US pays RWE $1.2B to walk away from its offshore wind leases

German utility RWE has agreed to abandon its US offshore wind developments in exchange for a $1.2bn payout from the Trump administration’s Department of the Interior. The company will surrender leases off California, Louisiana, and in the New York Bight, and redirect the money toward fossil-fuel infrastructure — most of it, roughly $900m, into an LNG export terminal in Louisiana. RWE framed the retreat as a business reality, saying there is no viable path to permit offshore wind in the US for the foreseeable future, while pledging around €17bn of broader US investment over six years.

The payout fits a clear pattern. Interior has struck comparable deals this year with TotalEnergies, which pivoted to a Texas LNG plant and Gulf oil, and with Duke Energy, which took $129m to drop a lease in the Carolinas. Each swaps a wind project for conventional gas or oil, aligning with an administration that has openly campaigned against offshore wind and for expanded fossil-fuel production.

The significance is less about any single company than the emerging playbook: the federal government is spending public money to actively unwind wind projects and steer developers toward gas, reshaping the US energy build-out through direct financial incentives rather than regulation alone. For firms holding offshore leases, the message is that permits are effectively frozen and a buyout is the expected exit.