Michigan’s clean-energy pipeline is drawing to a close as President Donald Trump’s second-term administration cancels and freezes federal climate grants and reshapes the incentives tied to energy-transition manufacturing, according to data and reporting compiled for Bridge Michigan. The cancellations add up to about $540 million for Michigan since Inauguration Day, and the changes arrive as auto companies adjust investment plans for electric vehicles and energy-related manufacturing.
Annabelle Rosser, a research analyst with Atlas Public Policy, said the grant cancellations track national patterns, adding, “It certainly mirrors what we’re seeing nationally.” The overall picture described in the reporting blends federal program decisions with market shifts, including the end of federal tax credits for electric vehicles and evolving demand expectations.
The largest chunk of the canceled funding cited for Michigan comes from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Solar for All Program, a $7 billion fund aimed at expanding solar energy in disadvantaged communities. The reporting said Michigan had been slated to receive a $156 million grant through that program and that Native American tribes in Michigan were expecting part of a separate $62 million grant shared with other Great Lakes tribes.
Dana Nessel, Michigan’s attorney general, is among the state leaders who sued over the cancellations. The reporting says the lawsuit challenges what it describes as the administration “unilaterally and illegally terminated” the program, overstepping checks and balances to cancel congressionally approved funding. Beyond Solar for All, the reporting describes more than 20 Michigan grants ranging from large manufacturing and power projects to much smaller local climate resilience awards.
Among the Michigan grants cited as canceled or proposed to be canceled, Bridge Michigan’s reporting includes $28.2 million for TS Conductor to build a high-capacity power line plant in Erie; $20.4 million for Ecoworks, a Detroit nonprofit intended to convert houses of worship into climate resilience hubs; and $20 million for the Inter-Tribal Council of Michigan to improve energy efficiency in tribal homes. The list also includes $20 million for the Southwestern Michigan Planning Commission to build two resilience hubs in Benton Harbor, upgrade energy efficiency in low-income housing, and support a workforce development initiative.
The reporting also says the administration has frozen a $20 billion federal “green bank” network that had been expected to send hundreds of millions of dollars to Michigan for housing building and rehab projects, including insulation and energy-efficiency upgrades in factories. Utilities in the state were described as waiting on the status of $15 billion in clean energy-related loans announced days before Trump took office, and the administration was described as reevaluating a $500 million grant program meant to retool a Lansing General Motors factory for electrified vehicles.
While the reporting describes a broad pullback, it also points to an exception in nuclear energy. It says the Trump administration continued disbursements from a $1.5 billion loan authorized in 2024 to support reopening of the Palisades nuclear power plant and that in December it announced another $400 million to develop two new reactors at the site. U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright said in a statement accompanying the grant announcement, “President Trump has made clear that America is going to build more energy, not less, and nuclear is central to that mission,” the reporting said.
The investment shift is also reflected in manufacturing plans, according to the Atlas analysis described in the story. The reporting said Michigan manufacturers announced $23.8 billion in new investments tied to the energy transition between 2022 and 2024, mostly related to battery or electric-vehicle plants, but that the trendline reversed in 2025 with $3 billion worth of disinvestment.
It says companies have scrapped planned EV factories or closed existing ones, while some spokespeople from the U.S. Department of Energy did not respond to requests for comment. Glenn Stevens, executive director of MichAuto, an affiliate of the Detroit Regional Chamber, described the environment in market terms and said, “That’s just the way the market is shaking out right now.”
One of the biggest EV-related cancellations cited is the Gotion project, a once-planned $2.4 billion electric-vehicle battery plant near Big Rapids, which the reporting says was declared dead this fall after controversy. The Atlas analyst Annabelle Rosser is quoted as saying multiple factors likely played a role, including “The rollback of the (Inflation Reduction Act) clean energy tax credits, softening demand for electric vehicles, and concerns about the company’s foreign ownership are all likely factors,” according to the report.
The reporting also cited decisions affecting battery makers and suppliers in Michigan, including XALT Energy, which announced plans to close its Midland headquarters and an Auburn Hills facility after about two years after announcing plans to expand. It also described Dana Inc. as closing an Auburn Hills EV battery plant amid what the company described as an “unexpected and immediate reduction in customer orders driven by lower demand for electric vehicles,” and Fortescue as canceling an under-construction EV charger, battery and hydrogen generator plant at the former Fisher Body site in Detroit due to shifting markets and policy changes, including the loss of “critical tax credits.”
It said some planned projects continued to shift with policy and demand, including changes connected to Ford and General Motors timelines and battery manufacturing partnerships. The story described Ford as scaling back plans for an EV battery plant near Marshall, slated to open in 2026, and said General Motors sold its stake in a planned EV battery factory near Lansing with the plant’s opening delayed from 2025 to 2026. Stevens said he expects EV market growth in 2026, but added it “it’s not going to be at the acceleration curve that a lot of people projected, and certainly the previous administration was pushing.”