March 25, 2026 — The Trump administration’s $1 billion payout to a French energy company to walk away from U.S. offshore wind development is a novel tactic against the industry that supporters see as creative — but opponents see as foolish and extreme.
The Interior Department announced Monday that TotalEnergies agreed to what is essentially a refund of its leases for projects off the coasts of North Carolina and New York, and will invest the money in a liquefied natural gas export terminal in Texas and other fossil fuel projects instead. The department hailed it as an “innovative agreement” with the French energy giant so that the “American people will no longer pay for ideological subsidies that benefited only the unreliable and costly offshore wind industry.”
The tactical shift comes after federal courts have thwarted President Donald Trump’s efforts to stop offshore wind through executive action.
U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, told The Associated Press on Tuesday that the payment “sets a dangerous precedent and is a shortsighted misuse of taxpayer dollars.”
Robin Shaffer, president of the anti-offshore wind group Protect Our Coast New Jersey, applauded what he called “out of the box” thinking. Shaffer said after losing in the courts, the administration needed a way to take back leases that never should have been issued because of the harm offshore wind development causes to the marine environment.