The freshly inaugurated 47th president of the United States, Donald Trump, signed many executive orders during his first evening in office, one of which directed the Treasury Department to freeze new offshore wind leases on the country’s outer continental shelf.
This particular move has been in the headlines for some time, ever since Republican representative Jeff Van Drew revealed that he was tasked with making a draft of an order freezing offshore wind activities for six months. Details were revealed soon after, with the REACT Alliance claiming it was the primary group behind the document.
Now that the draft is an official order, it withdraws the entire shelf for new or renewed offshore wind leasing. However, this does not affect existing leases or leases in the continental shelf for oil and gas development.
The Interior Department was instructed through the order to lead a review of the environmental impacts of offshore wind leasing in collaboration with the Energy, Agriculture, and Commerce departments. It also directs the review to analyze offshore wind’s effects on bird and marine mammal life.
Trump frequently opposed wind power and stated that the US would have a policy of “no windmills being built” during his presidency. He also called wind “the most expensive energy there is” and claimed that wind turbines were a “disaster.”
“They litter our country, they’re littered all over our country like dropping paper, like dropping garbage in a field. They’re rusting, rotting, closed, and falling down. And they put new ones next to them because nobody wants to take them down, because why should they take them down? It’s very expensive to take them down,” Trump said in a speech in Mar-a-Lago earlier this month.
The National Ocean Industries Association (NOIA) president Erik Milito voiced his displeasure regarding the decision and warned that minor delays could lead to multi-year setbacks which can lead to higher costs that will impact the end consumer.
“Many offshore wind projects have been approved or are close to approval after undergoing years of reviews. Our member companies throughout the oil and gas supply chain are beneficiaries of economic growth that flows from investment in offshore wind projects,” he said.
The previous administration has been able to fully permit 11 commercial-scale offshore wind projects with the last one, SouthCoast Wind, crossing the line only three days before the executive order was signed. In total, the US approved 19GW of offshore wind in the last four years.
On top of the negative impact on offshore wind, Trump also signed an order to withdraw the US from the United Nations’ Paris climate agreement. This places the US in not-so-stellar company, as the only other companies outside the 2015 pact are Iran, Libya, and Yemen.
