'Empowering Rural America' Could Potentially Reduce Costs for Rural Energy Cooperatives

ROCHESTER, Minn. (KTTC) — On September 3, the Biden-Harris administration announced cleaner, lower-cost energy for all of rural America.

“Empowering Rural America” is a $7.3 billion fund aimed at promoting the construction of solar and wind energy, creating more than 20,000 new jobs and, ultimately, reducing overall energy costs for users.

This funding will help reduce electricity costs for one in five Minnesota households through more sustainable forms of energy. The money will go to three Minnesota energy cooperatives: Dairyland Power Co-op, Minnesota People’s Energy and Great River Energy.

Dairyland Co-op received the largest sum of the three, $573 million in grants and loans. Dairyland CEO Brent Ridge says it will reduce energy costs by up to 42 percent over a decade.

DairyLand says the primary use of the funding will be to build four solar farms and four wind farms in southeast Minnesota, northeast Iowa and Wisconsin.

Whitney Muse, a senior White House policy adviser, estimates that this would reduce greenhouse gas emissions by more than 43 million tons over the next ten years.

“People are pretty sensitive to electricity costs, so a program like New Era really helps bring those benefits to the programs that have been put in place by President Biden in communities across the country,” Muse said.

Muse says the funding will create more than 20,000 new jobs across America. 16,000 of those will be temporary construction jobs and 4,500 permanent jobs in solar and wind farms.

Minnesota Sen. Tina Smith said she has been working for nearly two years to help rural energy cooperatives.

“The transition to clean energy is happening all around us, and my goal is for Minnesota to be the leader in that transition, and with these grants, we will certainly be in the lead,” Smith said.

The federally funded project for Dairyland will also include the Farmer Benefits Plan and the Union Engagement Plan to receive feedback and voice concerns from users.

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