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Judge in Virginia Hands Trump 3rd Setback This Week on Wind Farms

January 20, 2026 — President Trump’s efforts to stifle the offshore wind power industry suffered a third legal setback this week, after a federal judge ruled on Friday that an $11.2 billion wind farm off the coast of Virginia can resume construction.

The Interior Department last month ordered all work to stop on the Virginia wind farm and four other offshore wind projects under construction, citing unspecified national security concerns. The developers of the projects have all sued in various courts, arguing that the government failed to justify its actions and that any delays would cause irreparable harm to the companies.

So far, judges have sided with the companies. On Friday, Judge Jamar K. Walker of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia issued a preliminary injunction that would allow the Virginia wind farm to continue construction while its developer, Dominion Energy, pursues its legal case against the stop-work order.

Separate federal judges this week have already issued preliminary injunctions that allowed two other projects — Revolution Wind, off Rhode Island and Empire Wind, off New York — to restart construction.

Read the full article at The New York Times

Burgum ordered Revolution Wind’s August halt, documents show

January 16, 2026 — Interior Secretary Doug Burgum personally ordered the halt of an offshore wind project off of New England in August, but federal officials later downplayed his participation, according to emails obtained by POLITICO’s E&E News.

Such direct involvement from a political appointee in an individual project is unusual, analysts and industry experts say. The sequence of events, shown in documents released to E&E News in a public records request, hint at the extent to which some of the most senior officials in the Trump administration are involved in the president’s anti-wind agenda.

Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management issued a stop-work order for Revolution Wind in August. The $6.2 billion offshore wind project is expected to generate enough power for 350,000 homes in Rhode Island and Connecticut.

Read the full article at E&E News

Rebuking Trump Administration, Judge Allows Revolution Wind To Continue Construction

January 14, 2025 — A federal judge ruled Monday that Revolution Wind can continue construction work as its legal appeal of the Trump administration’s freeze on federal leases for offshore wind projects progresses. Revolution Wind, located off Rhode Island, is one of three wind farms suing over the pause, which the Trump administration claims is necessary to mitigate national security concerns.

District of Columbia Judge Royce Lamberth said the federal government did not provide sufficient justification for the freeze and found that Revolution Wind was likely to succeed on the merits of the case.

Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum claimed that the pause “addresses emerging national security risks, including the rapid evolution of the relevant adversary technologies, and the vulnerabilities created by large-scale offshore wind projects with proximity near our east coast population centers.”

The Trump administration has been vague about the specific nature of its national security concerns, and some critics have alleged that the government’s actions are more related to President Donald Trump’s personal dislike of wind turbines.

Revolution Wind called the administration’s actions unlawful, saying it had consulted with the Department of Defense on potential national security issues and had even reached a formal mitigation agreement.

Read the full article at the Nantucket Current

Judge Strikes Down Trump’s Latest Effort to Stop Offshore Wind Project

January 13, 2026 — A federal judge on Monday ruled that construction could resume on a $6.2 billion wind farm off the coast of Rhode Island, striking down the Trump administration’s decision last month to halt work on the Revolution Wind project.

Judge Royce Lamberth of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ruled that the Interior Department’s suspension order was “arbitrary and capricious” in violation of federal law.

Revolution Wind is one of five offshore wind projects under construction along the East Coast that were ordered to stop work last month by the Trump administration, which cited unspecified national security concerns. Several states, as well as developers of four of the projects, have challenged the move in court. The case involving Revolution Wind was the first complaint to be heard.

The decision is a temporary victory for Revolution Wind and the offshore wind industry, which has been roiled by the Trump administration’s efforts to block offshore wind farms that had received permits under the Biden administration. Orsted, the Danish energy giant that is building Revolution Wind, can now continue with construction as litigation it has filed against the Trump administration proceeds.

Read the full article at The New York Times

Offshore wind developer prevails in U.S. court as Trump calls wind farms ‘losers’

January 13, 2026 — A federal judge ruled Monday that work on a major offshore wind farm for Rhode Island and Connecticut can resume, handing the industry at least a temporary victory as President Trump seeks to shut it down.

At the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Senior Judge Royce Lamberth said the government did not explain why it could not take action short of a complete stop to construction on Revolution Wind while it considers ways to mitigate its national security concerns. He said it also did not provide sufficient reasoning for its change in position.

Revolution Wind has received all of its federal permits and is nearly 90% complete to provide power for Rhode Island and Connecticut.

Trump says his goal is to not let any “windmills” be built. Three energy developers are challenging the administration’s freeze of their offshore wind projects in the federal courts this week.

Danish energy company Orsted, Norwegian company Equinor, and Dominion Energy Virginia each sued to ask the courts to vacate and set aside the administration’s Dec. 22 order to freeze five big projects on the East Coast over national security concerns. Orsted’s hearing was first on its Revolution Wind project. Orsted said it will soon resume construction to deliver affordable, reliable power to the Northeast.

Read the full article at The Associated Press

Trump cites national security risk to defend wind freeze in court

January 12, 2026 — The Interior Department is defending its decision to halt construction of the Revolution Wind project off the coasts of Rhode Island and Connecticut over alleged national security concerns.

