The Interior Department said Wednesday it would revoke the permit for a massive offshore wind project planned off Massachusetts, marking the third time in two weeks that the administration has blocked wind farms.
In a motion filed with the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, government lawyers said Interior plans to remand a permit for New England Wind by Oct. 10. The announcement came on the heels of similar moves to cancel permits for projects off Massachusetts and Maryland.
ACK for Whales, a Nantucket-based group opposed to offshore wind, had sued Interior to overturn the permit issued to New England Wind, arguing that the project threatens the critically endangered North Atlantic right whale. But the Justice Department lawyers told the court the suit is no longer relevant because Interior is revoking the permit.
New England Wind was planned as a phased development that could eventually generate up to 2,600 megawatts of power. Avangrid, the project developer, was provisionally awarded a contract by Massachusetts for an initial phase of 791 MW last year. Negotiations to finalize the contract have been repeatedly postponed this year amid uncertainty about President Donald Trump’s attempts to curtail wind development.
