States file new lawsuits against Trump’s payouts stopping offshore wind

Attorneys general from eight East Coast states filed suit over federal payments to Bluepoint Wind and Invenergy, $1.4 billion combined, to abandon offshore wind leases near New York and New Jersey, with the companies agreeing to reinvest the money into oil and gas projects elsewhere. The administration has now pledged more than $4 billion total to persuade developers to give up a dozen offshore wind leases, using the Judgment Fund, an appropriation Congress created to pay court judgments against the government, not to fund the administration's energy preferences.

The states argue the settlements violate the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, the Administrative Procedure Act, the National Environmental Policy Act and the Judgment Fund Act itself, and are asking courts to strike the deals down and restore the leases. New Jersey's attorney general noted the irony of paying companies not to build power at a time when grid demand is rising and residents want relief from high electricity prices. California has filed its own separate suits over Pacific coast leases.

The full dispatch is available from the source below.