The Trump administration has waged a war on "windmills" and CLF has fought back, successfully, in the courts. Photo: Shutterstock
In 2021, construction began on Vineyard Wind 1, an offshore wind farm located about 15 miles south of Martha’s Vineyard. When complete, the project will harness 62 turbines to power more than 400,000 homes and businesses in Massachusetts with clean, affordable electricity.
Nonetheless, the Trump administration tried to kill it.
That effort is part of Trump’s war on “windmills.” On the very first day of his second term in office, Trump issued an executive order banning new wind projects and directing federal agencies to reevaluate existing approvals of permitted wind projects.
Last May, CLF, along with nine other environmental groups, responded to Trump’s nationwide wind ban by filing a “friend of the court” legal brief in the case of State of New York v. Trump. We argued that the court should immediately overturn the Trump administration’s counterproductive ban.
And the courts agreed with us. In December, a U.S. District Court called the president’s executive order “arbitrary and capricious and contrary to the law.”
Unhappy with not getting his way, Trump maneuvered again, announcing a 90-day pause on five leases for offshore wind projects under construction due to unspecified “national security risks.” Of those five projects, two were in New England: Vineyard Wind 1 and Revolution Wind, off the coast of Rhode Island and Connecticut. The day the Trump administration issued its pause last December, about half of Vineyard Wind’s turbines were already sending affordable power into the Massachusetts grid, helping lower electricity costs in a region over-reliant on expensive natural gas for its power. As wind developers appealed to federal courts once more, those courts reversed the stop-work orders in January. Trump lost again when a federal judge allowed projects to resume while legal challenges made their way through the courts.
It’s Clear What This is Really About
“This pause was a desperate rerun of the Trump administration’s failed attempt to kill offshore wind – an effort the courts had already rejected,” says Kate Sinding Daly, CLF’s senior vice president for law and policy. “The biggest national security threat we face is climate change. Blocking clean energy projects limits our energy options and makes electricity unaffordable, all while causing more pollution that is harming our health and our climate. If we want clean, reliable, and affordable energy options, wind energy must be part of the mix.”
The War on Wind
Though Trump may be intent on killing wind energy, the fact is that it already accounts for a significant share of the nation’s electricity. In 2023, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, wind energy made up 10.2% of utility-scale electricity generation. Before the Trump administration attacks, wind energy also supported approximately 131,000 U.S. jobs.
CLF has been at the forefront of this wind movement for decades, including helping to facilitate the country’s first utility-scale offshore wind project. The Block Island Wind Farm began delivering electricity to more than 17,000 homes in 2016, powering homes on Block Island, Rhode Island, and sending excess power to the mainland. Since then, we’ve continued to push for the responsible development of additional offshore wind projects as part of a critical strategy to help New England reduce its reliance on climate-damaging fossil fuels.
Pushing for Responsible Wind
Since then, we’ve continued to push for the responsible development of additional offshore wind projects as part of a critical strategy to help New England reduce its reliance on climate-damaging fossil fuels.
Trump’s pause on existing wind projects sought to sideline not only the Vineyard and Revolution projects but also Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind, as well as Sunrise Wind and Empire Wind off New York. The pause affected $25 billion worth of existing leases already under construction projected to power more than 2.5 million homes in the Eastern United States. In addition to this pause on existing leases, the Trump administration rescinded federal funding for wind initiatives in 11 states, including wind-associated infrastructure.
“The Trump administration wants to keep us tethered to outdated, dirty, and expensive energy sources, like coal, gas, and oil,” says Daly. “If we allow the administration to crush this efficient, clean, and cheap energy source, we have also crushed any hope of reining in the pollution causing our planet to overheat.”
Construction Resumes on Offshore Wind
As of this writing, each of the paused projects is back under construction thanks to temporary injunctions that put the administration’s order on hold. What will happen next depends on how soon lawsuits challenging the legality of that order wend their way through the courts. No matter what, it’s safe to assume the administration is unlikely to approve new wind projects for the foreseeable future. These policies are oddly self-defeating, given that artificial intelligence data centers are projected to increase demands on our electricity grid in the coming years. Increased demand will likely lead to higher electricity prices unless new energy sources, such as wind power, come online. The disruption of oil supplies following turmoil in the Middle East has only underscored the folly of this position.
“Wind power generates electricity without polluting our air and does it much more economically than fossil fuels,” says Daly. “That makes it a key strategy for affordable energy bills.”
Wind is Already Powering Our Homes
Increasing our energy options by building out wind power may seem like common sense, but that’s one resource the Trump administration has in short supply. As the administration seeks to slow progress on wind while claiming concern over rising prices, its arguments ring hollow, particularly in states where residents have already benefited from energy prices that would have been higher without wind power in the mix.
“Pausing active leases, especially for completed and nearly completed projects, defies logic, will hurt our bid for energy independence, will drive up costs for American ratepayers, and will make us lose thousands of good-paying jobs,” said Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey, Rhode Island Governor Dan McKee, Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont, and New York Governor Kathy Hochul in a joint statement last year. “It also threatens grid reliability that is needed to keep the lights on.”
We’re Fighting for Our Collective Future
CLF sat at the table during the development of Vineyard Wind and will now fight to preserve its promise. With the five paused wind projects eventually currently back online – and they will –millions of homes and businesses will be powered by wind.
“And that will remove millions of tons of carbon pollution from the air we breathe, the equivalent of taking 2.3 million cars off the road,” says Daly. “That means a healthier planet and healthier people.”
