By Christie U. Omonigho
Energy Window International (Media) – TotalEnergies says it has entered into settlement agreements with the United States Department of the Interior (DOI) to relinquish its Carolina Long Bay lease (Lease OCS-A 0545) and its New York Bight lease (Lease OCS-A 0538), both awarded in 2022, along with its partners. “Therefore we will no longer be developing offshore wind projects in the United States”, TotalEnergies said.
The French firm said that it would recover, under the terms of the settlement, the lease fees paid and then invest an equal amount in the development of U.S. Gas & Power production and exports.
The company said its studies on the leases showed that offshore wind developments in the United States, unlike those in Europe, were costly and may have a negative impact on power affordability for U.S. consumers. “Since other technologies are available to meet the growing demand for electricity in the United States in a more affordable way, we considered there was no need to allocate capital to this technology in the US”, TotalEnergies said
“TotalEnergies is pleased to sign these settlement agreements with the DOI and to support the Administration’s Energy Policy. Considering that the development of offshore wind projects is not in the country’s interest, we have decided to renounce offshore wind development in the United States, in exchange for the reimbursement of the lease fees,” says Patrick Pouyanné, Chairman of the Board of Directors and Chief Executive Officer of TotalEnergies. “Furthermore, these agreements, under which we will reinvest the refunded lease fees to finance the construction of the 29 Mt Rio Grande LNG plant and the development of our oil and gas activities, allows us to support the development of U.S. gas production and export. These investments will contribute to supplying Europe with much-needed LNG from the U.S. and provide gas for U.S. data center development. We believe this is a more efficient use of capital in the United States.”
The company also said it signed and recently too a Letter of Intent (LOI) with Glenfarne, lead developer of the Alaska LNG project, for the long-term offtake of 2 million tons per year (Mtpa) of liquefied natural gas (LNG) over 20 years, subject however to the project’s final investment decision.
Meanwhile the company said that it has invested nearly $12 billion in the U.S. to accelerate development in oil, LNG, and electricity, deploying integrated energy model across the United States where it says it has been active since 1957, boasting of its integration throughout the LNG value chain, touted its upstream gas production assets in Texas and offshore United States, with 19 million tons exported in 2025, It also touted of its integrated power strategy with 10 GW of installed power capacity.
