The Justice Department asked a federal court to send the approval of Revolution Wind's construction plan back to the Interior Department for review. The project off Rhode Island began producing electricity in March, and the request comes weeks after a bipartisan permitting deal promised developers more certainty.
Orsted's Revolution Wind is no longer a construction project. It is delivering power. That did not stop the federal government from asking to revisit its approval.
Federal lawyers told a court on Friday that Interior wants its sign-off on Revolution Wind's construction and operations plan sent back for another review, to check it against the statute that governs energy projects in U.S. offshore waters. Orsted owns the Rhode Island project with Global Infrastructure Partners. Turbines started delivering electricity in March, and the wind farm is due to run at its full 704 megawatts before the end of 2026.
Orsted declined to comment. Its shares fell more than 3% in Copenhagen in early trading on Wednesday.
Two messages from one administration
The administration says the filing is narrow. "Our position has remained consistent throughout this administration and this filing should not be misconstrued as a shift in the Department's approach to offshore wind," Interior said. The White House energy adviser who runs the National Energy Dominance Council, Jarrod Agen, traced the case to a suit that local opponents filed against the Biden administration and said the White House still backs the Senate's permitting legislation.
Wind developers are counting on that bill. The bipartisan deal struck at the end of September would overhaul how federal approvals work, and part of the bargain was a promise that the administration would quit obstructing wind and solar projects that already hold their permits.
Democrats read Friday's filing as a test of that promise. "Frankly, we need to get permitting certainty in law, and this proves it," said Rhode Island's Sheldon Whitehouse, the lead Democrat on permitting, in a statement he issued with New Mexico's Martin Heinrich.
Why a remand matters to investors
A remand does not stop the turbines. It reopens a question investors had treated as settled, and the outcome of a re-evaluation is not known. For a completed project, the risk is less about construction delays than about the value of an operating asset whose permit is under review.
The project already has a history with this administration. It was a target of an earlier federal stop-work order, and a court later allowed construction to resume. By August, 61 of its 65 turbines were in the water.
Market implications
One reading is that the filing is procedural. Interior says its approach has not changed, the White House backs the permitting bill, and an analyst at research firm Capstone said the bill as written would protect permits already approved, giving Orsted a path to certainty.
A second reading is that no permit is safe until the law passes. A project producing power has had its approval reopened weeks after a political deal on permitting, and investors in U.S. offshore wind may demand a higher return for that risk.
What to watch
The court's decision on the remand request, the Senate vote on the permitting legislation and any timetable for Interior's review will determine how much risk remains on Revolution Wind and other operating U.S. projects.