A federal judge from Massachusetts has halted five separate orders from the Trump administration that were impeding renewable energy project development with federal oversight. Chief Judge Denise Casper from Massachusetts’ U.S. District Court filed a preliminary injunction on Tuesday blocking these orders claiming that they violate an administrative procedure law and are damaging to renewable energy developers.
Credit: EDP Renewables North America
“Today, the courts rightly blocked illegal regulatory attacks that drive up energy costs and slow down the development of new sources of electricity we urgently need,” said Sandra Purohit, federal advocacy director with E2. “Wind and solar remain the cheapest and fastest-to-deploy energy sources we can build. The law doesn’t allow agencies to rig the process against them.”
The preliminary injunction was filed on behalf of defendants from renewable energy advocacy groups. It claims that these Trump administration orders have prevented renewable energy developers from having their projects reviewed through the necessary Dept. of the Interior processes.
The five orders affected by this preliminary injunction are a memo issued in July 2025 that increased the DOI’s permit reviewing process for solar and wind projects; another that prohibited solar and wind projects from using the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s online environmental review planning tool; an order from DOI Sec. Doug Burgum titled “Managing Federal Energy Resources and Protecting the Environment;” a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers memo on energy project permitting; and a DOI order related to developing projects in U.S. seas and outer continental shelf lands.
Industry groups have been pushing back against the Trump administration’s opposition to renewable energy development at a federal level. In Dec. 2025, the Solar Energies Industry Association organized and sent a letter signed by 143 solar companies to the U.S. House of Representatives after the DOI virtually ceased all related solar project permitting. A month prior, the group also published an analysis estimating that 500 solar and energy storage projects, representing 116 GW of energy capacity, were affected by these permitting changes.
“This ruling is a win for affordable energy in America, a win for American consumers and a win for workers. Energy costs are rising for Americans, and the only way to put downward pressure on prices is with more power, not less,” Darren Van’t Hof, interim president and CEO of SEIA. “Low-cost, quick-to-deploy solar and storage are key to meeting the Trump administration’s goals of keeping costs down for Americans and bolstering our AI leadership on the world stage. This is a constructive step forward toward letting America’s solar and storage industry build and deliver more American energy to households and businesses nationwide.”
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