Saving Seafood

MARYLAND: Maryland fires back against EPA claims about its offshore wind permit

July 22, 2025 — The Maryland Department of the Environment is defending the permit it issued to a wind farm proposed off the coast of Ocean City, after a challenge from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

The Thursday letter from Maryland Secretary of the Environment Serena McIlwain also said the state would not be reissuing the permit, as the EPA requested, because the state had not made a mistake that needed correcting.

The EPA had contended that when Maryland issued the permit to Baltimore-based company US Wind, it identified the wrong process for citizens to file appeals.

Amy Van Blarcom-Lackey, EPA administrator for Region 3, which includes Maryland and other mid-Atlantic states, contended in a July 7 letter that any appeals challenging the air pollution permit issued to US Wind should be filed to the clerk of the EPA’s Environmental Appeals Board.

But Maryland argues that its permit would need to be appealed through the state courts, which would involve filing a challenge at the appropriate circuit court — in this case in Worcester County.

Notably, the due date for a state court challenge has already passed. It was set for July 14 — about a month after MDE issued the permit, according to MDE’s website.

Read the full article at WTOP

Trump adds new level of scrutiny to wind and solar projects

July 18, 2025 — The Interior Department said Thursday that it would add additional layers of review for wind and solar energy projects, following President Donald Trump’s executive order aimed at ending any “preferential treatment” for renewable energy.

The new requirement threatens to trip up the approval process as wind and solar projects race to begin construction by a deadline next July to qualify for tax credits, which have been gutted by Trump’s signature One Big Beautiful Bill that Congress approved this month. The department’s policies apply to projects on federal lands and waters, but generally not to those on private property.

Also on Thursday, Trump issued a proclamation exempting several coal plants in Ohio, Colorado and Illinois from stricter Biden-era rules limiting mercury and other toxic emissions through 2029.

“The Federal Government plays a pivotal role in ensuring that the Nation’s power supply remains secure and reliable,” the proclamation said. “Forcing energy producers to comply with unattainable emissions controls jeopardizes this mission.”

Separate proclamations gave exemptions from toxic emissions rules to 25 chemical manufacturers including Shell Chemical and to certain iron ore processing facilities, including two operated by the U.S. Steel Corporation.

Read the full article at The Washington Post

Fulton Fish Market Cooperative rallies to urge Trump to halt Empire Wind project

July 18, 2025 — Bronx, New York City, USA-based Fulton Fish Market Cooperative held an emergency rally on 16 July to urge U.S. President Donald Trump to halt the Empire Wind offshore wind project that seafood industry stakeholders claim will put their livelihoods at risk.

Seafood industry stakeholders gathered at the event – many of whom were unionized employees of the market – said the project threatens their livelihoods and those in New York’s seafood industry. Fulton Fish Market Cooperative CEO Nicole Ackerina said the project will heavily damage the industry and push it out of the region.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

EPA Seeks to Assert Authority Over Maryland’s Offshore Wind Project Appeals

July 17, 2025 — The federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) attempted to assert its authority “at the eleventh hour” over the final approvals for Maryland’s first offshore wind project. The deadline was on July 14 for appeals on the final approval for the project, and according to media reports, the EPA sent a letter last week asserting the appeal was under its jurisdiction and not the state’s authority.

In a letter from the region EPA administrator to Maryland’s Department of the Environment posted online by Maryland Matters, the EPA asserts that it has “identified an error” in the state’s final permit decision, which it asserts could “result in invalidation of the permit on appeal and confusion among relevant stakeholders.” The letter contends that the authority to issue to permit was under federal authority delegated to the state, and as such, the appeal is under the EPA’s oversight.

The EPA was calling for Maryland to reissue the final permit decision for US Wind. Maryland, however, on its website for the process added a footnote saying “A previous version of this webpage also described a separate permit appeals process through the U.S. EPA. The appeals process for this permit is through the State of Maryland only, and the language describing the U.S. EPA appeals process has been removed.” It also reissued the public notice in early June, a month before the EPA’s letter.

Read the full article at The Maritime Executive

MASSACHUSETTS: One Year Later, Vineyard Wind Blade Failure Still Unfolding

July 16, 2025 — One year ago today, Nantucket residents awoke to reports that green debris was littering the south shore beaches from Madaket out to Tom Nevers. It quickly became clear that the thousands of pieces of fiberglass and foam had floated to the island from the Vineyard Wind farm 15 miles to the southwest following a blade failure.

After failing to notify the town about the incident for 48 hours, Vineyard Wind finally acknowledged the situation following the initial reports of debris washing up and dispatched a team to the island to begin the assessment and cleanup. But in those first few hours, it was the island’s lifeguards – some of them just teenagers – who collected the largest and most dangerous pieces of debris from the surf. Despite warnings not to, residents took it upon themselves to gather and dispose of the blade pieces.

The incident rapidly became a regional and then national news story as the town announced that all of Nantucket’s south shore beaches were closed to swimmers “due to large floating debris and sharp fiberglass shards.”

Within hours, the federal government agency responsible for monitoring the Vineyard Wind project – the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE) – shut down the multi-billion-dollar project. The story of Vineyard Wind’s blade failure and the revelations that followed – including manufacturing deviations and allegations of a safety data falsification scheme at a wind turbine blade plant in Canada – would become the biggest news story of the past year.

Twelve months later, while some parts of the story have concluded, others are still unfolding and remain unresolved.

Read the full article at the Nantucket Current

Seafood workers, supporters rally at Fulton market against Empire Wind

July 16, 2025 — The Fulton Fish Market Cooperative hosted a July 15 rally at its Hunts Point facility in the Bronx to protest the Empire Wind energy project, now under construction around traditional fishing grounds off New York.

