TotalEnergies halts billion-dollar wind project in New York after Trump's win

The CEO of TotalEnergies, Patrick Pouyanne, announced that the company would put its project to develop an offshore wind farm off the coast of New York "on pause." The reason is the return of Donald Trump, he told an industry conference in London covered by Bloomberg.

The French multinational energy company bought the rights to install wind turbines in the area in an auction that fetched $4.4 billion. At the time, in October last year, the auction was celebrated as the Democrats as a milestone in President Joe Biden's green campaign. The president promised that the United States would be 100% reliant on renewables by 2035.

The tides shifted with Trump's victory. During his campaign, he spoke out against offshore wind farms. He even promised during a speech that he would issue an executive order to ban them: "We are going to make sure that that ends on Day 1." The president-elect assured that it is the "most expensive energy there is" and that that they "ruin the environment," emphasizing the reports on the risk they pose to wildlife.

Named Attentive Energy, the wind farm was to occupy 85,000 acres of seabed more than 42 miles off the coast of Seaside Heights, N.J. Total Energies claims it would have had the potential to generate 3,000 megawatts, enough to power 1.4 million homes. The project was in the early stages.

Pouyanne assured that it was not the end of the project, but that he will take it up again when another president, someone more sympathetic to the cause, occupies the White House. "I said to my team, the project in New York, we’ll see that in four years," he maintained, according to Bloomberg. "But the advantage is it’s only for four years."