The Norwegian energy company Equinor said Friday it will be forced to terminate an offshore wind project for New York within days unless President Donald Trump 's administration relents on its order that stopped construction.
Work on Empire Wind has been paused since April 16, when Interior Secretary Doug Burgum directed the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to halt construction. Burgum said it needs further review because it appeared the Biden administration rushed the approval. Equinor went through a seven-year permitting process before starting to build Empire Wind last year, and the project is roughly a third complete.
Trump has been hostile to renewable energy, particularly offshore wind, and has signed a spate of executive orders aimed at boosting oil, gas and coal. His first day in office, Trump signed an executive order temporarily halting offshore wind lease sales in federal waters and pausing the issuance of approvals, permits and loans for all wind projects.
Empire Wind is fully permitted and the developer has already invested more than $2.5 billion so far in the project, said Molly Morris, president of Equinor Renewables Americas, in an interview Friday.
She said this is an “urgent, unsustainable situation” because each day of uncertainty is extremely expensive: Equinor spends up to $50 million per week on the project and has 11 vessels on standby. The developer has done a significant amount of onshore work already, where the cable from the wind farm will connect to the local grid.
“If no material progress is made toward a resolution within days, Equinor will be forced to terminate the project,” she said. “This is about honoring contracts and financial investments made in the U.S. It could set a dangerous precedent by stopping a project in mid-execution.”
The Interior Department did not immediately respond to emails seeking comment.
Equinor has over $60 billion in investments across the U.S., including substantial oil, gas and renewable projects. RWE, a German energy company, has stopped its offshore wind work in the United States, citing the political environment. French energy giant TotalEnergies paused the development of its offshore wind project in New York after Trump won reelection.
Equinor is considering legal options, but rather than getting tied up in the courts, Morris said the best way forward is a quicker political resolution. The summer construction window for major offshore work began this month, and missing it would set the project back a year, she said.
Morris and Equinor CEO Anders Opedal met with Kevin Hassett, director of the National Economic Council, on Wednesday. She said it was helpful, but they've asked to meet with Burgum and haven't gotten a meeting.
Equinor is building Empire Wind to start providing power in 2026 for more than 500,000 New York homes. Equinor finalized the federal lease for Empire Wind in March 2017, early in Trump’s first term. The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management approved the construction and operations plan in February 2024 and construction began that year.
New York is leading a coalition of state attorneys general challenging the wind energy executive order in court. They say in the lawsuit filed Monday that Trump doesn’t have the authority to unilaterally shut down the permitting process, and he’s jeopardizing development of a power source critical to the states’ economic vitality, energy mix, public health and climate goals.
The White House says Democratic attorneys general are trying to stop the president’s popular energy agenda instead of working with him to restore America’s energy dominance.
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Jennifer Mcdermott, The Associated Press
