Trump halts more than $300bn in US green infrastructure funding

Republican Donald Trump’s return to the White House has put more than $300 billion of potential federal infrastructure funding at risk, US investors said, as they grappled with the scale of his move to unpick Joe Biden’s climate agenda.

Within hours of his inauguration on Monday, the US President signed scores of executive orders rescinding Biden’s policies, including one halting federal disbursements to manufacturers and infrastructure developers.

The funds affected were provided under two of Biden’s signature legislative achievements — the Inflation Reduction Act and bipartisan infrastructure law — and include almost $50 billion in Department of Energy loans already agreed and another $280 billion worth of loan requests under review..

“All agencies shall immediately pause the disbursement of funds appropriated” through the acts, the Trump administration said in an executive order titled “Unleash American Energy”.

Among the disbursements now immediately in peril are a $9 billion conditional loan to Michigan-based utility DTE Energy and another of $3.5 billion to Oregon-based utility PacifiCorp.

DTE did not immediately respond to a request for comment. PacifiCorp said it was working with the department on the loan guarantee conditions.

“If you had grants, loan guarantees, funding that was sort of tied in with the IRA and the money’s not out the door yet, it’s going to be very hard to see that money go out the door under the Trump administration,” said Rob Barnett, a senior analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence. 

The executive order was among dozens signed by Trump in a late-night blitz after he was sworn in for a second presidential term and promised to end Biden’s “Green New Deal” and boost fossil fuel output.

Trump’s move to halt the funding sent a shockwave through the clean energy sector and signalled his intent to undermine Biden’s industrial policy, particularly his programmes to speed up an energy transition.

“The executive orders indicate that federal funding for EV and battery manufacturing will be harder to access, increasing the risk of stranded capital for manufacturing projects already under way,” said Shay Natarajan at Mobility Impact Partners, a private equity fund based in New York. 

The 2021 infrastructure law offered $1.2 billion to improve the country’s transport system, while the IRA offered $370 billion in tax credits, grants and loans.

Both programmes vastly expanded the Department of Energy’s Loan Programs Office, which was responsible for doling out $400 billion to developers and has been a favourite target of Republican attacks.

Investors said they feared another $300 billion worth of future federal funding — mostly from the infrastructure law — would also now be frozen by Trump’s move.

Unlike the money in the loans office, the IRA’s tax credits — the main form of subsidy in the legislation — are unlikely to be affected. The credits have been a primary driver of investment, with manufacturers committing more than $130 billion since the law passed, according to FT analysis. 

Fearing that Trump would move to halt the disbursements, Biden officials rushed nearly $50 billion in loan commitments out to developers in the weeks after he won re-election in November.

Trump also wants to stop construction of wind farms on federal lands and waters and said he would end “unfair subsidies” for electric vehicles. Shares in Tesla, Rivian, Ørsted and other EV and wind companies fell on Tuesday.  

This week Italian cable manufacturer Prysmian Group said it was scrapping plans to build a factory in Somerset, Massachusetts, which would have made cables for the offshore wind sector.  

Other investors had already scaled back their US renewable energy plans in the US ahead of Trump’s return. German energy giant RWE announced in November it was pulling back its US wind power plans. 

Nearly 25GW of offshore wind projects, 65% of the US projects in development, are unlikely to progress under the Trump administration, Rystad Energy said on Tuesday.

“When you start to make it look like there’s a lack of stability in the investment that you thought you were making into the US, that has a potentially very negative effect, long term, on our ability to attract capital,” said Eli Hinckley, a partner at Baker Botts.