By Matt A.V. Chaban, Source: The New York Times

A dozen construction workers gathered around a flatbed truck in Long Island City, Queens, one recent Tuesday, marveling at the final piece of a new 15-story apartment building they had just finished assembling. As a mobile crane hoisted the 20-foot-long black contraption over Pearson Street, many of the workers used their phones to film its ascent.

What looked like a huge carbon-fiber strand of DNA strung around a 10-foot mast was the last of three wind turbines being installed atop the Pearson Court Square, a 197-unit luxury apartment building.

In an industry, a city and a society obsessed with being green, wind turbines remain scarce — only two apartment buildings in New York City harvest the skies for energy, with limited yields.

But in the past few weeks, two new installations have popped up, the one on Pearson Street and another atop what is now Brooklyn’s tallest building, 388 Bridge Street. At least half a dozen more are on the horizon.

Whether turbines become as common as doorknobs, or even solar panels — a recent cover of The New Yorker had both devices dotting the skyline — remains to be seen. But with each passing project, New York resembles a new New Amsterdam just a little bit more.

Read the rest at: The New York Times