Timothy L. Nuvangyaoma, chair of the Hopi Tribe in Arizona, saw the unprecedented gusher of federal clean energy money as a potential lifeline for his community still reeling after the closure of a job-creating coal plant in 2019.
After applying for and receiving some $90 million in federal funding for solar power projects, battery installations and microgrids, Nuvangyaoma hoped the support would finally bring power to the 30 percent of homes that are not served by the local utility.
He predicted on-site clean power would end blackouts in some areas that led to food spoiling and medical equipment blinking offline.
Now, President Donald Trump’s broad funding freeze covering some of the Biden administration’s clean energy spending has thrown tribal projects into limbo. As of Thursday morning, funding for the Hopi Tribe that had been approved remained suspended. Two awards — $4 million for a solar-powered microgrid to run wells and pump water and $4 million for a battery project — had not been finalized before Trump’s inauguration, meaning it’s possible they could be rescinded.
“We have real lives at stake. The funding freeze is truly having an impact on living, breathing individuals,” Nuvangyaoma said in an interview. “I can’t even think of a strong enough word, this is so important for us. We had part of a solution come our way, and now it’s taken away.”
After taking office, Trump sought to stop all climate spending tied to the Joe Biden-era Inflation Reduction Act and bipartisan infrastructure law. The administration also targeted programs it placed under a broad category of social equity. Federal courts have since ordered the White House to lift any blanket spending freeze on appropriated funds. And a federal judge this week admonished the administration for appearing to ignore the order.
The chaotic and uneven attempts under Trump to put a hard stop on spending programs enacted by Congress are setting up a legal battle over executive power. Administration policy is also sowing confusion inside some of the nation’s most vulnerable communities.
Among the Hopi’s grants that remain suspended is more than $25 million from EPA’s Solar for All program, which is designed to install rooftop solar and battery power for roughly 550 households on the Hopi Reservation.
Another $12 million for a solar-and-battery microgrid for government buildings comes through the Energy Department’s Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations. Then another $20 million to help connect solar to the electric distribution system is EPA funding through the Climate Pollution Reduction Grant program.
Work on those projects has largely gone dark, said Fletcher Wilkinson, energy manager for the Hopi Utilities Corp. The tribe is continuing to do community meetings and small-scale work, Wilkinson said, but the tribe does not have room in the budget to continue working with contractors and partners without federal support.
“We’re doing our best to not miss deadlines, but if the freeze drags on for months, that’s just inevitable,” Wilkinson said.
‘This might be the only chance’
States, community groups and private companies have been reeling from the uncertain status of federal funds since Trump’s executive order. But Native American tribes say that their heavy reliance on federal funding and a historical lack of communication from the federal government puts them at particular risk if funds do not flow.
John Echohawk, executive director of the Native American Rights Fund, said in a statement last month that “Tribal Nations, more so than almost any other community, will be negatively impacted by this decision,” with federal funding affecting “essential needs, including public safety, healthcare, education, infrastructure and the basic needs of our most vulnerable citizens.”
That’s especially true for energy support. An estimated 17,000 homes on tribal lands nationally don’t have energy access, a deficit the Biden administration sought to close.
“Especially in Tribal spaces, imagine how hard it is to make any project happen,” said Matthew Tejada, senior vice president for environmental health at the Natural Resources Defense Council and a former EPA environmental justice official who worked with Native American tribes. “The places where it is hardest to make anything happen were finally primed to do real, community-changing, life-changing projects, and now it’s all frozen.”
“Any pause can blow apart years of work, and this might be the only chance they get,” Tejada added.
EPA spokesperson Molly Vaseliou said in an email that EPA staff had worked to “ensure all accounts were accessible” in accordance with the court order. Vaseliou added that “EPA personnel have identified certain grant programs as having potential inconsistencies with necessary financial and oversight procedural requirements or grant conditions of awards or programs.”
Department of Energy spokesperson Ben Dietderich said in a statement that the department is “complying with recent court orders related to funding.”
The two agencies did not respond to specific questions about the Hopi Tribe’s grants.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) warned in a letter to the Trump administration last week that funding for tribes needed to continue despite the executive order, noting that the political status of tribes meant their funding should not be mistaken for equity-focused programs opposed by the White House.
“Any pauses or elimination of these programs would undermine the United States’ trust responsibility to Indian Tribes and their ability to provide services to their members,” wrote Murkowski, who chairs the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs.
Other tribes and tribal partners contacted by E&E News said they are still experiencing disruptions.
Grid Alternatives, a community organization providing solar power to low-income communities, received an award from the Solar for All program to provide solar power for tribal communities across six western states. Grid said in a statement that awardees’ ability to draw funds has been suspended and that it is “concerned about performing work under the federal award that may not be compensated promptly or at all in a worst-case scenario.”
Funding through the Department of Interior’s Tribal Electrification Program — a $150 million program designed to improve electricity transmission and distribution for tribes — has not been affected by the funding freeze.
Delayed transition
The Hopi Tribe — which spans 1.5 million acres in northeastern Arizona — had long relied on the Navajo Generating Station in northern Arizona. The plant and the accompanying Kayenta Mine complex closed in 2019 after more than 40 years of operation. While some members of the Hopi and nearby Navajo Nation tribes were encouraged by the environmental benefits of ceasing coal generation, the economic hit from lost jobs and royalties proved damaging.
Since 2019, Nuvangyaoma estimates that the Hopi general fund budget has dropped between 60 and 80 percent annually. That’s made it hard to upgrade infrastructure, especially to bring power to homes from the single distribution line that runs through the reservation.
The Biden administration, he said, was “really receptive” to the concerns of the Native American community and made an effort to understand the specific challenges on the reservation. The funding opportunities and assistance in applying from agency staff offered hope for an economic and humanitarian boost.
The funding freeze, Nuvangyaoma said, has jeopardized that work. Interruptions to the projects can mean a loss of jobs and a potentially crippling delay in restoring power to the homes that need it.
“How do we get them to better understand what this means?,” said Nuvangyaoma.
“It’s not an easy question to answer,” he said, “but every day we wake up hopeful that the creator is touching the hearts of those that are making these decisions to have flexibility and loosen restrictions so we can move forward with this important work.”
