Trump team weighs paying $1B to get companies to stop off-shore wind farm projects [View all]

Source: msn/The Independent

Tuesday 17 March 2026 17:51 EDT


The White House is reportedly preparing to pay nearly $1 billion to an energy giant to abandon major offshore wind projects, moving from legal challenges to direct financial settlements.

After federal judges blocked five previous attempts by the Trump administration to halt wind farms currently under construction along the East Coast, senior officials are now drafting agreements to pay TotalEnergies to walk away from its leases. According to documents reviewed by The New York Times, the proposed settlements would see the Justice Department pay more than $928 million to the French energy firm.

The deal would effectively terminate the Attentive Energy project off the coast of New York and the Carolina Long Bay project in North Carolina. In exchange for the payout — which serves as a reimbursement for lease bids won during the Biden era — TotalEnergies would not only scrap its wind plans but also commit to "accelerated investments" in natural gas infrastructure in Texas.

“It is quite unusual for the administration to do this cash outlay, seemingly just because Trump doesn’t like offshore wind,” John Leshy, a former general counsel for the Interior Department, told The New York Times. This new buyout approach follows a string of courtroom defeats for the administration.

Read more: https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/general/trump-team-weighs-paying-1b-to-stop-wind-farm-projects/ar-AA1YRa8p