Doug Burgum Archives - Saving Seafood

Gulf of Maine may be impacted by Trump’s offshore oil and gas drilling expansion

May 8, 2025 — As part of the Trump’s administration’s effort to expand fossil fuel production in the United States, the Department of the Interior announced recently that it would accelerate the permitting process for a range of energy sources and seek new oil and gas lease sales in offshore waters, including in the Gulf of Maine.

Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum said the permitting changes — which speed up review under the National Environmental Policy and Endangered Species Acts, among others — would cut what is often a multi-year review process down to several weeks.

Environmental groups and Maine lawmakers decried the moves while oil and gas industry representatives celebrated them. Days later, a group of New England Senators, including Sens. Susan Collins and Angus King, introduced legislation to ban offshore drilling in waters throughout New England.

“The waters off Maine’s coast provide a healthy ecosystem for our fisheries and are an integral part of our tourism industry, supporting thousands of jobs and generating billions of dollars in revenue each year,” said Collins in a statement. “Offshore drilling along the coast could impact Mainers of all walks of life for generations.”

Read the full story at the Boston Globe

Interior Department to Fast-Track Oil, Gas and Mining Projects

May 6, 2025 — The Interior Department said late Wednesday that it would fast-track approvals for projects involving coal, gas, oil and minerals on public lands, arguing that President Trump’s declaration of an energy emergency allowed it to radically reduce lengthy reviews required by the nation’s bedrock environmental laws.

Environmental reviews that typically take a year to complete would be finished in 14 days, administration officials said. More complicated environmental impact statements that usually take two years would be completed in 28 days, they said.

“The United States cannot afford to wait,” Doug Burgum, the Interior secretary, said in a statement.

The shortcuts would apply to projects that increase the production of crude oil, natural gas, critical minerals, uranium, lease condensates, coal, biofuels, geothermal energy, kinetic hydropower and refined petroleum products, according to the department.

Read the full story at The New York Times

Burgum leans away from ‘all-of-the-above’ energy

April 29, 2025 — When he fought for votes in North Dakota’s Republican gubernatorial primary in 2016, tech executive Doug Burgum did not have the financial backing of the state’s powerful oil and gas lobby.

Burgum — who is now Interior secretary — labeled that money a conflict of interest.

As governor, Burgum sought to push North Dakota to be carbon-neutral by 2030. He stressed “the importance of an all-of-the-above energy policy” when then-Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm visited the state in 2021. And he chaired a state commission that approved North Dakota’s first injection well for the geologic storage of carbon dioxide.

But as a member of President Donald Trump’s Cabinet, Burgum has taken a sharply different tack.

Last week, the Interior Department unveiled a plan to speed up the development of domestic energy and critical minerals. The new emergency permitting procedures don’t apply to renewable sources such as wind and solar, reflecting Trump’s priorities and his Jan. 20 energy “emergency” executive order. Carbon capture and storage technology, or CCS, was also left out.

The new policy arrived days after Interior moved to halt construction on the Empire Wind project off the coast of New York, arguing it was approved “without sufficient analysis.” That has left observers wondering what’s next from Burgum.

Read the full story at E&E News

Interior won’t release evidence for blocked NY wind farm

April 23, 2025 — The Interior Department says it stopped work on a New York offshore wind farm because the project’s permit was based on “bad & flawed science.”

It has yet to produce that science.

Interior has offered little explanation for its decision last week to halt work on Empire Wind. Its public statements have been limited to a pair of social media posts by Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, who initially announced the decision on X last week and followed up with a post Monday saying the move was based on findings from NOAA.

Read the full story at E&E News

Trump escalates his feud with offshore wind

April 21, 2025 — Donald Trump took his disdain for offshore wind to a new level this week.

The president moved to halt a wind farm off New York’s coast that was already under construction — a step analysts say sets a dangerous precedent for all energy projects, not just renewable ones, writes Benjamin Storrow.

“No one with any kind of an energy project can rely on the permits that have been issued if this administration, for whatever reason — legally or illegally, rightly or wrongly — decides that they want to call into question permits that have already been issued,” Allan Marks with Columbia University told Ben.

“That should scare any investor in any energy project.”

Interior Secretary Doug Burgum delivered the administration’s rationale in a social media post on X. The 810-megawatt Empire Wind project is being halted, he wrote, to review information “that suggests the Biden administration rushed through its approval without sufficient analysis.”

Read the full story at Politico

Trump administration moves to shut down Empire Wind

April 17, 2025 — Interior Secretary Doug Burgum is directing the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to halt construction activity on Equinor’s Empire Wind project off New York.

“Approval for the project was rushed through by the prior administration without sufficient analysis or consultation among the relevant agencies as relates to the potential effects from the project,” Burgum wrote in a memorandum Wednesday, first reported by the Washington Free Beacon.

Citing President Trump’s Jan. 20 executive order calling for a broad review of all offshore wind power projects in federal waters, Burgum wrote that the construction halt will remain pending review to “address these serious deficiencies.”

Planned as an array of 54 turbines between shipping approaches to New York Harbor, the 810-megawatt project recently started with subsea rock installation on the turbine sites, and pile-driving for foundation installation expected in May.

Project opponents have furiously lobbied the administration to take dramatic action against the project, one of five East Coast wind installations where developers with approvals under the Biden administration have pressed forward despite hostility from Trump.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Trump administration issues order to stop construction on New York offshore wind project

April 17, 2025 — The Trump administration issued an order Wednesday to stop construction on a major offshore wind project to power more than 500,000 New York homes, the latest in a series of moves targeting the industry.

Interior Secretary Doug Burgum directed the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to halt construction on Empire Wind, a fully-permitted project. He said it needs further review because it appears the Biden administration rushed the approval.

The Norwegian company Equinor is building Empire Wind to start providing power in 2026. Equinor finalized the federal lease for Empire Wind in March 2017, early in President Donald Trump’s first term. BOEM approved the construction and operations plan in February 2024 and construction began that year.

Read the full story at the Associated Press

What to know about Doug Burgum, Trump’s pick to lead Interior Department and as energy czar

November 18, 2024 — President-elect Trump has chosen North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum (R) to lead the Interior Department, which manages the nation’s public lands and waters.

Trump also said Friday that Burgum would lead a newly formed “national energy council” that’s in charge of energy ” permitting, production, generation, distribution, regulation [and] transportation”

Read the full article at The Hill

Trump announces North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum as Department of the Interior Secretary

November 14, 2024 — The Interior Department oversees the creation and management of U.S. national monuments, including marine national monuments. The department also includes the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), which manages offshore wind development. The following is excerpted from an article by Fox News:

President-elect Trump teased a “big” announcement Thursday night, sharing that North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum will lead the Department of the Interior.

“He’s going to be announced [Friday]…I look forward to doing the formal announcement, although this is a pretty big announcement right now, actually,” Trump said during his speech at the Americans For Prosperity Gala at Mar-a-Lago on Thursday. “He’s going to head the Department of Interior, and he’s going to be fantastic.”

Burgum, a multi-millionaire former software company CEO turned two-term governor, launched a White House bid in June 2023.

Bergum made energy and natural resources a key part of his campaign for the GOP nomination.

After making the stage at the first two GOP presidential debates, Burgum failed to qualify for the third showdown, in autumn of last year, and he dropped out of the White House race last December. A month later, he appeared in Iowa with Trump and endorsed the former president for the GOP nomination, days ahead of the first-in-the-nation caucuses.

Read the full story at Fox News