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US Administration halted largest Offshore Wind project in the U.S.

gnabgib

Related: US halts work on almost finished wind farm because national security (117 points, 4 months ago, 83 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45002747

lateforwork

In October Trump canceled the largest solar project in the United States. Known as Esmeralda 7, the project planned in the Nevada desert would have produced enough energy to power nearly two million homes. https://www.politico.com/news/2025/10/10/trump-interior-depa...

PeterCorless

Should be far, far larger news, to be honest.

HardwareLust

Why is this flagged?

belter

You did not noticed HN is 100% MAGA now? Everybody here thinks they are a new Peter Thiel. What other reason could be?

linhns

Did you make this up? HN user base wasn’t going to change that fast in a year. And given that HN was left-leaning before Trump, I’d say it to be neutral at most now.

belter

Go to the dead and flagged and see what is flagged...and you will understand.

Facemelters

oh look, lying about national security concerns again. It's funny that the only thing this administration does is destroy things, lie, and make our lives measurably worse.

nneonneo

It sounds like “national security” is the legal justification they’re using to do an end-run around Congress, just like the justifications they’ve used to implement tariffs and which underpin a bunch of their EOs.

jimt1234

It's about time a US administration is brave enough to tackle real national security concerns: windmill cancer, completing the White House ballroom, and Antifa! /s

tencentshill

"Radar interference risk" is the cited reasoning. It took them the entire year to use anything other than a conspiracy theory to justify shutting these down.

cr125rider

It’s unfortunate many people are able to see through this to the blatant corruption. Energy independence and national security is renewable energy. All sorts of diverse energy sources are good. But we don’t like that.

xnx

They could've cited "owned the libs" and it wouldn't have made a difference. Republican congress tacitly supports all of this.

ZeroGravitas

I think Swedish right-wingers pioneered this particular form of anti-renewable propaganda last year.

seanmcdirmid

Trump was anti offshore wind farms since before his first term. He claimed they caused brain cancer or something foolish like that.

kyleee

And promotes conspiracy theories about harm to birds and underwater sea life

bediger4000

Isn't citing "US administration" incorrect? Trump should be given credit.

nodesocket

Let’s look at the economics instead of emotionally. Wind turbines (real rough back of the napkin) CapEx break even is estimated 7-10 years. They can consume thousands of liters of lubrication oil, and estimated break-even just on energy to produce the unit is 5-8 months (energy required to build it). Then you have the issue of how ugly (in my opinion) large farms look.

mikeyouse

You know who looks at the economics of wind turbines? Companies that build wind turbines. The fact that these farms were all under construction means they pencil out just fine.. there's such bizarre strains of concern trolling on clean energy topics.

sephamorr

You say economics instead of emotion, but your last sentence is emotion. If capex is your concern, explain the purpose of canceling an almost-complete farm. If energy breakevens are your concern, explain how this breakevens compares against, e.g. oil liquids.

blackguardx

I live near both wind turbines and oil/gas fracking sites in Colorado. The wind turbines are far less obtrusive. Fracking sites produce a lot of noise and they try to hide them with these giant walls that look like a post-apocalyptic fort. On top of that, because they don't disclose their fracking fluids you always kind of have ground water contamination near your home on the back of your mind.

I'm not even against fracking but the alternatives to wind and solar are more a public nuisance to live around.

yesfitz

What alternative powerplant would you recommend that has a shorter breakeven, doesn't consume oil, and is attractive to look at?

bryanlarsen

OTOH I think wind farms are pretty and pump-jacks are ugly.

Our biases shine through.

infecto

I love to look at the economics. The payback periods don’t look terrible. More importantly the market should decide what is good or not. I am all for removing subsidies but let the market decide the best path forward.

bryanlarsen

> CapEx break even is estimated 7-10 years.

> estimated break-even just on energy to produce the unit is 5-8 months

Those are really good numbers, a good argument for why they're being built.

janice1999

I live near one (no-USA) and honestly it doesn't bother me. It's a small price to pay to avoid ever-decreasing foreign-sourced oil/gas and insanely over-budget/over-schedule nuclear.

amanaplanacanal

Likely just a temporary pause. This administration won't be around that much longer.

squarefoot

I feel bad for ruining someone's dreams, but you really have no idea how wrong you are.

amanaplanacanal

Everybody can see that climate change is real. Relying on fossil fuels is just the last gasp of a dying industry.

pjc50

They're stuck there for four year terms, and in the case of SCOTUS life, are they not?

amanaplanacanal

Nobody can predict the future, but there are several possibilities, including impeachment and death in office. The man really doesn't look very good, I don't expect him to last out his term.

Not only that, but the president can only do what Congress allows him to do. Look for a blue wave next year.

thinkcontext

Even if a Dem is elected in '28, who is going to make a multi-year investment with the chance that JD Vance/Trump Jr/MTG could be elected in '32?

amanaplanacanal

Do you think they will necessarily have the same hardon against wind that Donald Sr has?

thinkcontext

I have seen no indication that any of those 3 wouldn't. And in general the GOP is pretty virulently against wind power, take the false stories about them causing whale strandings or the Texas winter power outage. Its true no one has had quite the sustained, obsessive, demented hatred that Trump has ("windmills cause cancer"). But would you be willing to bet $Bs on them being any better?

mdhb

They aren’t leaving until someone forces them to do so. They aren’t going to accept any election results that they don’t like they have already proven that.