The Trump administration has forced a Canadian-backed renewable energy company to abandon its landmark wind power project \u2014 and is demanding an equivalent investment in US fossil fuel development if the company wants to recoup $120 million USD in offshore wind leases.<\/p>\n
The project, Golden State Wind, is a joint venture wind power project off the coast of California. Reventus Power, a UK-based, wholly owned portfolio company, is the wind power generation venture of the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB). As of 2024, the Canada Pension Plan had over $1 billion CAD invested in wind power generation through Reventus Power.<\/p>\n
\u201cCanadians would be horrified to learn that millions of dollars from the Canada Pension Plan are being diverted (potentially illegally) to advance the Trump administration\u2019s fossil fuel agenda instead of [being] invested in renewable energy as intended,\u201d said Patrick DeRochie, Senior Manager with Shift Action for Pension Wealth and Planet Health. Shift Action is a Canadian pension watchdog group that pressures Canadians\u2019 pensions to divest from fossil fuels.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The US Department of the Interior (DOI) announced that Golden State Wind had voluntarily ended its offshore wind lease in a statement issued on April 27.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The project is a partnership between Reventus and Ocean Winds, a company specializing in the development, construction and operation of offshore wind farms. The DOI indicated that the company has agreed to make \u201cfinancial investments in reliable conventional energy projects.\u201d The DOI statement further said that Golden State Wind would be eligible to recover \u201c$120 million in lease fees after an investment has been made of an equal amount in the development of US oil and gas assets, energy infrastructure, and\/or LNG projects along the Gulf Coast.\u201d<\/p>\n
The state of California is now investigating the matter. The California Energy Commission told the Associated Press on May 4 that it issued an administrative subpoena to Golden State Wind. The commission is seeking documentation about the agreement, with chair David Hochschild characterizing the arrangement as a \u201cback room deal\u201d that \u201cturns back the clock on innovation.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe fact that CPPIB\u2019s welcome investment in offshore wind is being hijacked by the Trump administration to prop up fossil fuels should tell CPPIB all it needs to know: the oil and gas industry can no longer compete with renewables on a level playing field,\u201d said DeRochie in a statement to\u00a0Canada\u2019s National Observer. \u201cThe oil and gas industry is resorting to blatant corruption on behalf of captured regulators and climate-denying authoritarians in an attempt to slow fossil fuels\u2019 terminal decline.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Interior Department said the agreement it made with Golden State Wind was based on an earlier arrangement secured with TotalEnergies, the French energy giant. In late-March, Total agreed to a refund of its leases for offshore wind projects near North Carolina and New York State. The agreement involved the Trump administration paying the money back to Total, which in turn\u00a0invested the money into US fossil fuel projects<\/a>. Environmentalists denounced the agreement as a billion-dollar bribe to kill clean energy projects.<\/p>\n Canada\u2019s National Observer\u00a0reached out to the CPPIB for comment. Frank Switzer Managing Director, Communications with the CPPIB, would not answer specific questions addressed to the Canada Pension Plan, instead saying they should be sent to Reventus.<\/p>\n Upon announcing their investment in Golden State Wind, the CPPIB said \u201cthis investment aligns well with our efforts to reduce carbon emissions across our portfolio while continuing to deliver strong, long-term risk-adjusted returns for the Fund\u2019s contributors and beneficiaries.\u201d<\/p>\n The same statement said the\u00a0CPPIB was investing $30 million USD<\/a> in \u201cworkforce development and supply chain initiatives and to work closely with key local stakeholders to maximize the benefits to California from the emerging offshore wind industry.\u201d DeRochie notes that this amount is not included in the agreement made with the Trump administration.<\/p>\n \u201cYou would think that this kind of dirty dealing that puts its own renewable energy investments at risk would be enough for CPPIB to cut ties with fossil fuels and stop investing the Canada Pension Plan in companies that are fighting tooth-and-nail to delay the transition to a climate-safe, clean-energy future,\u201d said DeRochie. \u201cInstead, the CEO of CPPIB is telling Bay Street that it remains \u2018steadfast<\/a>\u2019 in its support for the oil and gas industry.\u201d<\/p>\n According to the DOI statement, the company has decided not to pursue any new wind power development projects in the United States.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Trump administration has forced a Canadian-backed renewable energy company to abandon its landmark wind power project \u2014…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":654516,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[49,48,295,66],"class_list":["post-654515","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-environment","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654515","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=654515"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654515\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/654516"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=654515"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=654515"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=654515"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}