After months of threats, Ocean City on Friday filed a lawsuit against the federal government over the siting of a massive wind farm a little more than 10 miles off its coast.

The Maryland tourist town was joined in its suit by a large and eclectic group of plaintiffs, including Worcester County, a Delaware town, a host of community associations, a hotel management company, the Ocean City Marlin Club and a national group dedicated to protecting the endangered right whale.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court, comes as seaside communities along the East Coast have pushed back against a nascent U.S. offshore wind industry, considered by many climate experts and the Biden administration to be a crucial piece in the country’s transition away from fossil fuel.

The project off the coast of Ocean City, known simply as the “Maryland Offshore Wind Project,” is being developed by Baltimore-based US Wind and received permitting approval last month from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, a division of the Interior Department.

One of two offshore wind developments planned off Maryland’s coast, the US Wind project covers 80,000 acres and would generate up to 2,200 megawatts of electricity, enough to power 770,000 homes.

“For the past seven and half years we have been trying to work with the State of Maryland and the federal government to address our concerns with this project,” Ocean City Mayor Rick Meehan said in a statement Friday afternoon. “All of our concerns were either ignored or considered insignificant. It is unfortunate that it has come to this, but the Town was left with no choice but to file suit.”

The U.S. Department of the Interior did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit.

A spokesperson for US Wind declined to comment Friday evening. The company has previously said Ocean City’s lack of cooperation with its effort wouldn’t hamper the project. The company has said it intends to begin construction next year and aims to bring turbines online in 2026.

But the US Wind project, first leased by the Interior Department in the waters off Ocean City in 2014, as been a source of aggrievement for the beach town for years. Ocean City, whose year-round population is under 7,000, has been signaling plans to sue the feds over the venture for months, arguing that the 114 wind turbines would tarnish beachfront views, damage the local tourist economy and even harm local wildlife — a claim largely disputed by an environmental assessment that federal officials released this summer.

“Ocean City Is Not For Sale,” Meehan declared earlier this year, when he said US Wind began offering communities cash in exchange for refraining from critical statements about its project.

In the 92-page lawsuit filed Friday, Ocean City and other opponents take aim at an environmental assessment that the Interior Department released in July. It outlined certain minor consequences of the development for birds, whales, and fishing and natural habitats, but largely concluded the wind farm would have few “major” environmental impacts.

Ocean City argues that the assessment, instrumental in the project’s approval last month, violated a slew of federal laws designed to protect the environment, wildlife and historic sites in the areas of large developments. Among other things, the city says, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management failed to take into account the effects of the US Wind project on horseshoe crabs and right whales as well as the implications of the giant turbines for tourism. It also neglected to adequately explore alternative sites for the development, attorneys said.

The shallow waters off the East Coast are prime territory for tapping an enormous wind resource on the seas. The wind blows so strong and with such consistency there that experts believe it could power huge swaths of the Northeast.

The two offshore wind projects are key components in achieving Maryland’s goal, backed by Gov. Wes Moore, of developing 8.5 gigawatts of offshore wind power by 2031. A spokesperson for Moore did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday.

Though the Biden White House, too, has ambitious goals for jumpstarting the country’s offshore wind industry, the coming presidential election could alter the fate of early-stage projects, including the one off Ocean City’s beaches.

Former President Donald Trump has a long and quarrelsome relationship with wind turbines. In May, he told a crowd in New Jersey that he would block an offshore wind farm there on his first day in office.