NJ has given up on offshore wind for now. Who’s to blame?

New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy, a Democrat, spent seven years trying to transform his state into a leader for offshore wind only to step away from that dream in the final months of his term.

Last Monday, the state’s Board of Public Utilities canceled an offshore wind power solicitation, a process in which states agree to purchase electricity from wind turbines planned to be built off their coasts. The move left a key project, Atlantic Shores, without a customer — just days after it was abandoned by Shell, one of its two owners and developers.

All of this came in the wake of an executive order signed by President Donald Trump on his first day in office that paused the approval of leases, permits, and loans for both offshore and onshore wind energy pending a federal review. The move immediately froze the dozen or so projects that do not yet have the federal permits required to begin construction.

But Atlantic Shores, one of nine U.S. offshore wind projects that already has all of its federal permits in hand, appeared safe to begin building turbines. All that was left for the 2.8-gigawatt project to nail was a purchase agreement from the state, which would have enabled financing. Now that’s dead in the water — at least for the remaining 11 months of Murphy’s term.

Christine Guhl-Sadovy, president of the Board of Public Utilities, said in a statement that ​“a number of reasons led to this decision” but only named Shell’s withdrawal and ​“uncertainty” over federal actions in Washington.

News reports were also quick to blame Trump alone for the project’s demise.

Left unmentioned were the unique political dynamics within the Garden State, which is home not only to some of the most aggressive offshore wind goals in the country but some of the loudest and most powerful detractors of the emerging industry.

“I think New Jersey has been different from the start,” said Paulina O’Connor, executive director of the New Jersey Offshore Wind Alliance, an advocacy organization whose work is funded in part by wind developers.

Murphy’s exit, Van Drew’s rise 

Murphy has prioritized his environmental agenda throughout his time in office.

New Jersey became the first state to require that climate change be taught in every grade, from kindergarten through high school. In 2021, Murphy donned a hard hat to help break ground on the New Jersey Wind Port, a still-incomplete hub roughly 220 acres in size that was meant to position the state as the East Coast leader for staging and assembling wind infrastructure. Murphy promised the purpose-built port for offshore wind, the nation’s first, would create up to 1,500 clean energy jobs.

He also aimed to set New Jersey on the path to building a 100% zero-emissions power grid by 2035, creating through an executive order one of the country’s most ambitious state-level decarbonization goals. In his State of the State address given the week before Trump’s inauguration, Murphy said he was working with legislators to codify New Jersey’s decarbonization plan into state law.

Not referenced in Murphy’s January address was offshore wind, which he has long touted as a cornerstone of the state’s decarbonization plans. Last year, for example, Murphy mentioned offshore wind twice in his State of the State address.

In retrospect, experts said, it might have been the first signal that Murphy had decided to distance himself from offshore wind heading into his lame-duck year.

Murphy will leave office without any offshore projects under construction along the state’s 130 miles of coastline. That’s in stark contrast to Massachusetts, Virginia, New York, and Rhode Island, all of which have projects completed or currently underway.

“We have no turbines in the water. Not even close,” said O’Connor.

Atlantic Shores Offshore Wind CEO Joris Veldhoven said that while Murphy’s 2035 clean energy commitment is ​“genuine and commendable,” last week’s auction cancellation ​“clearly puts this goal at risk.”

Meanwhile, Rep. Jeff Van Drew, a New Jersey Republican, remains on Capitol Hill, where he’s been a vocal opponent of Atlantic Shores — and a thorn in the side of New Jersey’s nascent offshore wind industry in general.

Van Drew also has the president’s ear on offshore wind. Just one week before Shell withdrew from the project, Trump posted on Truth Social thanking the ​“great New Jersey Congressman Jeff Van Drew for his fight against a large scale Windmill DISASTER off the coast of Southern New Jersey.”

Although Trump didn’t name Atlantic Shores outright, industry groups saw this as the president putting a target on the back of one specific U.S. offshore wind project, something he had not done in his dozens of previous anti-wind posts.

The fate of the New Jersey Wind Port is also now up in the air given the uncertainty surrounding installations in New Jersey. The state’s Economic Development Authority announced last week that it will seek ​“alternative uses” for the wind port.

Murphy’s lame-duck period should not be discounted as a driver of the state’s decision.

