Ørsted’s Revolution Wind starts commercial operation after court fight

Ørsted A/S said Thursday that the 704-megawatt Revolution Wind has reached commercial operation. The project is a 50:50 partnership with Global Infrastructure Partners and was among several U.S. offshore wind projects threatened with cancellation by the Trump administration.

“In October the project achieved commercial operations under its offtake contracts with utilities in the states of Connecticut and Rhode Island”, the Danish majority state-owned renewables developer said in its third-quarter report.

Last December the Interior Department issued a 90-day pause order on Revolution Wind and four other offshore wind leases under construction, citing security risks identified in “classified reports”. The others were Dominion Energy Inc’s 2,600-MW Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind, Ørsted’s 924-MW Sunrise Wind east of Long Island, Equinor ASA’s 810-MW Empire Wind 1 south of Long Island, and Iberdrola SA and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners’ 800-MW Vineyard Wind 1 south of Martha’s Vineyard.

The companies said security concerns had already been addressed in the permit application process. Early this year all five projects obtained court preliminary injunctions allowing activities to resume while litigation over the Interior order continued.

At least two have now been completed: Revolution Wind and Vineyard Wind 1. Equinor said in its Q3 report that Empire Wind’s challenge against the December suspension had been dismissed on mootness grounds because the order’s effective period expired.

At Sunrise Wind, Ørsted’s other project in the suspension order, all wind turbine foundations have been installed, the company said Thursday.

Ørsted also said it has put into service the 913-MW Borkum Riffgrund 3 on Germany’s side of the North Sea, a 50:50 joint venture with Nuveen Infrastructure.

Installed capacity grew to 19.5 gigawatts at the end of Q3, with 1.8 GW added during the three months. Power generation rose 19 percent year-on-year to 8,817 GWh in Q3 2026 from 7,437 GWh in Q3 2025.

The United Kingdom is Ørsted’s biggest offshore wind producer, accounting for 2,220 GWh of its 4,517 GWh in offshore wind generation in Q3 2026. The United States generated 2,241 GWh in onshore wind power for Ørsted in the quarter.

Power sales climbed seven percent year-over-year to 4,242 GWh in Q3 2026, while gas sales increased 26 percent to 6,058 GWh. Quarterly net losses narrowed 57 percent year-on-year to DKK 728 million (around $109 million) “mainly due to increased EBITDA, partly offset by higher impairment losses”, Ørsted said.

It booked impairment losses of DKK 3.83 billion from Sunrise Wind and DKK 1.2 billion from Revolution Wind for the first nine months of 2026. “Impairment losses had a negative non-cash effect of DKK 3.4 billion in Q3 2026 related to our U.S. projects”, it said. “The projects continue to progress according to plan and remain on budget. The impairment was due to increases in the long-dated U.S. interest rate”.

Quarterly EBITDA increased 72 percent year-on-year to DKK 5.26 billion for Q3 2026. Revenue rose 73 percent to DKK 21.18 billion. Operating losses narrowed 51 percent to DKK 543 million. Operating cash flow remained negative at DKK 1.16 billion.

Interest-bearing net debt stood at DKK 37.74 billion — DKK 51.11 billion after adjustment — at the end of Q3 2026. Funds from operations equaled 37.3 percent of adjusted interest-bearing net debt.