So-called clean energy, like wind and solar, were supposed to save the world from allegedly manmade climate change. But what about toxic manufacturing pollution and devastation to wildlife? These conflicting interests are visible in the tension caused by the recent pause in construction on the Empire Wind project near New York. The Trump administration doesn’t worship at the alter of union jobs and “clean energy” – and that has progressives howling.
Halting the Wind Empire
On April 16, 2025, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum announced that New York’s Empire Wind development had not undergone sufficient environmental analysis before approval and must be halted pending review. The project is the techno-darling of Norwegian energy company Equinor, which now threatens suit over the delay, alleging billions of dollars in financial losses. Trump critics claim the decision to reverse Biden-era regulatory approvals is political ping-pong, while supporters allege that Team Biden rushed it carelessly.
New York Governor and Trump nemesis Kathy Hochul has protested loudly, stating: “Permits secured. Shovels in the ground. 1,000 union workers earning a paycheck. Now the federal government wants to kill Empire Wind 1, putting jobs, affordable energy, and our economic future at risk.”
Less regulation, more jobs, economic growth – Hochul almost sounds like a Republican! But in crying foul, the governor has not considered the fowl. That is, the seabirds that will be displaced and killed by the massive array of monstrous wind turbines, far larger than European installations and thus more disruptive to the ecosystems of the Atlantic coast. She also omits bats, whales, and fisheries (including the jobs and economic activity that depend on them).
This likely explains why the usual climate activists are not yet mobilized – the carbon dioxide cult conflicts with increasing voices explaining that massive turbine blades are made of fiberglass, that oil leaks from these sci-fi machinations, and that their eventual disposal is an ecological nightmare. Animal rights activists largely oppose them, as the science is not in doubt: Birds, bats, fish, and whales will die. It’s just a question of which ones and how many.
Numerous Industry Problems
The decision to pause development imperils the other 17 monstrous arrays slotted for erection along the East Coast. “Real science” suggests these mega-installations impair radar and navigation, imperiling ocean safety for humans. Federal agencies commissioned to study wildlife impacts find more and more risks, both known and unknown, as time passes. Time is not on wind developers’ side.
The viability of big wind has long been controversial. Like solar panels that don’t generate power during inclement weather or nighttime (when grid demand increases), the technological problem of intermittency crops up for wind turbine blades that don’t spin when the air is still. But that doesn’t stop industry advocates from spinning tales of urgency.
The recent grid failure in Spain and Portugal was likely attributable to this shortcoming – a lack of back-up, or what is called “dispatchable” power. If clouds hide the sun and the wind dies down, grids lose power capacity despite continuing or increasing demand. Without nuclear, coal, or natural gas generation to satisfy that demand quickly, grid failure results.
As explained by National Wind Watch:
“Electric grids require reliable power delivery to meet their grid reserve margins. Wind’s intermittent and unreliable nature means it contributes little towards meeting a grid’s reserve margin capacity requirements. To compensate for wind’s limited capacity credit, regional power providers must still build additional capacity, usually gas-powered units, to make up for gradual yet nonetheless significant swings in wind energy output in order to achieve regional reserve margin requirements.”
Industry observers assert there are only two classes of gas-powered turbines that can be employed to solve this problem: open-cycle gas turbine (OCGT) and combined-cycle gas turbine (CCGT). According to National Wind Watch, “While OCGT may be well-suited to back up wind, doing so becomes more expensive and actually produces a negligible reduction in GHG emissions when compared to using a cleaner burning CCGT plant alone.”
Saving Whales, Fish, and Birds
Robert Kennedy, Jr. raised similar alarms about wind turbines in Nantucket Sound two decades ago, earning him a vaunted spot as one of Time magazine’s “Heroes for the Planet.” Yet today, ocean wind turbine installations are being constructed all along the eastern seaboard. And the whales, bats, fish, and birds must still be factored into the ecological equation. Despite Hochul ignoring these critters entirely, the impacts of wind turbines on wildlife are substantial.
“Construction and operation of hundreds of wind turbines is likely to introduce increased ocean noise, vessel traffic and possibly habitat alteration. All of these factors have the potential to affect right whales,” The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration warned in 2021. “Increased vessel traffic in the region will bring with it a greater risk of vessel strikes, one of the leading causes of serious injury and death of right whales.”
Fisheries are also at risk. A first-of-its-kind, 400-page report issued in 2023 concluded:
“By disrupting NOAA Fisheries survey programs and the advice that depends upon them, regional wind development will result in major adverse impacts on U.S. fisheries stakeholders, including fishermen and fishing communities….
“The impacts on survey programs will lead to greater uncertainty in estimates of abundance, which through the application of the precautionary approach will likely lead to lower fishery quotas, ultimately resulting in lost revenue to commercial and recreational fishermen.”
A Dubious Proposition
A telling controversy about the devil’s bargain presented by offshore wind turbines was especially well captured in a 2022 article by Audubon that chronicled specific harms to seabirds, especially gannets, yet argued in favor of wind turbines to save the birds from certain doom from climate change:
“Authorities and wind developers acknowledge the risks to wildlife.
“That’s a calculus the scientists are prepared to accept. “We have such a hard time grasping how big a problem climate change is that it’s sometimes easier to focus on the immediate risk of a structure in the water,” Felton says. “These birds are going to lose all of their habitat if the planet keeps warming. They need clean energy, but they are going to be threatened by it. The best we can do is minimize that threat.”
It is not so clear that human activities are causing the planet to warm, and even less clear that renewables manufacturing – especially wind turbines – will effectively counter planetary warming. What is certain is that there is big money in big wind, and that birds, whales, and fish are all on the climate change altar for sacrifice – in the name of saving them. The Trump administration’s pause of the Empire Wind project will elevate these problems into a much-needed national discussion.
