Saving Seafood

MARYLAND: Maryland Democrats back offshore wind project awaiting key court decisions

November 3, 2025 — Top Maryland Democrats are coming out in full force to support a massive offshore wind project currently tied up in federal court.

Baltimore-based US Wind has faced an onslaught of challenges in recent months keeping the company from starting construction on a 114-turbine wind farm off the coast of Ocean City, which is estimated to generate enough power for 718,000 Maryland homes.

In October 2024, the Town of Ocean City and numerous plaintiffs representing the fishing and tourism industry filed a lawsuit against the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), challenging the federal permit approval process for US Wind’s project.

This September, the Trump administration asked the court to vacate the project’s Construction and Operations Plan — approved under the Biden administration — and send it back to BOEM for reevaluation, signaling plans to reverse approvals of the necessary permits.

If the court approves such a move, Ocean City’s lawsuit could become moot.

Read the full article at WYPR

Feds Gamble on Offshore Wind Funding for Future Cleanup

October 30, 2025 — For decades, nuclear power plant owners have been required by law to set aside money for decommissioning at the start of operations, but developers of two New England offshore wind farm projects face no such immediate mandate. The latter, according to a local grassroots organization, puts federal taxpayers at risk of being on the hook.

“BOEM (Bureau of Ocean Energy Management) abdicated its responsibility to the American people by relying heavily on the ‘financial strength’ of the project instead of upholding its duty to protect the environment, public health, and safety,” Thomas Stavola, attorney for Save LBI, said last week.

The group is taking BOEM to task over its 15-year deferral of financial responsibility for the owners of Rhode Island’s Revolution Wind and Massachusetts’ Vineyard Wind.

Stavola called the approvals “patently absurd.”

In an Oct. 16 letter, Save LBI, which has swelled to more than 10,000 supporters, urged the U.S. Department of the Interior “to end the egregious practice of letting operators of offshore wind farms postpone providing financial assurance earmarked for the future decommissioning and removal of turbines and related infrastructure.”

The group said the postponement provides the developers with an exorbitant amount of time to establish the necessary decommissioning funds it will take to remove the planned 127 turbines off the New England coast. Stavola and Bob Stern, Save LBI president and co-founder, signed the letter.

“BOEM authorized a deferral for Revolution Wind on the basis that ‘providing the full amount of its decommissioning financial assurance prior to receiving any revenue under its power purchase agreements would be an unnecessary and unreasonable financial burden on the company.’ However, such revenues are received by the company well before the 15-year deferral given,” according to the letter.

Save LBI is asking BOEM to revoke prior financial deferrals and require future approvals to fully fall in line with the Code of Federal Requirements.

In a statement released earlier this month, Save LBI said BOEM’s action does not take into consideration use of funding for unplanned events, such as Vineyard Wind’s blade failure last year, and heightens the chance developers would not be able to finance the removal of aging turbines from the ocean floor 15 years from now.

Read the full article at The Sand Paper

Judge denies motion to pause Ocean City wind farm litigation

October 6, 2025 — A federal judge denied the Trump administration’s bid to pause Ocean City’s lawsuit over offshore wind power due to the federal government shutdown.

Before the government shutdown, Judge Stephanie Gallagher was expected to issue a ruling that would either allow U.S. Wind to move forward or give the U.S. Department of the Interior the ability to pull back its approval. In August, the Department of the Interior, speaking for the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, joined Ocean City in asking the court to send the case back and vacate the prior approval.

The government’s Thursday filing asked the court to pause the case because the Department of Justice’s attorneys are “prohibited from working, even on a voluntary basis, with few exceptions” since the shutdown began on Wednesday.

Read the full article at the Miami Herald

Dept. of Justice Tells Court BOEM Will Review Atlantic Shores COP Approval

October 2, 2025 — The Department of Justice told a federal district court that it plans to review and likely change the approval of the Construction and Operation Plan for New Jersey’s Atlantic Shores South offshore wind farm. While the project has largely been abandoned for months, the move is symbolic because it was where candidate Donald Trump, during a 2024 campaign stop, vowed to bring an end to the offshore wind energy sector.

The filing, which was made on September 27, is similar to others the Department of Justice has made as part of pending lawsuits against wind farm projects from Massachusetts to Maryland. In each of the cases, DOJ has asked the court to stay the pending litigation brought by local activist groups, saying it was “potentially needless or wasteful litigation.” The Department of the Interior and its Bureau of Ocean Energy Management are involved in the cases as the local opposition repeatedly challenges the approvals given to the projects.

The Atlantic Shores South project, which would consist of two large offshore wind farms, received its final approval from BOEM in October 2024 for a project that would have been off the southern New Jersey coast. It called for 197 turbines that would have been at least 8.7 miles from Long Beach Island as part of a project to provide 2.8 GW of energy to the state.

Read the full article at The Maritime Executive

Revolution Wind can restart construction off Martha’s Vineyard, judge rules

September 25, 2025 — Construction on the 65-turbine Revolution Wind project off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard can resume after a federal district court judge granted the developers reprieve from a stop work order issued by the Trump administration.

