Ørsted is allowed to resume work on offshore wind farm Revolution Wind off the U.S. East Coast, judge rules in federal court in Washington, D.C., Monday evening Danish time.
In early January, Ørsted announced that the company had filed a complaint to the court after the U.S. Department of the Interior paused the offshore wind project in December. In connection with this, the company requested that the court grant a stay of the complaint. This is the part that has now been granted.
»We are pleased that Revolution Wind has once again received the court’s approval to continue work,« says Ørsted’s CEO, Rasmus Errboe, in a written statement to Politiken.
»Our focus now is to resume construction work as quickly as possible so the project can deliver reliable and affordable energy to 350,000 American households in Rhode Island and Connecticut«, he adds.
Because the company has now been granted this part, work on the project can resume, at least until a final court decision is made in the main lawsuit.
The order from the authorities on December 22 last year meant that activities related to Revolution Wind had to be halted for 90 days. According to U.S. Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum, the reason was national security. The ministry said, according to news agency Reuters, that the Pentagon had expressed concern that the movement of wind turbine blades and reflective towers caused radar interference. But the judge in the case did not buy that on Monday. He simply did not believe that the ministry’s documentation in the case was sufficient.
Revolution Wind is an offshore wind farm that Ørsted is constructing off the U.S. East Coast. According to Ørsted, the park is about 87 percent complete, and 58 out of 65 wind turbines have been installed. The park is a joint project between Ørsted and Skyborn Renewables, which is a co-owner.
The ruling
Judge Royce Lamberth was clearly unimpressed with the Trump administration when he sharply dismissed the administration’s arguments Monday evening and now lifts the temporary work stoppage order.
The U.S. Department of the Interior has demanded that work be halted for 90 days while it investigates new information from the Department of Defense that the turbines pose a new threat to national security. Judge Lamberth reviewed the classified information and did not believe it provided strong reasons to stop construction.
On the contrary, the judge said in his ruling, which Politiken listened to via a phone connection, that it was unclear how they differed from the concerns that had already been addressed in cooperation between the authorities and Ørsted in 2024.
The judge did not believe the new work stoppage order was much different from the first, which he also dismissed as illegal in September 2025.
Analyst: Really good news
The Trump administration has previously tried to halt several offshore wind projects in the U.S. In August, Ørsted and partner Skyborn Renewables were told to stop construction of Revolution Wind. At that time, the order was also justified by a concern for national security
The two partners filed a lawsuit against the U.S. government. In September, they received a judge’s ruling that construction could continue.
Revolution Wind is one of two offshore wind projects off the U.S. East Coast that have been affected by the U.S. order. Sunrise Wind is the other. A complaint has also been filed regarding that project.
Jacob Pedersen, head of equity research at AL Sydbank, calls Monday’s ruling »really good news«.
»It could mean a less difficult path to completion for Revolution Wind, although the past year has taught us that you should never say never when it comes to the Trump administration’s attempts to derail offshore wind projects«, he writes in an analysis.
At the same time, the lifted suspension saves Ørsted half of the construction stop costs of approximately 275 million kroner monthly, he writes:
»And it reduces, in our view, the risk of a complete abandonment, which would cause Ørsted total losses of approximately 20 billion kroner«.
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