Posted on March 14, 2025
Washington, D.C. March 10, 2025 – A broad coalition of commercial fishing industry interests has appealed to the Supreme Court to challenge authorization of the Vineyard Wind 1 offshore wind project, which jeopardizes working-families and the iconic coastal communities dependent on our oceans’ fisheries. The commercial fishing industry has fed our country, and the world, since before the United States became a nation. Now their livelihoods, along with their safety, shoreside-based family businesses, and our nation’s sustainable domestic seafood production hangs in the balance.
Commercial fishermen have expressed serious concerns about offshore wind development from the very first offshore wind auction gavel-strike in 2013. Yet despite years of pleas, their operational requirements have all been ignored in the federal offshore wind leasing and permitting process.
The Responsible Offshore Development Alliance (RODA) filed a petition for a writ of certiorari explaining that the Interior Department reinterpreted statutory language of the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act (OCSLA) to approve Vineyard Wind 1. Section 1337(p)(4) of OCSLA requires that the Secretary of the Interior “shall ensure” that any approved activities – including offshore wind projects – are consistent with Congress’s requirement to ensure “prevention of interference with reasonable uses,” such as the “use of the sea, or a seabed for a fishery.” In 2021, the Interior Department effectively reinterpreted the statute to authorize Vineyard Wind 1, claiming the “shall ensure” language merely requires these factors be “considered” or “balanced” against the need for offshore wind.
Vineyard Wind 1 was the first approved commercial-scale offshore wind project and its approval sets the precedent for all future US offshore wind development. The construction and operation of up to 3000 offshore wind turbines, along with thousands of miles of high-voltage electric cables plus offshore substations and offshore AC/DC converter stations placed in our seas, will forever alter the pristine ocean marine environment Americans cherish and have vigorously protected. Offshore wind will forever change our oceans, and have lasting effects to US commerce, navigational safety, search and rescue operations, commercial, charter, and recreational fishing, and public enjoyment of our waters.
Congress’ mandate to the Secretary of the Interior remains clear; the Secretary “shall ensure” prevention of interference with reasonable uses of the Outer Continental Shelf, including use for a fishery. Petitioning the SCOTUS is the only option left to ensure American seafood harvesters, and the US wild-caught sustainable seafood industry are not put out of business at the hands of those who want to turn our oceans into a massive web of industrial power plants.
Petition available here.
About Responsible Offshore Development Alliance
Responsible Offshore Development Alliance (RODA) is a broad membership-based coalition of fishing industry associations and fishing companies — across the United States — committed to improving the compatibility of new offshore development with their businesses. The Alliance works to directly collaborate with relevant regulatory agencies, scientists, and others to coordinate science and policy approaches to managing development of the Outer Continental Shelf in a way that minimizes conflicts with existing traditional and historical fishing.
