French Energy Giant Scraps Two US Wind Farms

A French energy giant just made a big U-turn on America's seas. TotalEnergies said Monday it will walk away from two offshore wind farms it was developing off North Carolina and New York, reports the Wall Street Journal. The company struck a deal with the Trump administration to relinquish its leases, get reimbursed, and direct the roughly $1 billion into fossil fuel projects instead, per the Washington Post. That includes a liquefied natural gas plant in Texas.

"We're partnering with TotalEnergies to unleash nearly $1 billion that was tied up in a lease deposit directed towards the prior administration's subsidies that were pushing expensive, weather-dependent offshore wind," said Interior Secretary Doug Burgum. President Trump has long railed against wind and solar projects, and the Interior Department stopped all federal permits for renewable energy projects last year. The settlement announced Monday is a "new strategy" in the White House fight against such projects, notes the Post, one that avoids a court fight.