Biggest offshore wind project in U.S. to resume construction after judge lifts Trump suspension
Employees of Dominion Energy gaze at one of two wind turbines located 27 miles off of Virginia Beach in the Atlantic Ocean on July 17, 2023. The two turbines are part of a pilot program for the Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind Program.
Kendall Warner | Virginian Pilot | Tribune News Service | Getty Images
Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind will resume construction, after a federal judge Friday temporarily lifted the Trump administration’s suspension of the project.
It is the largest offshore wind project under construction in the U.S. Shares of Dominion Energy, the owner and developer, rose about 1% on the news.
The Department of Interior in December halted construction of five wind farms off the East Coast, including Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind, claiming national security concerns.
Judge Jamar Walker of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia granted Dominion’s request for a preliminary injunction Friday. Dominion called the Trump suspension “arbitrary and illegal” in its lawsuit.
“Our team will now focus on safely restarting work to ensure CVOW begins delivery of critical energy in just weeks,” a Dominion spokesperson told CNBC in a statement Friday.
“While our legal challenge proceeds, we will continue seeking a durable resolution of this matter through cooperation with the federal government,” the spokesperson said.
Dominion said in December that “stopping CVOW for any length of time will threaten grid reliability for some of the nation’s most important war fighting, AI, and civilian assets.”
Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind is a 176 turbine project that would provide enough power for more than 600,000 homes, according to Dominion. It is scheduled to start dispatching power by the end of the first quarter of 2026.
The project will help meet power demand in the world’s largest data center market in northern Virginia. Data centers are increasingly straining the electric grid as they consume more power to train and run artificial intelligence applications.
The Trump administration tried to halt four other offshore wind farms in December. They are Vineyard Wind 1 off Massachusetts, Revolution Wind off Rhode Island, Sunrise Wind off Long Island and New England, and Empire Wind 1 south of Long Island.
Federal judges this week allowed Revolution Wind and Empire Wind to resume construction.
