January 21, 2025 — President Donald Trump ordered a halt to new leases and permits for wind projects on his first day back at the White House.
The order stops short of freezing construction of offshore projects along the East Coast, as sought by wind opponents and feared by the industry’s supporters. But it does direct the Interior secretary to review existing wind permits.
The moves amounted to an extraordinary attack on America’s largest renewable energy industry, both on land and at sea.
January 20, 2025 (Saving Seafood) — WASHINGTON — In an order signed in the Oval Office this evening, President Donald J. Trump issued a memorandum to the Secretary of the Treasury, the Attorney General, the Secretary of the Interior, the Secretary of Agriculture, the Secretary of Energy, and the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency directing the temporary withdrawal of all areas on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) from wind energy leasing and calling for a comprehensive review of federal wind leasing and permitting practices.
The memorandum, “Temporary Withdrawal of All Areas on the Outer Continental Shelf from Offshore Wind Leasing and Review of the Federal Government’s Leasing and Permitting Practices for Wind Projects”, is effective tomorrow, January 21, 2025, and includes the following directives:
The memorandum will be published in the Federal Register.
January 17, 2025 — New Jersey Congressman Jeff Van Drew, a Republican from Cape May County, said he’s working with President-elect Donald Trump on an executive order that “would halt offshore wind on the East Coast.”
“These offshore wind projects should have never been approved in the first place,” Van Drew said in a statement, referring to President Joe Biden’s effort to expand renewable energy as a “reckless green agenda that put politics over people.”
He says the executive order is just the first step in reversing course on the state’s offshore wind development.
“We will fight tooth and nail to prevent this offshore wind catastrophe from wreaking havoc on the hardworking people who call our coastal towns home,” Van Drew said.
January 17, 2025 — President-elect Donald Trump tasked a New Jersey congressman and vocal critic of offshore wind with writing an executive order he could issue to halt wind energy projects.
Offshore wind is a major part of transitioning to an electric grid powered entirely by sources that don’t emit carbon dioxide when generating electricity. The power sector is responsible for nearly a third of the nation’s planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions. On the campaign trail, Trump vowed to end the offshore wind industry as soon as he returned to the White House. He wants to boost production of fossil fuels such as oil, natural gas and coal, which cause climate change, in order for the U.S. to have the lowest-cost energy and electricity of any nation in the world, he says.
Republican Rep. Jeff Van Drew said he spoke with Trump by phone about a month ago and urged him to act on his campaign promise.
January 16, 2025 — A local grassroots organization is continuing its battle in the courtroom to have offshore wind farms off Long Beach Island and Brigantine scrapped in perpetuity without a chance of being revived in the future, even as President-elect Donald J. Trump prepares to deliver on his campaign promise to permanently stop offshore wind energy projects off the East Coast under his administration.
A presidential executive order halting wind turbine activity off the East Coast is expected to be finalized in the first few months of his second presidency.
“These offshore wind projects should never have been approved in the first place,” Congressman Jeff Van Drew said Jan. 13, adding he has been working closely with Trump to draft the order, which also lays the groundwork for permanent measures against the projects.
Whether the permanent measures are related to national security is unknown, but in November, Sweden, a country viewed as wind turbine friendly, rejected certain offshore wind projects in the Baltic Sea due to concerns over radar interference and national security.
What is known is that in the days almost immediately following Sweden’s action, elevated drone sightings over New Jersey and other East Coast states began. Those reports reached a frenzy last month as federal agencies punted on what New Jersey residents were seeing and where the so-called drone incursions originated. (See related story in this edition.)
“That’s one of the issues connected to this (Atlantic Shores) project because we have military radars in Gibbsboro, N.J.,” Bob Stern, president of Save LBI, said at the time, explaining radar is used to protect against unwanted activities in the ocean and would be impacted by offshore wind turbines.
“There have been rumblings from our Department of Defense about this project and other projects. We’ve not been able to really get a lot of information about that, maybe because some of it is classified. But I’m pretty sure our defense department has had some issues with this (radar interference) as well,” Stern said.
Atlantic Shores Offshore Wind did not respond to a request for comment as of The SandPaper deadline.
Meanwhile, Van Drew said earlier this week the outgoing administration rammed offshore wind projects through an approval process that lacked proper oversight, transparent lease agreements and a full understanding of the consequences.
“They are an economic and environmental disaster waiting to happen,” Van Drew said. “President Trump is committed to stopping these harmful projects and is taking decisive action. This executive order is just the beginning. We will fight tooth and nail to prevent this offshore wind catastrophe from wreaking havoc on the hardworking people who call our coastal towns home.”
Paulina O’Connor, executive director of the New Jersey Offshore Wind Alliance, disagrees.
