Seven US states are challenging in court the "deal" obtained by TotalEnergies to abandon offshore wind farms.

At the end of March, a member of Donald Trump's government and the head of TotalEnergies, Patrick Pouyanné, signed an agreement under which the state would reimburse the energy giant nearly one billion dollars to compensate for the abandonment of the wind farms it was supposed to build on the Atlantic coast of the United States.

The agreement had been presented as a "win-win" situation by both parties.

The text, consulted by AFP, stipulates that TotalEnergies will receive the money once it has justified having invested the same amount in "conventional" energies (which includes oil and gas) in the United States, between November 18, 2025 and the end of September 2026.

The coalition of Democratic states, from Maine to New Jersey, believes that this agreement is "manifestly illegal" and is asking the courts to cancel it, explained the authorities of the State of New York, who are leading the opposition, in a statement.

"After suffering several defeats in court, this government concocted a sham agreement to pay a foreign energy company hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to abandon offshore wind and invest instead in oil and gas," denounced Attorney General Letitia James, quoted in the press release.

Governor Kathy Hochul sees it as "an outrageous misappropriation of taxpayer money that prevents us from meeting our energy needs, creating quality jobs and helping to ensure American energy independence while reducing emissions."

In 2022, TotalEnergies was awarded two offshore wind farm concessions (off the coast of New York and North Carolina) for $928 million in royalties. The company put these projects on hold after Donald Trump's victory in the presidential election at the end of 2024.

The American president is a notorious climate change denier and particularly hostile to wind turbines.

Mr. Pouyanné explained in March that he had chosen to innovate and be "pragmatic" by negotiating with the executive, rather than taking legal action against it as other European companies, Orsted and Equinor, have done.