Nantucket group pushes wind challenge to Supreme Court

The Nantucket anti-offshore-wind organization ACK for Whales is pushing a lawsuit targeting the Vineyard Wind project to the U.S. Supreme Court. 

On Monday, the group officially requested the Supreme Court review its appeal of a decision reached by the U.S. First Circuit Court of Appeals. It is yet to be seen whether the Supreme Court will actually review the case.

ACK for Whales said in a statement that the appeals court had “wrongly allowed” the National Marine Fisheries Service to ignore Endangered Species Act requirements to use “the best available scientific and commercial data available.”

The suit was originally filed in 2021 in federal court, when the group was called Nantucket Residents Against Turbines. Multiple government entities alongside Vineyard Wind were named as defendants, including the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and Cabinet members like Interior Secretary Deb Haaland. The Nantucketers alleged federal agencies failed to ensure Vineyard Wind would not jeopardize the survival of endangered and threatened species, especially the North Atlantic right whale. 

However, the suit was shot down in federal court in May 2023. Judge Indira Talwani deemed the Nantucket group failed to demonstrate that marine fisheries or the ocean energy bureau violated the Endangered Species Act or the National Environmental Policy Act. Months later, ACK for Whales raised the suit to the federal appeals court. 

Craig Gilvarg, Vineyard Wind’s spokesperson, was not immediately available for comment.