The Trump administration said Wednesday it will pay Invenergy $765 million to walk away from four U.S. wind leases, including one off the coast of Morro Bay, California. The agreement ends plans for projects in California, the New York Bight and two areas off the Gulf of Maine.
The payment is a partial reimbursement for what the company paid for the leases, according to the administration. Invenergy said it will redirect the money toward natural-gas-fired power plants in Indiana, Wisconsin, Iowa, Kansas and Missouri, along with geothermal projects in the western U.S.
The move marks the third time this year the Trump administration has announced a deal to unwind offshore wind projects. In March, the Interior Department said it had reached a $1 billion agreement with TotalEnergies to abandon leases off North Carolina and New York, and in April the administration struck an $885 million deal with Golden State Wind and Bluepoint Wind to end leases off California, New Jersey and New York.
Thursday’s deal leaves only three offshore wind leases intact off California, including one off Morro Bay and two off Humboldt Bay. One of the lingering tensions in the state’s energy plan is plain: California still has a target of 25 gigawatts of offshore wind power by 2045, even as Washington is paying to shut down part of the pipeline that would have helped get there.
Invenergy’s California site, known as Even Keel Wind, covered about 80,000 acres roughly 20 miles offshore. The administration said the company is shifting investment back toward more dependable energy infrastructure, with Doug Burgum saying the move was a common-sense step to put the American people first and lower utility costs.
What remains unclear is how much of the $765 million Invenergy will actually receive after what it originally paid for the leases. That number matters because the deal does not simply erase the projects; it resets the price of backing out of them.
