Low-Energy Fridays: President Trump isn’t the only barrier to new wind power projects
President Donald J. Trump has long made his views on wind power clear: He’s not a fan. With a record of linking wind power to everything from electricity blackouts to cancer, he has a particular animosity toward offshore wind—attacking it on economic, environmental, and even aesthetic grounds.
This aversion to offshore wind is not merely rhetorical, as the Trump administration has taken a number of actions since retaking office that affect the viability of wind projects. Some of these actions involved withdrawing subsidies and other government payments from wind projects, which fall within the general deregulatory philosophy that has animated past Republican administrations. But the Trump administration has moved beyond this, repeatedly pausing permitting for offshore wind projects that require federal approval. Though invalidated by the courts, the latest pause demonstrates that the administration’s skepticism regarding wind energy is more than just talk.
While Trump’s degree of rhetorical hostility to wind power is unique, his administration is not alone in blocking wind projects. In fact, according to a recent analysis by the Breakthrough Institute, the Biden administration canceled or delayed more offshore wind capacity than the current administration.
A few caveats are in order here. First, the rhetorical attacks on wind could have a chilling effect on future investment, which wouldn’t necessarily show up in the data yet. Second, we are just over a year into Trump’s current term. The administration will likely cancel or delay more projects in the coming three years, so comparing the whole of President Joe Biden’s term to one year of Trump’s is not exact.
Projects are sometimes canceled due to changing economic circumstances or other factors unrelated to government action. In fact, canceling an offshore wind project that no longer makes economic sense can be a good thing. That said, there seem to have been more project cancellations in 2024 than in 2025, when economic conditions were most similar.
These cautions aside, the Breakthrough analysis shows that regulatory delays are forming a substantial barrier against clean energy project development. A key bipartisan blocker of clean energy projects is the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), which mandates that projects requiring major federal action (such as a permit approval) must first undergo an environmental impact review. According to R Street’s own research, as of 2021, almost half (42 percent) of all active energy projects requiring an environmental impact statement or environmental analysis by NEPA were related to clean energy.
NEPA wasn’t expected to become a major barrier to the completion of new projects, but that’s exactly what has happened. The average time necessary to complete environmental impact review has grown over the years; in fact, it grew from 3.4 years to 4.7 years between 2010 and 2019 (which included a slight decline in average permitting time under the first Trump administration).
The problems stemming from NEPA-related permitting delays have prompted a number of bipartisan reform efforts. Among them is the Standardizing Permitting and Expediting Economic Development (SPEED) Act, which passed the House of Representatives in December 2025. The SPEED Act aims to reduce the time it takes to finish environmental reviews and to speed up permitting timelines generally.
Offshore wind will remain a polarizing issue, and some people, including high-ranking officials in the current administration, won’t like it. But even an administration more positively disposed to wind can’t guarantee that permitting delays won’t end up derailing clean energy projects. Lasting reform can only happen if all sides agree to tackle these problems comprehensively rather than selectively favoring reform in certain areas.