Seven US states have launched legal action against the Trump administration over its decision to cancel a major offshore wind lease off the coast of New York, arguing that the deal was unlawful.
In March, federal officials agreed to pay nearly $1bn in taxpayer money to French energy firm TotalEnergies in exchange for the company scrapping plans for two offshore windfarms off New York and North Carolina. TotalEnergies also pledged not to develop any new offshore wind projects in the United States, while investing hundreds of millions of dollars in oil and gas projects.
The lawsuit, led by New York Attorney General Letitia James, claims the administration devised the agreement after losing repeated court battles over its attempts to halt offshore wind development. James said the deal threatened to erase over a thousand union jobs and cheat millions of New Yorkers out of clean, affordable energy.
The legal challenge, joined by the attorneys general of Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Rhode Island and Vermont, asserts that the deal violates the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act and the Judgment Fund Act. The plaintiffs are asking a court to strike down the agreement, halt the lease cancellation and prevent further steps to implement it.
Interior Secretary Doug Burgum defended the deal as a win for affordable and reliable energy, describing offshore wind as expensive, unreliable and environmentally disruptive. However, green groups criticised the move, with Sam Salustro of the Oceantic Network saying that removing affordable, homegrown energy from the equation leaves American consumers struggling to pay their electricity bills.