New Jersey is facing a budget gap. Murphy has spent months reducing spending and freezing new hires, according to reporting by the New Jersey Monitor. Taking on a major purchase agreement with an energy company can be a risk if you don’t have the resources to properly manage it, said Barbara Kates-Garnick, a professor of energy policy at Tufts University.

“There’s too much uncertainty at the change of an administration like this,” said Kates-Garnick about Murphy’s lame-duck period. She’s a former Massachusetts public utility commissioner and said in her experience with governors transitioning out of power there is often a strong urge to ​“kick the can down the road” to the next administration.

She added that project costs in New Jersey — and the Northeast — are getting expensive, too. Powering through to a purchase agreement with a project that’s on shaky financial ground, as was the case with Atlantic Shores once Shell had backed away, would have been a risk.

Murphy said after the auction’s cancellation that the ​“offshore wind industry is currently facing significant challenges, and now is the time for patience and prudence.”

Atlantic Shores, for its part, does not rule out searching for a new partner, refinancing, and pressing New Jersey for a new solicitation down the road. The project’s CEO last week insisted Atlantic Shores was pressing on, saying in an email sent to Canary Media that the venture stands ​“ready to deliver on the promise of offshore wind to achieve American energy dominance, grow the economy, and protect the environment.”

O’Connor accuses Murphy and the state Board of Public Utilities of generating at least some of the market uncertainty that was giving developers unease even before Trump took office.

“We’ve seen many delays in the [board’s] auctions,” she said. ​“This one that was just canceled was supposed to be in November or December. That is what we were hoping for. The longer you let things sit, the higher the risk.”

Kates-Garnick predicts that, due to Trump’s influence, the U.S. will fall dramatically short of the Biden administration’s goal of generating 30 GW of offshore wind by 2030. Her ​“back-of-the-envelope calculation” is that the U.S. will be operating less than 5 GW by then.

Will NJ’s next governor bring back offshore wind? 

Murphy’s possible successors run the gamut from a U.S. Navy pilot turned climate hawk to a certified public accountant who sells koozies that say ​“STOP OFFSHORE WIND.”

U.S. Rep. Mikie Sherrill is a four-term Democrat and a U.S. Navy veteran who arrived on the political scene in 2017 and unseated a Republican who had been in office for decades. Sherrill is one of 10 major party candidates who took the gubernatorial debate stage recently — and one of the three explicitly endorsing offshore wind on campaign websites.

Sherrill’s Democratic primary opponent Steve Sweeney, a former state senator, has the longest pro-wind track record. In 2010, Sweeney endorsed the original state bill that gave tax credits to offshore wind developers and manufacturers that set up shop in the Garden State. The law was signed by then-Gov. Chris Christie, a Republican.

Sherrill and Sweeney will face off against U.S. Rep. Josh Gottheimer as well as Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop, Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, and New Jersey Education Association President Sean Spiller for the Democratic nomination. Fulop endorses ​“responsibly developed” offshore wind infrastructure.

Spiller calls climate change ​“an existential crisis” but makes no mention of the sector on his campaign site. Neither does Baraka. They did not respond to requests from Canary Media to clarify their policy stances.

Republican Jack Ciattarelli, the accountant turned entrepreneur, is campaigning on a promise to ban future offshore wind development. Some of his Republican opponents have tried to throw sand in the gears of Murphy’s offshore wind push. Bill Spadea has spoken at anti-offshore wind rallies. Ed Durr, a former state senator, has helped spread misinformation that offshore wind activities are killing marine mammals in the region. Federal scientists and academic researchers have found no evidence for this claim.

Not all state Republicans running for governor share these strong views. State Sen. Jon Bramnick, a moderate, endorses renewables as ​“a pathway forward” for sustainable energy while also endorsing methane gas and nuclear sources in the near term.

Support for offshore wind in the state has declined from 80% to 52% since Murphy’s first term, according to a survey of New Jersey voters released in October by Stockton University. Among those surveyed, only 24% said building ocean turbines should be one of the state’s major priorities.

Despite the declining public support from both voters and the sitting governor, it’s far too soon to say the state will never see a turbine get built off of its coast, O’Connor of the New Jersey Offshore Wind Alliance said.

“For those who are writing offshore wind obituaries, I challenge them to wait,” she said. ​“We will have clarity when we see who the governor will be.”