Saving Seafood

NEW JERSEY: South Jersey congressman working with Trump to halt offshore wind

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.

Read the full article at whyy

MASSACHUSETTS: Can a $10M wind-energy center in New Bedford withstand opposition from locals and Trump?

January 17, 2025 — A state agency will continue efforts to develop a more than $10 million offshore-wind-based, ocean-energy innovation center in New Bedford in 2025, despite national opposition to offshore wind and local opposition to a proposed site.

Nationally, President-elect Donald Trump has vowed to halt offshore wind development.

Locally, an attorney has compiled 236 signatures in opposition to the center’s “preferred” site, a 17,000-square-foot parking lot abutting the Bourne Counting House off McArthur Drive on Homer’s Wharf, leased through the Port Authority. The center would include the Bourne Counting House building, which would be renovated.

Read the full article at The Herald News

Trump tasks congressman with writing executive order he could issue to halt offshore wind

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.

Read the full article at the Associated Press

NEW JERSEY: Trump on Track to Halt Wind Farms Approved Off LBI

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.”

Read the full article at The Sand Paper

East Coast ‘slow zone’ to protect endangered whales withdrawn

January 16, 2025 — Federal officials have withdrawn a proposed slow zone for ferries, ships and large boats along the U.S. East Coast after months of heated criticism from Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket, and other coastal communities. Whale conservationists lamented the move as a major loss, saying the proposal was a “much-needed” effort to protect critically endangered North Atlantic right whales from extinction.

In a document filed Wednesday morning, officials from a division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said they decided to withdraw the plan after receiving 90,000 public comments — many of which included requests for more public engagement.

“Despite its best efforts, [the National Marine Fisheries Service] does not have sufficient time to finalize this regulation in this Administration due to the scope and volume of public comments,” the filing said. “NMFS hereby withdraws the August 2022 proposed rule and terminates this rulemaking proceeding.”

Read the full article at Connecticut Public

Trump Again Vows To Stop Windmill Production—Here’s Why He Might Not Be Able To

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.

Read the full article at Forbes

Supreme Court won’t hear Vineyard Wind case; ACK for Whales files new suits

January 15, 2025 — The U.S. Supreme Court will not hear ACK for Whales‘ case against Vineyard Wind, which claimed the permitting process that allowed the 64-turbine wind farm to be built was flawed.

But the local opposition group isn’t being deterred by the latest legal setback, announcing Monday it is filing new litigation against the Department of the Interior and other federal agencies for the permitting of New England Wind, a separate proposed wind farm project 24 miles southwest of Nantucket.

ACK for Whales board member Veronica Bonnet said it was disappointing the highest court in the land did not hear the case, but that it was a long shot. Only 1% of the roughly 8,000 cases that are petitioned to the Supreme Court each year are chosen to be heard, according to the court’s website.

Read the full article at Mass Live

MASSACHUSETTS: Nantucket session with offshore wind regulators moved due to ‘volume of questions’

January 15, 2025 — The volume of questions about an offshore wind turbine blade folding over and sending broken pieces into the ocean, which occurred on July 13 south of the Islands, has led to a rescheduled meeting between Nantucket leaders and federal regulators.

The public information meeting the leaders were planning to host next week with the regulators about the Vineyard Wind 1 project and the blade failure has been moved to Feb. 3.

In December, the Nantucket Select Board invited the public to submit questions they had about the project for representatives of the federal Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement. An announcement from the Select Board this week about the meeting date change explained, “due to the volume of questions received by BSEE, more time was needed to process and prepare responses adequately.”

The Zoom meeting, previously slated for Jan. 14, will convene at 5 p.m. on Feb. 3.

Read the full article at Cape Cod Times

Republican drafting anti-offshore wind order with Trump

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.”

Read the full article at E&E News

How a Maryland county tried to sway a Delaware vote on offshore wind

January 14, 2025 — In early December, a new website appeared online urging Sussex County, Delaware, residents to contact their council members and tell them to deny a permit for a proposed offshore wind farm.

The website – StopOffshoreWind.com – materialized days before the Sussex County Council’s vote on the permit, which would allow for construction of an electrical substation needed by US Wind Inc. to build its massive ocean-based power plant.

StopOffshoreWind.com included the names and contact information for council members, as well as an online message form under the phrase, “Write a Letter to your Sussex County Councilmembers.”

“Tell the Sussex County Council to DENY this permit,” it said.

What it did not show were the names of the people or companies that had created and funded it.

Spotlight Delaware has since learned that the website was the creation of a coalition of Maryland wind farm opponents, funded and led by the government of Worcester County, home to Ocean City, a summer beach hotspot that is the primary driver of the county’s tourism-centered economy.

And, many of the local business owners there believe the sight of windmills 15 miles offshore would make the beaches less attractive to tourists.

Zach Bankert, executive director of the Ocean City Development Corp., said his group had led local opposition to offshore wind development in past years. But, with a staff of just two employees, he said the operation was too small to be effective, which is why the county’s Office of Tourism and Economic Development recently took it over.

Read the full article at Maryland Matters