Congress may help take the air out of the Cape Wind offshore wind farm project in Nantucket Sound. Representatives agreed to an amendment attached to a Coast Guard authorization bill that would allow Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R) to block the $900-million project.

Romney refuses comment on the amendment but last November wrote to then-Interior Secretary Gale Norton urging a delay in project review. Jim Gordon, president of Cape Wind Associates, Boston, decried the move, noting that Cape Wind was approved by a key state board and is moving through an environmental review involving 17 federal and state agencies.

Senate Energy Committee Chairman Pete Domenici (R-N.M.) spoke out against the amendment, which gives states veto authority over renewable energy projects on federal land.

“It would be folly for us in Congress to talk about breaking our addiction to foreign oil and, at the same time, pass laws that stymie our own production of clean and renewable energies here at home,” he says.

Karen Wayland, Natural Resources Defense Council legislative director, says the amendment will face a tough fight in Congress but could still be removed. “Procedurally, it wouldn't be hard for Congress to reject this,” she says.

Cape Wind calls for 130 wind turbines to be built in a 24-sq-mile section of Nantucket Sound. They would produce up to 420 MW of electricity.