The Interior Department halted work Friday on an offshore wind project near Rhode Island as President Donald Trump escalated his attacks on renewable energy.
The order issued to Revolution Wind interrupts a 65-turbine development that was nearing completion. The project was expected to begin sending power to about 350,000 customers next year.
In a letter to Ørsted, the project’s developer, federal regulators at the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management said the order was being issued to “address concerns related to the protection of national security interests of the United States.” It came after Ørsted’s stock tumbled earlier this month when it announced that it would raise money by selling shares.
This is the second time Interior has stopped construction of an offshore wind project. The department halted work for a month on a facility off New York earlier this year. In that case, construction had just begun. Revolution Wind is 80 percent complete. All of the project’s foundations have been installed, along with 45 turbines.
An Interior spokesperson declined to comment. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum retweeted a post on a Trump administration account on X that highlighted a story by the Daily Caller about the stop-work order.
Ørsted said in a statement that it was “considering a range of scenarios, including legal proceedings.”
The company has tailored its message in recent months to the Trump administration’s priorities, noting that it has invested $20 billion in the U.S. and highlighting how wind energy can boost grid reliability. The company’s South Fork Wind project, a nearby development that sends power to New York and was completed last year, has operated at 53 percent of its capacity throughout the first half of 2025, “on par with the state’s baseload power sources,” Ørsted said. The company is also building a third project, Sunrise Wind, that will serve New York.
Trump called wind power “THE SCAM OF THE CENTURY” in a Wednesday post on Truth Social, his social media site, and said, “We will not approve wind or farmer destroying Solar. The days of stupidity are over in the USA!!!”
