US Administration halted largest Offshore Wind project in the U.S.
41 comments
·December 22, 2025lateforwork
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?
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.
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