he Trump administration suspended leases on Monday for five large offshore wind projects that are under construction off the U.S. East Coast over what it called national security concerns, sending shares of offshore wind companies plunging.
The suspension was the latest blow for offshore wind developers that have faced repeated disruptions to their multi-billion-dollar projects under U.S. President Donald Trump, who has said he finds wind turbines ugly, costly and inefficient. State officials, Democratic lawmakers, offshore wind companies, and industry trade groups slammed the move as unjustified.
The U.S. Department of the Interior said the decision was the result of complaints by the Pentagon that the movement of huge turbine blades for offshore wind projects, as well as the highly reflective towers that hold them up, cause radar interference that can make it hard to identify and locate security threats.
The pause will give relevant federal agencies “time to work with leaseholders and state partners to assess the possibility of mitigating the national security risks posed by these projects,” the department said in a statement.
“The prime duty of the United States government is to protect the American people,” Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum said in the statement.
The pause will affect Danish energy firm Orsted’s (ORSTED.CO), opens new tab Revolution Wind and Sunrise Wind projects, Avangrid and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners’ Vineyard Wind 1 project, Dominion Energy’s (D.N), opens new tab Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind, and Equinor’s (EQNR.OL), opens new tab Empire Wind 1 project, according to the statement.
Shares in Orsted traded down more than 12%, with Dominion and Equinor also trading lower.
Dominion said the suspension will threaten grid reliability for its Virginia customers, including military bases and data centers powering artificial intelligence.
“These electrons will power the datacenters that will win the AI race, support our war fighters, and build the nuclear warships needed to maintain our maritime supremacy,” the company said.
Orsted said its projects were in advanced stages and had been preparing to power around 1 million homes across three states from next year.
