Judge orders restart of Revolution Wind offshore project

A federal judge on Monday ordered construction to resume on the near-complete Revolution Wind offshore project off the coasts of Rhode Island and Connecticut, saying the administration's August stopwork order threatened to inflict irreparable harm on the multibillion dollar enterprise. U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth granted a preliminary injunction after finding the developer and the two states had relied on federal approval and that delays were costing millions daily.

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management halted work on August 22, citing unspecified national security concerns. The Interior Department later said in court filings that while BOEM had approved the project it required the developer to continue coordinating with the Department of Defense to mitigate security risks and that, so far, it had not received information showing those concerns had been resolved. The department declined to comment on pending litigation.

Danish energy company Orsted and joint venture partner Skyborn Renewables, joined by Connecticut and Rhode Island officials, sued to lift the stopwork order. At a hearing Monday, Lamberth noted the project was roughly 80 percent complete, more than 1,000...