Dominion Energy’s Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind Project off the Virginia Beach coast is one of five major offshore wind projects around the U.S. whose leases were “paused” today by the U.S. Interior Department, citing unspecified national security concerns.
The Interior Department said national security risks were identified in recent classified defense reports.
The Dominion project is the largest of its kind in the U.S., and construction is underway off the Virginia Beach coast. According to Dominion, the federal government ordered a 90-day suspension of work.
“Stopping CVOW for any length of time will threaten grid reliability for some of the nation’s most important war fighting, AI and civilian assets,” Dominion said in a statement. “It will also lead to energy inflation and threaten thousands of jobs.”
“Virginia’s grid needs addition of electrons, not subtraction,” Dominion added. “We stand ready to do what is necessary to get these vital electrons flowing as quickly as possible.”
The pause is meant to give the Trump administration, which has criticized wind projects, “time to work with leaseholders and state partners to assess the possibility of mitigating the national security risks posed by these projects,” according to the statement issued by Interior.
“Today’s action addresses emerging national security risks, including the rapid evolution of the relevant adversary technologies, and the vulnerabilities created by large-scale offshore wind projects with proximity near our east coast population centers,” Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said in a statement.
The other projects are Vineyard Wind in Massachusetts, Revolution Wind at Rhode Island and Connecticut and the Sunrise Wind and Empire Wind projects in New York, according to the Associated Press.
Dominion’s CVOW project is supposed to include 176 wind turbines and power about 660,000 homes. The company originally planned to finish construction late next year.
