TPPF Files Administrative Petition to Reconsider Vineyard Wind Project

The Texas Public Policy Foundation, on behalf of local fishermenwhose livelihoods have been severely impacted, filed an administrative petitionchallenging the Vineyard Wind 1 offshore wind energy project. The petition requests the U.S. Secretary of the Interior and the Director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) to reconsider the prior administration’s approval of the construction and operations permit for the enormous Vineyard Wind 1 project, located off the coast of Massachusetts.

This administrative petition follows TPPF’s lawsuit challenging the Vineyard Wind 1 project's flawed approval process.

During the initial approval process, the Departments of the Interior, Commerce, and Defense, acting through their sub-agencies and officers, acknowledged that the Vineyard Wind 1 Project would harm safety, the environment, and national security. Yet they permitted the project anyway. Last July, TPPF’s warnings came true when an enormous windmill blade the size of a football field collapsed into the ocean, scattering fiberglass debris for miles and closing beaches on the East Coast.

image courtesy Robert F. Bukaty/AP

“The Biden Administration violated at least thirteen provisions of federal law when it approved the Vineyard 1 offshore wind project,” said TPPF senior attorney Ted Hadzi-Antich. “In the process, they tacitly agreed to the destruction of a prime fishing area that has been used by commercial fishermen to feed Americans for generations. Recognizing the devastating impacts of the prior Administration’s misguided offshore wind efforts, President Trump on his first day in office ordered a temporary withdrawal of offshore wind leasing on the Outer Continental Shelf and directed the Secretary of the Interior to review all offshore wind leases in order to address legal deficiencies. Our administrative petition sets forth those legal deficiencies in detail so that the Secretary is in a position to rescind the Construction and Operations Plan (COP) of the Vineyard Wind 1 project and to issue an order requiring that the entire area be remediated to the condition it was in prior to the approval of the COP.”

“This administrative petition provides the Secretary of the Interior ample reasons to rescind Vineyard Wind’s Construction and Operations Plan,” added TPPF attorney Eric Heigis. “President Trump’s requested review of offshore wind projects gives the Secretary a golden opportunity to correct the previous administration’s missteps when it came to approving offshore wind projects.”

To read the full administrative petition, click here.

For additional background on the case, click here.

Texas Public Policy Foundation | https://www.texaspolicy.com/