Offshore Wind is the Wildcard in New Jersey Gov Race
Activists are awaiting responses from Team Trump, challenging environmental establishment with fresh science.
Electricity rates have risen as much as 20 percent in parts of New Jersey, fueling public frustration with wind power projects driving cost increases—and potentially helping Republicans in the Garden State’s contentious election this November.
Jack Ciattarelli, the Republican gubernatorial candidate, is pounding away at the state’s “energy crisis” in a series of powerful ads and public comments. The wind plans for the Jersey Shore—and the Trump administration’s ability to halt them—figure prominently into the conversation.
New Jersey residents battling the offshore wind projects are still waiting to hear back from top Trump administration officials who have the authority to rescind prior approvals for the project. While construction has not yet taken place, local conservationists have expressed concern that the company behind the wind proposal could quickly reconstitute its plans once it has enough allies back in government.
That’s why the citizen activist group known as Save LBI is continuing to pursue litigation at the state and federal level aimed at blocking the project while at the same time petitioning Trump administration officials to take further executive action. Save LBI is also reaching out to some of the larger, more established environmental groups with correspondence asking them to reconsider their prior support for offshore wind. The anti-wind activists have collected updated scientific research that demonstrates how offshore wind damages the environment and marine life.
A Checkered History
Atlantic Shores Offshore Wind is the partnership between Shell New Energies US and EDF Renewables North America that has envisioned building up to 200 wind turbines positioned as close as eight miles off the coast of Long Beach Island (LBI), Brigantine, and Atlantic City in southern New Jersey.
That partnership has experienced some significant setbacks in recent months. In February 2025, Shell New Energy withdrew from the project and wrote off $1 billion of its investment. At the time, a company official told reporters the offshore wind effort no longer fit with its “capabilities” and did not generate the kind of returns the company would like to see. Shell’s decision prompted the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities (BPU) to cancel its “fourth offshore wind solicitation,” which meant it would not be providing Atlantic Shores with additional subsidies.
The January 2025 executive order from President Trump calling for a temporary cessation and immediate review of federal wind leasing and permitting practices dealt another blow to Atlantic Shores.
Not Quite Dead (Yet)
But does this really mean the project is dead?
Bob Stern, the president of Save LBI, and an engineer who previously managed environmental reviews for the U.S Department of Energy, says no.
“I tell people the project is halted,” Stern told Restoration News in an interview. “But as long as they hold the lease area, it’s still active and could come back.”
The other corporate partner EDF Renewables is a French-owned utility known in full as Electricity de France. In March 2025, EDF wrote down $940 million of its cost for the project. But the company has made comments indicating it’s still poised to going forward.
“EDF keeps making statements they are committed to the project,” Stern said. “The Atlantic Shores CEO also seems to be looking for new opportunities to proceed. So, it sounds to me like they want to see who wins the next gubernatorial election in New Jersey.”
Ciattarelli, a businessman and former assemblyman, is running for governor against Rep. Mikie Sherrill, a Democrat House member representing New Jersey’s 11th Congressional District. Ciattarelli is unequivocally opposed to offshore wind plans while Sherrill’s congressional record shows she has a history of supporting green energy projects. Gov. Phil Murphy, the incumbent Democrat and a proponent of offshore wind, is term-limited and will leave office in January 2026.
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Lee Zeldin Stands Out from the Pack
Among all the government officials Save LBI has interacted with, the group has had the most success with EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin. The petition Save LBI activists sent to the EPA Environmental Appeals Board proved to be instrumental in having Zeldin withdraw the air permit for the Atlantic Shores project back in March.
“This is the permit that deals with air emissions or pollutant emissions offshore from the pile driving that travel onshore,” Stern said. “So, when they do the pile driving to embed the foundations into the seabed, it takes a lot of power and a lot of energy. You’ve got diesel engines operating and vessels operating and they give off a significant amount of pollutants. Even though these are 8 or 9 miles offshore, that can travel onshore and impact the Brigantine National Wilderness Area which has strict requirements against degradation of its air quality.”
In analyzing the air permit, the Save LBI team found what Stern said were “a lot of flaws” in the process Biden’s EPA used to approve the air permit. Stern also told Restoration News that the agency failed to provide any meaningful explanation for its decisions and did not disclose whether the air emissions it had modeled matched up with the energy needed to pile drive the foundations into the seabed.
“Zeldin agreed with us and remanded the air permit and called it back for a further look and that was really very important to us because then the project did not have all the permits it needed to construct,” Stern said. “That enabled us and the administration to halt construction. That was a notable success on the permitting side.”
But on the flip side the letters and requests Save LBI sent to Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick have gone unanswered.
Specifically, Save LBI has asked Burgum to initiate a process for cancelling the lease and for Lutnick to create a turbine-free migration corridor along the East Coast for the benefit of the Right Whale.
The New Jersey conservationists have also asked Burgum and Lutnick to rescind the Biden administration’s Endangered Species Act (ESA) approval for the project.
They are still waiting for answers. But in meantime Save LBI has also released a new report titled “The Benefits and Risks of an Offshore Wind Project” that details what the negative impacts of the Atlantic Shores project will be if it moves forward. In letters addressed to executives of environmental advocacy groups, Stern encourages them to read the report and “critically examine” their prior support for offshore wind.
Reflecting on four years of effort trying to preserve the shore and the ocean environment, Stern concluded that the “mainstream environmental organizations had lost their way” and that “they have been consumed by the climate change issue, at the expense of other environmental protections.”
The letters from Stern and Save LBI were addressed to the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Sierra Club and more than a dozen other left-wing environmental groups.
Stern said his organization would be exploring the feasibility of creating a new national environmental organization dedicated to shore and ocean protection and “making practical international progress towards addressing climate change.”
Other offshore wind projects up and down the East Coast that have stirred controversy include Revolution Wind off Rhode Island and Connecticut, Empire Wind off New York and New Jersey, and Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind.
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