Southeast Asia embraces offshore wind power, as Trump bashes renewable energy

HANOI, Vietnam (AP) – Southeast Asia is a bright spot for the embattled offshore wind industry as it reels from U.S. President Donald Trump’s push against renewable energy.

The White House’s policy pivot has thrown billions of dollars’ worth of U.S. offshore wind projectsinto turmoil. Industry interest and investment are looking elsewhere, and developing regions with ample wind resources, like Southeast Asia, have the most to gain from this likely reshuffling, analysts say.

Wind energy is essential to efforts to curb climate change, scientists say, as global temperatures drift perilously higher. Offshore wind, which uses turbines installed in the sea, is set to grow rapidly because it can harness stronger, steadier ocean winds to generate clean electricity, the International Energy Agency says.

Southeast Asia, with its archipelago nations, long coastlines and consistently windy seas, is emerging as one of the world’s most promising regions for this technology. As energy demand continues to rise, the Philippines and Vietnam are building policy momentum that proponents hope will spur interest across the region.

Those moves could turn Southeast Asia into a model for other developing nations seeking to use wind energy as an alternative to fossil fuels, said Rebecca Williams, with the Global Wind Energy Council.

“Asia and Southeast Asia are a beacon of hope for the industry,” she said.

Trump has actively sought to kill the U.S. offshore wind industry, one of his presidential campaign promises.

He opposes using renewable energy, particularly offshore wind, and prioritizes burning fossil fuels for electricity, contending that climate change is a hoax.

The White House has halted construction on major offshore wind farms, revoked and paused permits, canceled plans to use large areas of federal waters for wind energy and cut $679 million in federal funding for a dozen projects – a complete reversal from former President Joe Biden’s Administration.

Trump’s anti-renewable energy stance has shaken U.S. confidence in offshore wind projects.

That has kickstarted an industry-wide search for other places to invest.

Globally, wind energy generation is growing, led by China. It dominates wind power installations and manufactures more than half of the world’s wind turbines. Beijing is also emerging as a quiet force in the region’s offshore wind buildout, supplying turbines and engineering expertise as countries race to tap their coastal wind potential.

“We’re seeing more governments in the Global South, especially in countries in Asia, who haven’t had that background in offshore wind, now really step up,” Williams said.

Home to half of the global population, Asia is expected to account for much of the world’s future energy demand. Yet the region still relies heavily on fossil fuels, and wind generates barely 7% of Asia-Pacific’s electricity, according to the IEA.

The 11 member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or ASEAN, a vast region that includes tiny Brunei to populous Indonesia, have no installed wind power capacity.

So there’s a lot of untapped potential up for grabs, said Amisha Patel, with the Global Offshore Wind Alliance, an organization of countries promoting offshore wind.

Trump’s rhetoric is disappointing given America’s vast wind potential, but it hasn’t slowed global wind power developments, and “Southeast Asia is stepping forward as the U.S. retreats,” she said.

Last month, Singapore announced a three-year plan for wind energy conferences to attract investment and become a regional hub for the industry.

“Asia is looking very, very attractive because of the momentum that we’re seeing there and the core understanding of the value of offshore wind,” Patel said.

The Philippines and Vietnam have an early advantage.

The Philippines held its first offshore wind auction in November, allowing companies to bid and compete for the right to build 3.3 gigawatts of wind farms on designated seabeds. Energy Secretary Sharon Garin said that shifted offshore wind power from “potential to reality,” with clear rules and plans for how wind farms will connect to the grid, which ports they’ll use and how equipment will be moved.

“The Philippines is ready to compete for global investment,” she said in a statement.

Filipino corporation ACEN partnered with Denmark’s Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners in May to co-develop the nation’s first large-scale offshore wind project, aiming for up to 1  gigawatts in the central Philippine province of Camarines Sur.

Vietnam has revived long-stalled offshore wind ambitions, issuing new rules and courting foreign investors. It revised its national power plan in April, targeting up to 17 gigawatts of offshore wind by 2035, and is speeding up marine zoning rules and updating permitting procedures.

Regulatory delays led Norway’s Equinor to withdraw from Vietnam in 2024, but investor confidence is slowly growing. Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners is working with state-owned PetroVietnam on an offshore wind project in south-central Vietnam and Germany’s PNE AG is planning a $4.6 billion, 2-gigawatt farm in Binh Dinh province.

Vietnam is exploring regional projects. It signed a deal in May for a transmission line to export power to Singapore and Malaysia.

China is also emerging as an important player in the region. State-owned Power China completed the Binh Dai offshore wind power project in Vietnam in November, according to the China’s official Xinhua news agency. In the Philippines, Mingyang Smart Energy is exploring a 2-gigawatt project in Northern Luzon.

Extreme weather is a challenge for offshore wind, especially in the Philippines and Vietnam, which endured an onslaught of deadly typhoons this year.

But technology for disaster-resilient turbines exists, said Michael Hannibal of Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners. “Countries will just need to make sure offshore wind sites are adapted and made for the environment that they are to live with and stand in,” he said.

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Associated Press writer Jennifer McDermott in Providence, Rhode Island, contributed to this report.