Offshore wind developers are now three for three in legal battles against Trump’s stop work orders now that Dominion Energy has defeated the administration in federal court.
District Judge Jamar Walker issued a preliminary injunction Friday blocking the stop work order on Dominion’s Coastal Virginia offshore wind project after the energy company argued it was issued arbitrarily and without proper basis. Dominion received amicus briefs supporting its case from unlikely allies, including from representatives of PJM Interconnection and David Belote, a former top Pentagon official who oversaw a military clearinghouse for offshore wind approval. This comes after Trump’s Department of Justice lost similar cases challenging the stop work orders against Orsted’s Revolution Wind off the coast of New England and Equinor’s Empire Wind off New York’s shoreline.
As for what comes next in the offshore wind legal saga, I see three potential flashpoints:
- First, we are still awaiting a decision by the Trump administration on whether it will appeal these losses and seek to halt construction until appellate courts rule on the preliminary injunction.
- Second, there is a new lawsuit: Vineyard Wind developer Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners this week filed a case against that facility’s stop work order, presumably emboldened after seeing peers in the space win so handily.
- Lastly, a fifth offshore wind project — Sunrise Wind — is still subject to a stop work order. Its developer, Orsted, filed a legal challenge on January 9, shortly before a judge overturned the stop work order against its Revolution Wind project. A hearing has been set for February 2.
It’s important to remember the stakes of these cases. Orsted and Equinor have both said that even a week or two more of delays on one of these projects could jeopardize their projects and lead to cancellation due to narrow timelines for specialized ships, and Dominion stated in the challenge to its stop work order that halting construction may cost the company billions.
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to reflect that Orsted has filed a preliminary injunction against the stop work order on Sunrise Wind.
