U.S. agrees to deal to cancel two more offshore wind farm leases
Credit: Published Apr 27, 2026, by The Maritime Executive | maritime-executive.com ~~
The U.S. Department of the Interior announced today that it has reached agreements to redirect the planned investment for two offshore wind farm projects into the oil and gas sector, and in exchange, it will reimburse the fees paid for the wind leases. The Trump administration has been pursuing this strategy with early-stage offshore wind projects that were still in the permitting stage, having already reached a similar deal valued at nearly $1 billion with TotalEnergies for its U.S. offshore wind portfolio.
Today’s agreements are with two of the lease sites owned by Ocean Winds, a joint venture between EDP Renewables and ENGIE, which was co-investing with Global Infrastructure Partners, which was acquired in 2024 by BlackRock. Details of the agreements are vague in the announcement, but it appears GIP agrees to make investments into U.S. LNG and U.S. oil and gas assets, and the U.S. will refund the total lease payments to Ocean Winds up to the amount of the investments made by GIP.
The larger of the two agreements is for a track in the New York Bight, which Ocean Winds won in the hotly contested 2022 auction. The company had proposed two projects located approximately 38 nautical miles off the coast of New York and 53 nm off the coast of New Jersey. At full capacity, the lease area, they said, would be able to generate 2.4 GW. Known as Bluepoint Wind, it was in the early stages of development, but had been proposed to New York and New Jersey.
https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2026/04/28/u-s-agrees-to-deal-to-cancel-two-more-offshore-wind-farm-leases/
