By Mike Tony, Charleston Gazette-Mail
CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The Trump administration has cancelled tens of millions of dollars in support for energy projects whose technology provider has been looking to usher in a new era of regional energy manufacturing at a nascent, state-supported battery-making plant in West Virginia.
The U.S. Department of Energy on Thursday announced the termination of 321 financial awards providing $7.56 billion in support for 223 projects. The terminations cut funding for clean energy projects in Democratic-led states and the District of Columbia, extending a history of President Donald Trump using his presidential power to target political opponents through financial penalties, legal prosecution or other means.
One of the enterprises for which the Department of Energy terminated funding is a project it selected in 2023 to award Minnesota-based Xcel Energy up to $70 million to partially fund two proposed long duration battery energy storage systems in Minnesota and Colorado.
Each system would be a 10-megawatt, 1,000-megawatt-hour iron-air battery developed by Form Energy, a Massachusetts-headquartered energy storage technology and manufacturing company which began trial production at its first commercial-scale battery-making facility in Weirton last year.
The batteries would be located at the sites of two retiring Xcel Energy coal plants: the Sherburne County Generating Station in Becker, Minnesota, and the Comanche Generating Station in Pueblo, Colorado. The systems would allow Xcel Energy to store renewable energy, like solar and wind, when it is being produced and then later distribute the energy during times of lesser renewable production.
