President Trump's Executive Order Slams Brakes On Offshore Wind

In an executive order signed just hours after his inauguration on Monday, President Donald Trump slammed the brakes on the nascent offshore wind industry.

Trump had been signaling his opposition to offshore wind projects for months and promised during his campaign to end them on "day one." His executive order immediately halts any new federal leases for offshore wind projects. It also sets the stage for his administration to terminate or amend existing wind energy leases - including for projects such as Vineyard Wind and SouthCoast Wind off Nantucket - following a review by the Secretary of the Department of the Interior.

That review will focus on "the ecological, economic, and environmental necessity of terminating or amending any existing wind energy leases, identifying any legal bases for such removal."

Trump's nominee to lead the Department of the Interior, Doug Burgum, said during his confirmation hearing last week that existing offshore wind projects that make sense and are already in law will continue.

“I’m not familiar with every project that the Interior has underway, but I’ll certainly be taking a look at all of those. And if they make sense, and they’re already in law, then they’ll continue,” Burgum stated. “I think the key is — and I think President Trump’s been very clear in his statements — that he’s concerned about the significant amount of tax incentives that have gone towards some forms of energy that have helped exacerbate this imbalance that we’re seeing right now.”

After he was sworn in on Monday, President Trump continued his diatribe against offshore wind energy during his speech in the Capitol One arena in Washington, D.C.

"We have more oil and gas than any country in the world, and we're going to use it, we're not going to do the wind thing," Trump said. "Big, ugly windmills, they ruin your neighborhood. If you have a house that's near a windmill, guess what? Your house is worth less than half... And they're the most expensive form of energy that you can have, by far. And they're all made in China, by the way, practically all of them. And they kill your birds, and they ruin your beautiful landscapes. But other than that, I think they're quite good."

While scientists and federal agencies including NOAA have stated there is no evidence that offshore wind development is harming whales or other marine mammals, Trump on Monday doubled down on that claim, stating “if you’re into whales, you don’t want windmills.”

The implications of Trump's order for the numerous offshore wind energy projects approved by the Biden administration that are in various stages of development and construction are not yet clear, but it certainly puts them in some level of jeopardy. Over the past four years, Biden's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) permitted 11 commercial-scale offshore wind energy projects, totaling 19 gigawatts of renewable energy, including Vineyard Wind in 2021.

Nevertheless, offshore wind opponents on Monday celebrated Trump's executive order, even as its ramifications were not yet fully understood.

"We are thrilled that this administration is recognizing the environmental carnage being inflicted by offshore wind," said Amy DiSibio, a board member with ACK For Whales, the Nantucket-based group that has been challenging Vineyard Wind for years. "President Trump’s executive order is an incredible first step in the right direction and a strong indication that he is taking this issue very seriously. We very much look forward to the review for which he is calling: the facts will speak for themselves."

Another group that has been vocal in its opposition to offshore wind, the New England Fishermen's Stewardship Association (NEFSA), offered similar sentiments.

“It’s been a long time since fishermen have had hope for a future,” said NEFSA CEO Jerry Leeman. “We are grateful that the new administration is protecting our iconic, multi-generational trade from foreign energy companies and alphabet soup agencies destroying our way of life. After four years of rushing leases and approvals to wind industry insiders, President Trump’s new directive will bring fairness and order to offshore wind development. Anyone committed to protecting our natural resources should welcome these changes.”

Vineyard Wind spokesman Craig Gilvarg said Tuesday that the company declined to comment about Trump's executive order, and a SouthCoast Wind representative did not immediately respond to a message from the Current.

Leases for millions of acres of offshore waters along the East Coast have already been auctioned off over the past 10 years - by both Republican and Democratic administrations. In fact, it was President Trump's administration that completed the initial lease sale of 132,370 acres to Vineyard Wind for $135 million in 2018.

The outgoing administration of President Joe Biden had made offshore wind a centerpiece of its energy and environmental policy, and during its final days it issued the final permits for SouthCoast Wind, and lifted the suspension order for Vineyard Wind that had been imposed since its blade failure incident last July.