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President Trump’s war on wind has left one construction crew stuck 15 miles out at sea.
The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management recently halted work on the $5 billion Revolution Wind project that is set to provide enough power for 350,000 homes in Rhode Island and Connecticut starting next year.
The WSJ’s David Uberti and Jennifer Hiller write that workers on the ECO Edison off the coast of Rhode Island who are used to 12-hour shifts seven days a week are now left wondering if they will be allowed to finish the job.
The struggles that led offshore wind to this moment of crisis predate
Trump. President Joe Biden’s climate law showered the sector with
subsidies, but inflation sent costs skyrocketing. Governments up and
down the East Coast competed for investment in ports and factories
promising blue-collar jobs. Supply chains couldn’t keep up. Local
opposition busted project timelines. Some developers pulled out.
Still, the Trump administration’s stop-work order surprised even the
shellshocked clean-energy sector because the development’s
skyscraper-sized turbines are largely complete.
A small army of workers and suppliers on the East Coast and elsewhere
are now racked by the possibility that a new industry for which they
spent years preparing could disappear. |