{"id":669159,"date":"2026-01-02T14:44:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-02T14:44:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/669159\/"},"modified":"2026-01-02T14:44:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-02T14:44:11","slug":"orsted-files-legal-challenge-against-us-government-over-windfarm-lease-freeze-orsted","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/669159\/","title":{"rendered":"\u00d8rsted files legal challenge against US government over windfarm lease freeze | \u00d8rsted"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">Europe\u2019s biggest offshore wind developer is taking the Trump administration to court over its decision to suspend work on a $5bn project on the north-east US coast.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">Denmark\u2019s \u00d8rsted filed a legal challenge on Thursday against the White House\u2019s decision 10 days ago to suspend the lease for its Revolution Wind site as part of a sweeping move <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/2025\/dec\/22\/trump-wind-farms\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">halting all construction of offshore wind<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">The attempted injunction is the latest in a series of legal volleys between the renewables industry and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/donaldtrump\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" data-component=\"auto-linked-tag\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Donald Trump<\/a>, whose administration has sought to block major offshore wind projects from moving ahead since his re-election.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">Trump, a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/2025\/jul\/20\/trump-energy-environment-agenda\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">vocal supporter of the fossil fuel industry<\/a>, opposes renewable energy, and wind in particular, saying he finds <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2025\/jul\/28\/are-trump-claims-about-wind-power-correct\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">turbines ugly, costly and inefficient<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">On 22 December, officials from the Department of the Interior suspended the leases for five large offshore wind projects that are under construction in US waters over unspecified \u201cnational security risks\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">A statement from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/business\/orsted\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" data-component=\"auto-linked-tag\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u00d8rsted<\/a> and its partner in the Revolution project, Skyborn Renewables, described the move as a violation of applicable law.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">\u201cLitigation is a necessary step to protect the rights of the project,\u201d and avoid \u201csubstantial harm\u201d to the project if the suspension order remained in place, according to the statement.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">\u201cRevolution Wind secured all required federal and state permits in 2023, following extensive reviews that began more than nine years ago,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">The move emerged months after the Trump administration issued a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/2025\/aug\/23\/wind-farm-rhode-island-connecticut\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u201cstop-work order\u201d<\/a> against construction of the Revolution project in August, citing a need to \u201caddress concerns related to the protection of national security interests\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">The halt to construction sent shock waves through the industry and pushed the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2025\/aug\/25\/rsted-shares-at-all-time-low-after-trump-halts-work-on-us-windfarm\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">market value of \u00d8rsted<\/a>, which is partially owned by the Danish state, to record lows. No details of the national security issues were provided by the White House and weeks later a federal judge allowed \u00d8rsted to restart work on the project.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">At the time, Sheldon Whitehouse, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/rhode-island\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Rhode Island<\/a> senator and ranking member of the Senate Environment and Public Works committee, said: \u201cIf Trump\u2019s plan is to raise families\u2019 energy prices, cut American jobs, turbo charge climate change, and accelerate the Great Climate Insurance Crisis, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/2025\/sep\/04\/rhode-island-connecticut-trump-administration-revolution-wind\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">he\u2019s knocking it out of the park<\/a> with his all-out attack on American offshore wind.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">Construction is now almost 90% complete and the site had been due to begin delivering \u201creliable, affordable power\u201d to US homes in 2026. \u00d8rsted said it had already installed all offshore foundations and 58 of the project\u2019s 65 wind turbines.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-130mj7b\">\u00d8rsted shares, which had taken another 12% plunge after the 22 December announcement, were lifted by nearly 4% on Friday on news of the court action.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Europe\u2019s biggest offshore wind developer is taking the Trump administration to court over its decision to suspend work&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":669160,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5311],"tags":[49,978,659],"class_list":{"0":"post-669159","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-united-states","9":"tag-us","10":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115826043342951973","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/669159","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=669159"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/669159\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/669160"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=669159"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=669159"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=669159"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}