“Offshore wind is not a supplement to our industry, it is a direct replacement,” Nicole Ackerina, CEO of the Fulton cooperative, said in a joint statement after the rally with union workers, commercial fishermen from New York and New Jersey, and coastal advocates.

“These projects will eliminate access to vital fishing grounds, destabilize our seafood infrastructure, and trade American jobs for short-term foreign-backed construction contracts.”

Fulton employs 1,200 full-time workers, including 500 Bronx residents, most of them union members, said Ackerina.

“Our industry feeds America. NOAA (the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) reported that in 2022, New York’s seafood industry supported nearly 70,000 jobs and over $9.2 billion in sales. New Jersey supported more than 72,000 jobs and $12.9 billion in sales. This is not expendable.”

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

NEW YORK: NYC fishermen beg Trump to rethink offshore windfarm that could devastate marine life

July 16, 2025 — Commercial fishing workers pleaded with President Trump to again maroon a wind project off the Long Island shore – arguing Tuesday the green energy initiative could throw the industry into disarray.

Business and environmental organizations gathered at the Fulton Fish Market Cooperative in the Bronx early Tuesday to emphasize the devastating effects the Empire Wind One project could have on fishermen’s jobs and marine life.

The Trump administration temporarily paused the project in April while it was already under construction, launching a review of the permits issued during former President Joe Biden’s administration. The stop was lifted a month later.

Read the full article at The New York Post

Trump’s EPA flags a problem with offshore wind permit issued by Maryland

July 16, 2025 — Federal officials are calling on the state to reissue a permit for a wind farm planned off the Ocean City coast, to correct what they say is an error in the original document.

In a July 7 letter to the Maryland Department of the Environment, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency took issue with the process that MDE laid out to appeal the final construction permit awarded to US Wind.

The state said any challenge to the state permit would have to go through state courts, but EPA Region 3 Administrator Amy Van Blarcom-Lackey said that any appeal would have to be filed with the clerk of the EPA’s Environmental Appeals Board.

“Failure to rectify this error could result in invalidation of the permit on appeal and confusion among relevant stakeholders with respect to where to bring such an appeal,” Blarcom-Lackey wrote.

MDE spokesperson Jay Apperson said in a statement that the agency is reviewing Blarcom-Lackey’s letter and is “committed to ensuring all our permit processes are transparent and in accordance with the law.” An official with US Wind said the company is “confident that all of our project’s permits were validly issued.”

Read the full article at Maryland Matters

MASSACHSUETTS: Maker of broken Vineyard Wind blade will pay Nantucket $10.5 million

July 15, 2025 — GE Vernova, the manufacturer of the faulty Vineyard Wind turbine blade that broke and washed onto Massachusetts shores one year ago, has agreed to pay the Town of Nantucket $10.5 million to compensate for impacts to the town and local businesses during what was peak summer tourist season.

In the days after the blade broke on July 13, 2024, the town closed beaches to swimming out of safety concerns over fiberglass shards. A local surfing business told town officials in meetings that followed about cancelled lessons. Local officials, eventually with the assistance of company officials, engaged in beach cleanups.

Under the agreement, the town will establish a “Community Claims Fund” to be administered by a third party, which will review claims submitted for cleanups, property damage and lost profit, and dole out compensation.

“We are pleased to have reached a final settlement agreement with the Town of Nantucket to provide compensation for any impacted local businesses,” said a GE Vernova spokesperson in an email Friday.

Nantucket may use any funds not dispensed through the claims process “at its discretion in the public’s interest,” per the 17-page settlement.

The multi-million dollar settlement “finally and forever” releases GE Vernova, Vineyard Wind and the town from “any and all” claims and suits related to the 2024 blade incident. It also binds the Town of Nantucket in an agreement to not sue GE Vernova over the incident.

Notably, the town stated it “would not accept” Vineyard Wind as a signatory to the settlement, though Vineyard Wind still benefits from it.

“The Town has found Vineyard Wind wanting in terms of its leadership, accountability, transparency, and stewardship in the aftermath of the blade failure,” reads the town’s FAQ page. Vineyard Wind is constructing the offshore wind farm about 15 miles south of Nantucket, using turbines built by GE Vernova.

The Light contacted both Vineyard Wind and the town Friday morning for clarification on whether Vineyard Wind requested to be a signatory on the settlement.

Read the full article at The New Bedford Light

MASSACHUSETTS: Vineyard Wind Blade Break Reverberates One Year Later

July 11, 2025 — One year ago Sunday, the U.S. Coast Guard got a report it had never received before.

At 7:01 p.m., about 20 miles off the Vineyard’s southern shore, large pieces of debris were scattered in the water near the Vineyard Wind wind farm.

Green and white bits of fiberglass and foam, some the size of kitchen tables, were floating in the water, and eventually, with the help of wind and tides, would make their way onto Nantucket beaches.

Nantucket charter fishing Capt. Carl Bois was one of the first people to see the bobbing detritus off the outer continental shelf when he was out on his boat the next day.

“I’ve never seen anything on the water quite like that,” he said at the time.

Not long after, Vineyarders, Nantucketers, state lawmakers and some of the highest ranking officials in Washington, D.C. learned all too well what Mr. Bois was seeing: pieces of a broken Vineyard Wind turbine blade.

On July 13, 2024, the 107-meter GE Vernova Haliade-X turbine blade on the offshore wind energy farm’s southernmost turbine snapped unexpectedly and dumped thousands of pieces of fiberglass into the ocean. Broken about 20 meters from its base, a large portion of the blade would later drop into the water, sinking to the bottom.

Read the full article at the Vineyard Gazette