Imagine a future in which you join a farm share program and receive, along with your in-season fruit, vegetables and flowers, cheap electricity.

A future where you receive a wider range of produce over a longer season, maybe even year-round, as greenhouses proliferate on those farms, taking advantage of that cheaper, price-stable, renewable energy.

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More than 15 years ago, Brian Braginton-Smith of West Yarmouth came forward with an idea to meld wind power and aquaculture in what he envisioned as an “ocean ranch.”

Mr. Braginton-Smith’s proposal was the seed for what became the controversial proposal by Cape Wind Associates to place 130 wind turbines on Horseshoe Shoal south of Cape Cod.

The visionary now has separated himself from Cape Wind, saying he is concerned about the impact such a project would have on what he sees as an environmentally fragile fishing ground.

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The Martha's Vineyard Commission on Monday voted without dissent to designate an energy district critical of planning concern in the town of Aquinnah, the first such district of its kind on the Island.

The town and the commission will now begin the process of drafting special townwide regulations for Aquinnah to promote alternative energy in new construction and establish guidelines for the placement of wind turbines, solar panels and geothermal systems.

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The town of Aquinnah, known for being progressive in planning, this week moved a step closer to adopting a townwide energy conservation district.

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Some 61 per cent of residents of Cape Cod and the Islands favor the Cape Wind project, according to a major new scientific survey of 501 residents.

So said the press release put out yesterday by the Civil Society Institute, which describes itself as a nonprofit and nonpartisan think tank in Newton. The release made it look like a decisive verdict in favor of the wind power project, delivered in the court of public opinion.

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