NANTUCKET SOUND, Mass. – In the end, the Obama administration’s decision to approve or deny a massive wind turbine project in Nantucket Sound will hinge on the value it places on respecting an irreplaceable and immovable American Indian sacred site weighed against the worth and importance of a privately-owned renewable energy plant that could be built elsewhere.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, who traveled to Nantucket Sound Feb. 2 with his team from the Interior Department on what he called a “fact finding mission,” gave no hint about which direction the administration is leaning toward. On the contrary, in discussing the pros and cons of the Cape Wind energy project, the secretary said he is as likely to approve the project as he is to deny it.

Cape Wind would be built on Horseshoe Shoal in Nantucket Sound and would include 130 wind turbines rising some 440 feet above the ocean surface across a 25 square mile area. The installation would also include a 10-story electrical service platform with 40,000 gallons of transformer oil and 1,000 gallons of diesel fuel and a helicopter pad. The plant would be as close as four miles offshore.

The application has been in the pipeline for almost 10 years, and Salazar promised to bring the controversial proposal to conclusion – one way or another – in April. He set a March 1 deadline for the parties to reach an agreement, but the proposal is so fraught with passion, that “I’m not holding my breath,” Salazar said,

Among the project’s strongest opponents are the Mashpee and Aquinnah Wampanoag nations – the state’s two federally acknowledged tribes – to whom Nantucket Sound is sacred ground.

The wind factory would be clearly visible to the Aquinnah on Noepe (Martha’s Vineyard) and the Mashpee on Cape Cod, degrading their ceremonially essential view of the rising sun.

The Wampanoag leaders praised Salazar for the visit.

“We have repeatedly raised serious concerns over the proposed project for more than six years,” said Mashpee Wampanoag Chairman Cedric Cromwell. “For the first time, we believe that our concerns are being heard, and we look forward to continuing the process of consultation until an acceptable outcome has been achieved. This process is long overdue, and we thank Secretary Salazar and President Obama for their commitment to the rights of Native Americans.”

Aquinnah Chairwoman Cheryl Andrews-Maltais said Salazar had kept his word.

“He promised that he would come and he did come and we are so pleased and grateful. He is a man of his word. Not only did he take the time to come, he got up so early before the sunrise to stand on the beach and see personally what we were talking about.”

If the Wampanoags wanted to show Salazar how important an unobstructed view of the sunrise is to their culture and traditional ceremony, they could not have picked a better day. With a clear sky, the sun that morning was a spectacularly huge ball of fiery beauty as it rose above the horizon, shimmering its light all over the waters of Nantucket Sound.

Salazar watched the sun rise with Cromwell and others on Cape Cod. It was “very meaningful,” he said.

“There’s only so much you can learn from maps and diagrams that you have in Washington, D.C. It was very important for us to be here in the Sound itself where we could actually see the sun rising, where we could see the crimson skies, where we could see the beauty of the Sound, where we could see the history and heritage of this place,” Salazar said.

On the other hand, “I’m very bullish on the future of wind energy in the United States of America.”

Salazar said he must weigh President Obama’s “imperative” to develop renewable energy in an effort to gain energy independence, battle climate change, and create jobs, against the need to preserve and present the history of America. At the same time, the administration must fulfill “a very important responsibility which is as equal as the others, which is making sure we are respecting the tribes of America and we’re having a government-to-government relationship with all of them.”

Massachusetts’ Office of the State Historical Preservation Officer determined that the proposed Cape Wind site is a traditional cultural property and in early January, the National Park Service said Nantucket Sound is eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places as a significant traditional, cultural, historic and archaeological property. That would place the Sound under the regulations of a number of federal laws concerning the protection and preservation of historical and sacred sites.

Andrews-Maltais said that despite historical evidence to the contrary, she still has faith that the legal system will work in the nations’ favor. If not, further, unspecified, steps will likely be taken, she said.

“We’re hoping for the best and preparing for the worst.”

The wind energy plant would not only obscure the view of the rising sun, but also would be built on once dry land, desecrating the earth where, according to Wampanoag oral tradition, the ancestors once lived, died and were buried.

Science is beginning to catch up with oral tradition.

Interior department archaeologist Chris Horrell, who accompanied Salazar on the trip, said materials found in core sediments, affirm that the site was above water 6,000 to 8,000 years ago.

Horrell acknowledged the presence of American Indians then, “but I want to be clear, that there was no archeological evidence uncovered in the core data; just the presence of a land surface that could have once been used by Native Americans in this region.”

After meeting with the Mashpee at sunrise and with the Aquinnah at mid-morning, Salazar in his signature black Stetson, embarked on the U.S. Coast Guard’s Ida Lewis, a 175-foot buoy tender, in Martha’s Vineyard for a tour of the proposed wind farm project.

The boat stopped at a meteorological tower at the Cape Wind site where data shows average winds of 19 mph, but the waters of the shoal were as calm as a mill pond and there wasn’t a breath of wind that day.