(The Center Square) – A second New York offshore wind farm can resume construction after being halted by the Trump administration nearly two months ago over unspecified national security risks, a federal judge ruled Monday.
The ruling by U.S. District Judge Royce Lambert in Washington rejected the Interior Department’s claim that national security concerns outweighed any harm to the developers from a pause. Work on the 924-megawatt Sunrise Wind project off New York’s coast can resume immediately while the court fight plays out.
“Every court to review this question has now found that the loss of specialized vessels and resulting delays amounts to irreparable harm. I agree,” Lambert wrote in the ruling.
Lambert’s ruling is the latest to blow to the Trump administration’s efforts to scuttle the offshore wind projects, and comes nearly three weeks after another federal judge cleared New York’s Empire Wind project to resume construction.
Orstead, the Danish company behind Sunrise and Revolution Wind, off Rhode Island’s coast, sued the Interior Department for halting construction of the projects. In court filings, lawyers for the company said it is losing about $1.5 million a day amid the shutdown of the project, which is nearly 45% complete. It will be capable of powering more than 600,000 homes, the company says.
“The project will resume construction work as soon as possible, with safety as the top priority, to deliver affordable, reliable power to the State of New York,” the company said in a statement in response to Monday’s ruling.
Gov. Kathy Hochul called the ruling a “big win for New York workers, families, and our future” and said it “puts union workers back on the job, keeps billions in private investment in New York, and delivers the clean, reliable power our grid needs, especially as extreme weather becomes more frequent.”
“The Trump administration tried to shut down this fully permitted project under a bogus claim of national security,” she said in a statement. “But energy independence is national security.”
There was no immediate response from the Interior Department to the ruling.
In December, the Interior Department halted federal leases for Sunrise and four other large-scale offshore wind projects under construction: Empire Wind 1 project in New York, Revolution Wind, Vineyard Wind in Massachusetts and Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind. All of those projects have now been allowed to resume construction following court rulings over the past two weeks.
Interior Secretary Doug Burgum cited unspecified national security risks posed by the offshore wind turbines in pausing federal permits for the projects, but said the move is aimed at “protecting” the American people. In court documents, lawyers for the department said the security risks were based on classified reports.
President Donald Trump has vowed to end federal support for offshore wind and other clean energy projects as he focuses on boosting fossil fuel production as part of broader efforts to improve the nation’s energy independence.
In September, the president directed the U.S. Department of Transportation to cancel $679 million in federal funding for a dozen infrastructure projects that would support New England Wind and other projects, saying the plans “were not aligned with the goals and priorities of the administration.”
Wind currently provides about 10% of the electricity generated in the U.S., making it the nation’s largest source of renewable energy, according to federal data.
