New Jersey Loses Another Offshore Wind Farm in Ongoing Struggles

Asbury Park, NJ—The name Empire Wind might make you think of Long Island or New York City. But this off-shore wind farm, which is based in New York, would have been just a few miles off the northern Jersey Shore.

The Trump administration put an end to the Empire Wind offshore project this week after Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) asked them to. They said they were worried about the project’s impact on the environment and on national security.

Doug Burgum, Secretary of the Interior, told the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to stop working on the wind project off the coasts of New Jersey and New York. He said that project approvals may have been rushed by the previous government.

Smith said in a statement on Wednesday, “This is a great victory for all of us who have been fighting to protect the Jersey Shore from offshore wind industrialisation.” He praised both President Trump and Secretary Burgum for doing something about the problems that have been brought up over the last few years.

In a letter to the acting head of the bureau, Burgum said that new information “raises serious issues with respect to project approvals.” He also said that the project may not have had enough environmental review or consultation with other agencies.

Smith wrote to Secretary Burgum at the end of March, telling him to “do everything in your power to stop Equinor’s dishonest rush to begin piledriving,” which is the term for the building methods used to place turbines.

Equinor is a Norwegian business.

The GAO study leads to more scrutiny

The Government Accountability Office released a report on Monday that backs up the concerns that Smith and other lawmakers made. The study came to the conclusion that radar interference from offshore wind farms could hurt national defence systems as well as aviation and maritime safety. Smith had helped start the GAO review with Reps. Jeff Van Drew, Andy Harris, and Bruce Westerman, who is the chair of the House Natural Resources Committee.

Smith said that the National Environmental Policy Act review that happened during Biden’s time didn’t deal with important issues, and that the approvals were dangerous to “national security, environmental health, and the economic well-being of nearby communities.”

Important Things

• The Trump administration stops the Empire Wind offshore project because the approval process was too quick.
• A study from the GAO backs up worries that wind turbines could interfere with radar and national defence.
• Rep. Chris Smith recently led a push with a message to Secretary Burgum asking that the project be put on hold.

Smith said the decision was a “huge relief” for residents and other interested parties. He criticised how the federal government and states had handled offshore wind energy growth in the past.

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