“This is another nail in the coffin for industrial offshore wind turbines here in New Jersey,” said U.S. Representative Chris Smith (R-NJ) in response to the March 14^th decision from the Environmental Appeals Board to remand the Atlantic Shores’ Clean Air Act permit which was issued last fall.

 “The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) through the Environmental Appeals Board has recognized the inadequacy of Biden-era reviews and are correctly revoking a reckless decision by the previous administration as it tried to rush these projects to completion,” said Smith.

“Offshore wind development will disrupt critical national security radar, destroy commercial and recreational fishing, harm tourism that local economies rely on, and impede Coast Guard search and rescue activities near wind farms,” said Smith, who has for years pointed out the lack of serious scrutiny, economic unsustainability, and legal deficiency of these projects and has led multiple efforts to secure answers from the Biden Administration on offshore wind.

This news follows the announcement from Shell Energy earlier this year that the company was withdrawing from the Atlantic Shores project, taking an almost $1 billion write-off (loss) in the process. In explaining the company’s withdrawal from the project, Shell Chief Financial Officer Sinead Gorman said, “We just don’t see that it fits both our capabilities nor the returns that we would like.”

“This judge’s decision underscores the horrible, slipshod federal approval process for offshore wind under Biden,” Smith added. “The reviews conducted by the Biden administration were grossly inadequate and failed to examine how these projects would disrupt and endanger our cherished coastal communities and ecosystems.

“I am confident that as further reviews continue, such as those mandated by President Trump’s January 20^th Executive Order, the Biden administration’s egregious whitewashing of offshore wind will continue to come to light and further expose the disaster our beloved shoreline almost had forced upon it.”

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