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ENB Pub Note: This is a follow-up story to the one that was run yesterday: “Trump allows Equinor to resume work on wind project off New York.” I added the power mix for the New York grid, and Michael Tanner and I discussed it on the Energy News Beat daily standup.
- A wind project in New York mothballed by the Trump administration is getting a new lease on life through a compromise.
- On his first day in office, Trump issued an executive order pausing new leasing and permitting of wind projects.
- The compromise includes the revival of an abandoned natural gas pipeline from Pennsylvania to New York.
A wind project in New York mothballed by the Trump administration is getting a new lease on life through a compromise that would also see an abandoned natural gas pipeline from Pennsylvania to New York revived.
Norway’s Equinor was three months into Empire Wind, a $5 billion offshore wind farm, when Trump came to power and set about dismantling the Biden administration’s wind power program.
On his first day in office, the second-term president issued an executive order pausing new leasing and permitting of wind projects, which he said are ugly, expensive and harmful to wildlife.
But Equinor, which recently shifted its focus to oil and gas from renewables, told Reuters that construction can resume on Empire Wind, which is expected to bring power to half a million homes after 2027, following the lifting of a one-month stop-work order.
The move comes amid industry challenges.
“The offshore wind industry is challenged in the short term with headwinds relating to supply chain, regulatory, and macroeconomic developments,” Orsted, the world’s biggest offshore wind project developer, said in its first-quarter press release on May 7.
Due to higher costs and interest rates, the Danish company announced it had decided to discontinue the development of the Hornsea 4 offshore wind project in the UK, ahead of the planned final investment decision (FID) later this year.
Earlier this month, Equinor said it is considering its legal options after the Trump administration ordered its Empire offshore wind project off New York halted. That of course will no longer be necessary.
Equinor is Norway’s largest oil and gas company, outputting about 70 percent of its total production, or 2 million barrels of oil equivalent per day. In February Equinor said it is reducing its renewable energy targets for 2030, citing challenges in the renewable energy sector.
Instead, the company is increasing its focus on oil and gas production, aiming to grow output by 10 percent from 2024 to 2027.
Norway’s energy market is experiencing turmoil due to increased energy exports to Germany and related political instability.
It appears Equinor’s Empire Wind project was only allowed to continue in exchange for the reinstatement of a stalled natural gas pipeline called Constitution. The Pennsylvania to New York line was canceled in 2020 after years of regulatory and legal battles over the environment, for one.
“Americans who live in New York and New England would see significant economic benefits and lower utility costs from increased access to reliable, affordable, clean American natural gas,” US Interior Secretary Doug Burgum wrote in a post on X on Monday.
Department officials reportedly said the former Biden administration had rushed the project’s approval without sufficient environmental analysis.
Norwegian Finance Minister Jens Stoltenberg said the reversal was good news for investors in the U.S. as the stop-work order threatened to create uncertainty after permits had been granted by U.S. authorities.
Equinor had warned it stood to lose billions of dollars due to the order which sent shockwaves through the offshore wind industry, raising concerns that fully permitted developments representing billions in investment are not safe.
In May, 17 states and Washington D.C. filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration over the halting of permits for wind-energy projects. The lawsuit said that the government’s decision presents a threat to the burgeoning industry. “This administration is devastating one of our nation’s fastest-growing sources of clean, reliable and affordable energy,” said Attorney General Letitia James of New York, which is one of the plaintiffs. James said the move threatened “the loss of thousands of good-paying jobs and billions in investments” and was “delaying our transition away from the fossil fuels that harm our health and our planet.”
The United States currently has four operating offshore wind farms and four under construction, including Empire Wind.
By Andrew Topf for Oilprice.com
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