AUSTIN – The Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF) applauds the U.S. Department of the Interior for announcing that it is pausing the construction on all large-scale offshore wind projects under construction in the United States, including the Vineyard Wind 1 Project off the coast of Massachusetts. This is welcome news for the offshore fishing industry, who can breathe a sigh of relief knowing this ill-conceived project will not be able to proceed with further disrupting the area’s marine wildlife habitat.

In 2021, TPPF filed a federal lawsuit against the Biden Administration challenging the approval of the Vineyard Wind project, claiming it would severely harm the commercial fishing industry in the area and destroy the lives of countless families, as well as create irreparable harm to the environment, ocean wildlife, and national security. Last July, TPPF’s warnings came true when an enormous windmill blade the size of a football field collapsed into the ocean, scattering fiberglass debris for miles and closing beaches on the East Coast.

Today’s announcement follows an administrative petition filed by TPPF in July and supplemented just a few days ago requesting the U.S. Secretary of the Interior and the Director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) to reconsider the prior administration’s approval of the project’s Construction and Operations Plan.

“We’ve been fighting the Vineyard Wind project for four years on behalf of our clients, commercial fishing families who have been using the area to feed Americans for generations. Finally, the federal government has realized that the project was ill-founded from the beginning,” added TPPF Senior Attorney Ted Hadzi-Antich. “The next step is for the government to order the developer to remove every last bit of equipment installed during construction and bring the area back to a pristine, fishable habitat for the benefit of all Americans.”

TPPF Attorney Eric Heigis added, “This welcome step is long overdue. The Biden Administration knew that offshore wind posed a threat to national security and defense radar. But the Biden commitment to the Green New Deal overrode these practical concerns. We encourage BOEM to review the additional evidence we have presented that shows this project should have never been built in the first place.”

For additional background on the case, click here.

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