A long-time colleague is very familiar with Judge Lamberth, a Reagan appointee, and thinks highly of him. Orsted has a lease contract, and no matter where you stand on offshore wind, you have to have a compelling case to halt a project that is in the advanced stages of development. Judge Lamberth ruled that the govt doesn’t have such a case. Per the judge:
- The govt presented insufficient evidence to support alleged permit noncompliance and national security concerns.
- The govt acted in an “arbitrary and capricious” manner.
- “If Revolution Wind cannot meet benchmark deadlines, the entire project could collapse.”
- “There is no doubt in my mind of irreparable harm to the plaintiffs.”
Projects under development will be difficult to pause or stop. The Administration should focus on requiring sufficient decommissioning financial assurance, monitoring and mitigating project impacts, making incident data publicly available, issuing the report on the Vineyard Wind blade failure (finally!), and improving the availability of dispatchable power (i.e. natural gas and nuclear).
Bud's Offshore Energy (BOE) 