“It is well documented that all proposed offshore wind projects go through rigorous reviews at all levels of government and there are extensive processes in place to provide members of the public the opportunity to participate in hearings and provide comments on all proposed projects. Recent comments and actions suggesting otherwise are misleading,” O’Connor said when reached the evening of Jan. 13. “Offshore wind remains New Jersey’s best solution to achieve energy independence.”
January 15, 2025 — President-elect Donald Trump said the U.S. government would no longer subsidize new windmill farms and reiterated his stance that he doesn’t “want even one built” during his administration in his latest tirade against renewable energy—but Trump might not be able to block production of turbines altogether.
Key Facts
Calling windmills “an economic and environmental disaster,” Trump wrote on Truth Social Wednesday he doesn’t “want even one built during my administration,” calling them the “most expensive energy” that only works “with massive government subsidies, which we will no longer pay.”
Trump also called for all “dead and broken” windmills to “be ripped down ASAP” and included a video about debris from a broken turbine off the coast of Nantucket littering the beach.
Trump initially proposed “a policy where no windmills are being built” earlier this month, but, as The New York Times notes, he would not be able to control what is built on private land, and he could influence but not fully dictate what is built on federal lands since companies that have already been issued permits are legally allowed to continue their projects.
January 14, 2025 — At the urging of a New Jersey congressman, offshore wind activities would have to hit the brakes under a new executive order that places a temporary moratorium on the industry.
Offshore wind developers — like they’ve done for years — continue to analyze lease areas to determine where offshore wind farms might be constructed. Hundreds are planned across the East Coast, including New Jersey.
U.S. Rep. Jeff Van Drew, R-2nd District, has been among the most vocal government critics of the nascent energy provider, which has yet to build one offshore wind farm off Jersey’s coast. Last week, the congressman said — at the behest of President-elect Donald Trump’s team — his office drafted an executive order that if issued (action from Congress is not needed) would halt offshore wind activities for six months for a review.
The pause, first reported by NJ Spotlight News, would be in place as federal regulators take a deeper look at the industry’s plans and impacts. Exactly what that means is not clear.
January 14, 2025 — New Jersey Republican Rep. Jeff Van Drew, one of Congress’ most vocal foes of offshore wind development, is working on an executive order with President-elect Donald Trump to stop the practice.
The order would halt federal work on offshore wind along the East Coast. Van Drew and other critics have accused the industry of harming whales and fishing. NJ Spotlight News was first to report the development.
“The Biden administration’s reckless green agenda put politics over people, and that ends now,” Van Drew said in a statement. “President Trump is committed to stopping these harmful projects and is taking decisive action.”
January 14, 2025 — Facing the existential threat of a new Trump administration, offshore wind power advocates are mounting their own post-election campaign to win critical support from Republican and Democratic lawmakers and governors.
President-elect Donald Trump’s campaign promise to make sure offshore wind development “ends on day one” of his new administration has cast a pall over the fledgling U.S. wind industry – raising the prospect of the incoming administration cutting off environmental and construction permits and blocking any future offshore wind lease sales by the Bureau of Offshore Energy Management (BOEM).
Wind industry advocates are scrambling to make their case that offshore wind is good for Trump’s stated goals of rebuilding U.S. industry and jobs. Since 2016, wind power companies have invested in purpose-built, U.S.-flagged vessels and have helped promote the use of hybrid power over traditional diesel propulsion – a shift that is being adopted by ferry and passenger vessel operators too.
Pitching U.S. offshore wind power as a bipartisan success story, Liz Burdock, president and CEO of the industry group Oceantic Network, credits Trump’s first administration for helping to get the industry off the ground.
“When President-elect Donald Trump takes office, he will re-inherit an industry he kickstarted. Eight years ago, the first Trump administration began implementing the fundamental framework for our modern offshore wind industry and oversaw three federal lease sales that netted $456 million for the federal treasury,” Burdock wrote in the Nov. 22 issue of Recharge.
January 10, 2025 — Debate surrounding the recent deaths of several large whales that have washed up on New England shores ramped up this week after President-elect Donald Trump linked the fatalities to offshore wind development.
During a Jan. 7 press conference at Mar-a-Lago, Trump called wind energy “the most expensive energy ever” and likened wind turbines to “dropping garbage in a field.” He specifically pointed to the Massachusetts area, and said, “the windmills are driving the whales crazy, obviously.” Trump vowed to halt offshore wind development.
His comments have drawn mixed reactions. Scientists and environmental organizations emphasized that there is no current evidence linking wind farms to whale deaths, while some activists welcomed Trump’s support for halting offshore wind development amid ongoing concerns about its impact on marine life.
“Offshore wind is dangerous to marine life, very costly to build (and) maintain, and will harm the critically endangered North Atlantic right whales,” Vallorie Oliver, president of ACK for Whales, a Nantucket-based grassroots group, said.