Surprising Array of Celebrity Opponents Has Deflected the Plan, Say the Authors of Cape Wind."