As promised, the Trump administration started on Day 1 to fix President Biden’s broken national energy policy. Chief among these “fixes” was issuing a presidential memorandum addressed to the Department of Interior, which ordered a complete reexamination of the purpose and need for offshore wind energy and whether current projects in federal waters should be amended or terminated.
The memorandum, which largely owes its language to the efforts of Rep. Jefferson Van Drew, New Jersey Republican, requires Interior Secretary Doug Burgum to take the lead in conducting two studies. The first is a “comprehensive review of the ecological, economic, and environmental necessity of terminating or amending any wind energy leases.” The second is “an assessment to consider the environmental impact of offshore wind projects on wildlife” and “the economic costs associated with the intermittent generation of electricity and the effect of subsidies on the viability of the wind industry.”
The memorandum halted any further leasing activity in federal waters. The question remains about its impact on offshore wind projects that are either under construction or have obtained the necessary permits to begin construction. Together, these projects would entail the installation of almost 1,000 wind turbines in federal waters off the east coast. The projects include Vineyard Wind, SouthCoast Wind and New England Wind off Massachusetts; Revolution Wind, Sunrise Wind, South Fork Wind and Empire Wind off New York; Atlantic Shores South off New Jersey; and Coastal Offshore Virginia Wind off Virginia.
It makes no sense for construction to continue on these projects until the studies mandated by the presidential memorandum have been completed and the findings have been absorbed into the policy objectives of the Trump administration. How can wildlife be protected, unnecessary additional costs be prevented, decommissioning expenses be avoided, and the clear intent of the memorandum be effectuated if offshore wind developers proceed with construction activity that may ultimately be amended or terminated? How can a complete reexamination of offshore wind be implemented if offshore wind construction continues unabated?
It can’t. The next question: Does the Interior Department have the legal authority to pause construction while the studies are conducted?
The answer is indisputably yes. Every developer for these offshore wind projects has entered into a binding contract with the Interior Department called a Construction and Operations Plan. Each plan governs the timing, methods and other conditions concerning the construction schedule applicable to the project. Every Construction and Operations Plan contains the following language: “The Department of the Interior (DOI) reserves the right to amend these conditions or impose additional conditions authorized by law or regulation on any future approvals of COP revisions.”
The language is clear. The Interior Department has contractual authority to unilaterally alter the terms and conditions of the Construction and Operations Plan, including the timing of construction. Indeed, the Interior Department, through its subsidiary agency, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, has invoked this authority to order a halt of construction on the Vineyard Wind project because of a catastrophic wind turbine failure that scattered fiberglass and other debris into the waters off Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket. Ordering a similar pause to construction on offshore wind project leases is supported by precedent and explicit contractual language in the Construction and Operations Plan.
Offshore wind project developers will object to any such pause, but they understand and agree that such an action lies totally within the legal discretion of the federal government for causes “authorized by law,” which applies to the presidential memorandum.
Offshore wind is objectionable on many levels: economic, environmental and even moral. The Trump administration has chosen to study and expose all these shortcomings. Wind developers that benefited from political favoritism must now reckon with the political risk they explicitly assumed when they entered a contractual relationship with the federal government.
Mr. Burgum has a clear mandate from President Trump and the legal authority to halt further offshore wind project development pending a review of the purpose and need for this questionable, inefficient, grossly subsidized and problematic mode of electrical generation.
Construction for some of these projects resumes May 1, so Mr. Burgum should act expeditiously.
This article originally appeared at The Washington Times
The post Secretary Burgum: You have the legal authority to halt offshore wind was first published by the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), and is republished here with permission. Please support their efforts.