In a ruling on Monday, D.C. district court Judge Royce Lamberth granted Revolution Wind a preliminary injunction, halting the enforcement of an Aug. 22 order from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, or BOEM.

“Revolution Wind has demonstrated likelihood of success on the merits of its underlying claims, it is likely to suffer irreparable harm in the absence of an injunction, the balance of the equities is in its favor, and maintaining the status quo by granting the injunction is in the public interest,” the judge wrote in his two-page opinion.

Read the full article at Mass Live

RHODE ISLAND: Revolution Wind Is Back On

September 25, 2025 — In the ongoing struggle over the offshore wind industry in the United States, the Danish energy company Orsted has won the latest round, with a federal judge issuing a preliminary injunction on Monday allowing construction to resume on its Revolution Wind farm.

Revolution Wind, a 65-turbine installation situated in federal waters on the outer continental shelf adjacent to the 12-turbine South Fork Wind farm around 35 miles off Montauk Point, was the subject of an Aug. 7 stop-work order issued by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management’s acting director. The “director’s order” ordered a halt to “all ongoing activities related to the Revolution Wind project on the outer continental shelf to allow time for it to address concerns that have arisen during the review that the department is undertaking.”

Read the full article at The East Hampton Star

US district judge lifts stop-work order on Ørsted offshore wind project

Sptember 23, 2025 — A U.S. judge has lifted a stop-work order on Ørsted’s Revolution Wind project, a large offshore wind installation off the nation’s East Coast.

The Revolution Wind project, which is being built off the coast of the U.S. state of Rhode Island, was halted in August after the Bureau of Energy Ocean Management (BOEM) issued a stop-work order, just weeks after it also canceled all offshore Wind Energy Area designations. BOEM issued a director’s order to halt “all ongoing activities” related to the project, which Ørsted said was 80 percent to completion.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

BOEM Tells Court it Wants to Resume Review of Permits for SouthCoast Wind

September 22, 2025 — The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management formally filed with a federal court on Thursday, September 18, calling for the court to set aside the actions of the Biden administration so that it can restart the environmental review on a Massachusetts offshore wind farm project as part of the Trump administration’s ongoing review of the industry.

The Department of Justice made the filing to the federal court as part of a legal action brought in March 2025 by Nantucket, which was challenging the approval of the Construction and Operation Plan for the proposed 2.4 GW SoutCoast Wind. The Department of the Interior and its BOEM are parties to the suit. They have asked that the case be postponed and the permits, which were granted on January 17, just days before the end of the Biden presidency, undergo further review.

The project, which was approved for up to 141 wind turbines and up to five offshore substation platforms, would be located 20 miles south of Nantucket and approximately 30 miles south of Martha’s Vineyard. It is being developed by Ocean Winds, which is a joint venture between EDP Renewables and Engie. They won the lease for the project originally known as Mayflower Wind at the end of 2018, and the company points out that it spent four years in the review and approval process before the Department of the Interior issued its Record of Decision on December 20.

Read the full article at The Maritime Executive

Trump administration moves to revoke permit for Massachusetts offshore wind project

September 22, 2025 — The Trump administration has moved to block a Massachusetts offshore wind farm, its latest effort to hobble an industry and technology that President Donald Trump has attacked as “ugly” and unreliable compared to fossil fuels such as coal and natural gas.

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, or BOEM, filed a motion in federal court Thursday seeking to take back its approval of the SouthCoast Wind project’s “construction and operations plan.’’ The plan is the last major federal permit the project needs before it can start putting turbines in the water.

SouthCoast Wind, to be built in federal waters about 23 miles south of Nantucket, is expected to construct as many as 141 turbines to power about 840,000 homes in Massachusetts and Rhode Island.

The Interior Department action is the latest by the Trump administration in what critics call an “all-out assault” on the wind energy industry.

Read the full article at The Associated Press

In latest anti-wind action, Trump administration moves to revoke SouthCoast Wind permit

September 22, 2025 — In another attack on offshore wind, the Trump administration is looking to reconsider a key permit for SouthCoast Wind, a planned 141-turbine project off the Massachusetts coast.

The move comes a week after it revoked the same permit for a proposed wind farm near Maryland, and represents the latest escalation in the administration’s attempt to kneecap the offshore wind industry. Already, the multi-agency effort has resulted in frozen federal permits, restrictions on where wind farms can be built, and new reviews of existing regulations to make sure they they “align with America’s energy priorities under President Donald J. Trump.”

On Thursday, the government filed a motion in U.S. District Court in Washington D.C. to take back its approval of the SouthCoast Wind project’s “construction and operations plan,” or COP. The COP is the last major federal permit an offshore wind project needs before it can start putting turbines in the water.

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management had approved SouthCoast’s COP on Jan. 17, 2025, three days before President Trump’s second term began.

“Based on its review to date, BOEM has determined that the COP approval may not have fully complied with the law regulating the use of federal waters over the outer continental shelf,” the government wrote. “That is reason enough to grant a remand.”

In a statement, SouthCoast Wind said the company “intends to vigorously defend our permits in federal court.”

Read the full article at Rhode Island PBS