US halts Revolution Wind offshore project amid security review

The Trump administration ordered an immediate halt to construction on the Revolution Wind offshore project off Rhode Island, a nearly finished 704 megawatt facility that would have powered more than 350,000 homes in Rhode Island and Connecticut. The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management informed the Danish developer Ørsted that ongoing work must stop while the federal government reviews concerns related to national security and the potential interference with the uses of the oceanic zone. With about 80 percent of the work completed and 45 of 65 turbines already in the water, the pause arrives as the administration intensifies its scrutiny of offshore wind projects that had been approved under the prior administration.

Revolution Wind is located in federal waters roughly 15 miles south of Rhode Island, with the project’s components logistics hub located on the New England coast. The undertaking had cleared a lengthy slate of federal and state reviews and was expected to deliver power to roughly 350,000 homes starting next year. The halt, issued in a letter to the project’s developer, did not specify the exact national security concerns, saying only that the stop work order is meant...