The agency is facing a flurry of legal challenges after Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management ordered a 90-day pause on construction for the New England energy farm, along with four other offshore wind projects along the Eastern Seaboard. Those projects are Empire Wind 1, Sunrise Wind, Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind and Vineyard Wind 1.

The agency decided the Dec. 22 order was necessary after the Department of Defense (renamed the Department of War by President Donald Trump) issued a classified report late last year about the security risks of offshore wind, Justice Department attorneys said in a Thursday brief to the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

Read the full article at E&E News

‘Specific’ Revolution Wind national security risks remain classified in court documents

January 12, 2026 — A recent federal analysis revealed new and specific national security risks posed by offshore wind, including Rhode Island’s nearly completed Revolution Wind project,  according to the Trump administration.

But, it’s classified.

Federal regulators, and the U.S. Department of Justice attorneys representing them in court, offered little explanation for the abrupt suspension of five East Coast wind projects, including Revolution Wind, in court filings submitted Thursday. The tranche of documents, spanning 160 pages, defends the Interior Department’s Dec. 22 stop work order, which is being challenged by the Revolution Wind project developers, along with the companies behind three of the four other projects. The companies have each turned to federal courts to attempt to bar the Trump administration from interfering in their projects, claiming the 90-day suspension is an executive overreach that violates constitutional separation of powers, among other laws.

For the 65-turbine Revolution Wind project already 87% complete south of Rhode Island’s coastline, the late December halt to construction was especially harmful. The 704-megawatt project already endured a monthlong pause from August to September when federal regulators first sought to stop work under the guise of national security concerns.

The initial stop work order was temporarily tossed by U.S. Senior Judge Royce Lamberth of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Lamberth is scheduled to consider the second request for a preliminary injunction from the Revolution Wind developers, joined by the Rhode Island and Connecticut AGs, on Monday.

Read the full article at the Rhode Island Current

Offshore Wind Projects Challenge Trump Administration’s Order to Stop Work

January 5, 2026 — Developers of five offshore wind farms that were ordered last week by the Trump administration to halt construction are suing to restart work on at least three of the projects.

The Interior Department on Dec. 22 ordered companies to halt work on five wind farms in various stages of construction along the East Coast. They were: Sunrise Wind and Empire Wind, both off the coast of New York; Revolution Wind off Rhode Island and Connecticut; Vineyard Wind 1 off the coast of Massachusetts; and Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind off Virginia.

The administration cited unspecified national security concerns about the projects.

On Thursday, Orsted, the Danish energy giant that is building Revolution Wind, filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. On Friday Equinor, the developer of Empire Wind, did the same.

Both companies said they are seeking preliminary injunctions that would allow construction to continue as the litigation proceeds. Orsted is also building Sunrise Wind and said it was considering a similar legal challenge to restart work on that project, too.

Read the full article at The New York Times

 

RHODE ISLAND: Oysters remain king in Rhode Island’s aquaculture economy

January 2, 2025 — A boom in oyster sales is fueling Rhode Island’s aquaculture industry to its most successful period since data tracking started in 1995, according to the state Coastal Resources Management Council.

In 2024, oysters remained the most popular aquaculture product with 11,595,512 pieces sold for consumption, according to the CRMC annual report. The number of aquaculture sites, the farm-gate value, total farm workers and more all increased during the year.

In 1995, the total dollar value of all aquaculture was $83,518. Fast forward to 2024, when that figure skyrocketed to $8,795,493, a 9.37% increase since 2023, according to the report. Oyster seeds sales also saw a jump of 4.41%.

While farmers also grow crops such as sugar kelp, clams and scallops, Eastern oysters remain the backbone of the state’s aquaculture industry.

Read the full article at The Independent

Four Governors Protest Latest Wind Farm Stoppage

January 2, 2025 — Gov. Kathy Hochul and the governors of Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Massachusetts have written to Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum to demand rescission of the Trump administration’s Dec. 22 pause of leases for five wind farms under construction, including Sunrise Wind and Empire Wind off New York and Revolution Wind off Rhode Island and Connecticut.

In the latest round of on-again, off-again whiplash with respect to offshore wind, the Dec. 22 announcement escalates the president’s hostility to the renewable energy source, which he has criticized by citing multiple falsehoods. The latest rationale, according to the Interior Department, is that wind farms could interfere with radar systems.

The five wind farms “have already been subject to extensive federal review, including an assessment that expressly addressed national security considerations,” the governors wrote to Mr. Burgum on Dec. 24. “Neither the Department of the Interior [Bureau of Ocean Energy Management], nor any other federal agency, including the Department of Defense, informed our respective States of any purportedly new risk prior to these suspensions nor did they account for our States’ substantial reliance interests — our States’ economies are dependent on the power that these projects will generate — in these vital projects that already have undergone many federal approvals, including from the DoD. The absence of such notice undermines our ability to plan effectively and violates basic principles of cooperative federalism. The sudden emergence of a new ‘national security threat’ appears to be less a legitimate, rational finding of fact and more a pretextual excuse to justify a predetermined outcome consistent with the president’s frequently stated personal opposition to offshore wind.”

Read the full article at The East Hampton Star