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Hotspots

Is Trump Already Killing Off Renewable Energy Projects?

And more of the week’s news around renewable energy conflicts.

Map of renewable energy conflicts.
Heatmap Illustration

Queens County, New York – TotalEnergies’ first Attentive Energy offshore wind project might be the canary in the Trumpy renewables coal mine.

  • The New York wind project in the bight has been indefinitely paused, according to TotalEnergies CEO Patrick Pouyenne, meaning we have our first offshore wind derailment of the Trump era, many weeks before he’s even taken office.
  • It’s unclear how connected Trump is to the move. Attentive Energy also pulled out of New York state’s fifth offshore wind solicitation before this news dropped, which also arrived days before the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management implemented new requirements for projects built in the area where the project would be built.
  • However, remember that even though Attentive Energy has little opposition in New York State, anti-offshore activists are aggressively challenging efforts by New Jersey state to buy power from the project.
  • We’ll have to wait and see if this decision is a domino for other offshore wind curtailments. But we’re already seeing evidence, as Shell announced hours ago it is no longer investing in new offshore wind projects.

Clinton County, Michigan – EV manufacturing news in Michigan is showing that fallout from Trump’s election may not be limited to offshore wind, and could creep into other projects facing grassroots opposition.

  • Two manufacturing sites planned for construction in the Mitten State were quietly canceled over the Thanksgiving holiday. The sites were proposed on large swathes of rural land and led to local opposition against so-called “industrial” sites on farmland – a conflict similar to problems we see in solar energy.
  • The manufacturing plants under development by a Michigan economic development corporation were marketed as compatible with EV and microchip production as the state was angling to be a zero-emission tech hub. Both industries may lose federal subsidies under the now GOP-controlled Congress.
  • Then General Motors sold its stake in a separate battery plant, because it says more plants were no longer necessary. Is this a trend or a fluke of bad news?

Linn County, Iowa – Even carbon pipelines facing opposition are getting canceled right now, after Wolf Carbon Solutions rescinded its project application to the Iowa Utilities Board.

  • Like other projects – Summit, Navigator – the Wolf carbon pipeline has faced resistance at the local level. The project would cross multiple Iowa counties and extend into Illinois.
  • “While Wolf has continued to build relationships with landowners and stakeholders interested in the Project, a number of factors have continued to delay Wolf’s ability to proceed with the Project and Wolf has decided to cease pursuit of the required regulatory approvals at this time,” the company stated in a filing to the utilities board on Monday.
  • As we’ve explained, carbon pipelines should get at least some support from the Trump 2.0 administration. But as Wolf may show, the projects most likely to benefit will be those already far enough along in permitting to withstand the market uncertainties created by political instability, like Summit.

Here’s what else we’re watching right now …

In California, the city of Escondido has extended its moratorium against the Seguro battery storage project. (Consider us shocked.)

In Illinois, an Acconia Energy solar farm’s application with the Will County government is being delayed over local opposition.

In Nebraska, NextEra is facing resistance to a new 2,400 acre solar farm in Lancaster County.

In Oklahoma, momentum for a moratorium is building in Lincoln County, an area once friendly to wind development.

In New York, the small town of Glenville rejected a small solar project proposed by a Nexamp subsidiary.

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Q&A

How the Wind Industry Can Fight Back

A conversation with Chris Moyer of Echo Communications

The Q&A subject.
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Today’s conversation is with Chris Moyer of Echo Communications, a D.C.-based communications firm that focuses on defending zero- and low-carbon energy and federal investments in climate action. Moyer, a veteran communications adviser who previously worked on Capitol Hill, has some hot takes as of late about how he believes industry and political leaders have in his view failed to properly rebut attacks on solar and wind energy, in addition to the Inflation Reduction Act. On Tuesday he sent an email blast out to his listserv – which I am on – that boldly declared: “The Wind Industry’s Strategy is Failing.”

Of course after getting that email, it shouldn’t surprise readers of The Fight to hear I had to understand what he meant by that, and share it with all of you. So here goes. The following conversation has been abridged and lightly edited for clarity.

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Hotspots

A New York Town Bans Both Renewable Energy And Data Centers

And more on this week’s most important conflicts around renewable energy.

The United States.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

1. Chautauqua, New York – More rural New York towns are banning renewable energy.

  • Chautauqua, a vacation town in southern New York, has now reportedly issued a one-year moratorium on wind projects – though it’s not entirely obvious whether a wind project is in active development within its boundaries, and town officials have confessed none are being planned as of now.
  • Apparently, per local press, this temporary ban is tied to a broader effort to update the town’s overall land use plan to “manage renewable energy and other emerging high-impact uses” – and will lead to an ordinance that restricts data centers as well as solar and wind projects.
  • I anticipate this strategy where towns update land use plans to target data centers and renewables at the same time will be a lasting trend.

2. Virginia Beach, Virginia – Dominion Energy’s Coastal Virginia offshore wind project will learn its fate under the Trump administration by this fall, after a federal judge ruled that the Justice Department must come to a decision on how it’ll handle a court challenge against its permits by September.

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Spotlight

The Wind Projects Breaking the Wyoming GOP

It’s governor versus secretary of state, with the fate of the local clean energy industry hanging in the balance.

Wyoming Governor Mark Gordon.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

I’m seeing signs that the fight over a hydrogen project in Wyoming is fracturing the state’s Republican political leadership over wind energy, threatening to trigger a war over the future of the sector in a historically friendly state for development.

At issue is the Pronghorn Clean Energy hydrogen project, proposed in the small town of Glenrock in rural Converse County, which would receive power from one wind farm nearby and another in neighboring Niobrara County. If completed, Pronghorn is expected to produce “green” hydrogen that would be transported to airports for commercial use in jet fuel. It is backed by a consortium of U.S. and international companies including Acconia and Nordex.

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