Tribal Solar Projects Meet Different Fates In Wyoming After Trump Administration Kills Funding – Inside Climate News

WIND RIVER, Wyo.—Last week, the Northern Arapaho tribe learned that it was losing about $10 million in federal grants that would have helped members of the tribe lower their electrical bills.

“For us, it’s really a kick in the balls,” said Patrick Goggles, a member of the tribe who led the implementation of the federal Solar for All program in its Natural Resources Office.

Goggles learned that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was moving to cancel $7 billion in funding for low-income households to install rooftop solar panels when the New York Times reported it. The Northern Arapaho had expected to receive about $10 million between agreements with The Northern Plains Tribal Solar for All Coalition and the Bonneville Environmental Foundation, Goggles said.

“We were really looking forward to doing these projects,” said Dean Goggles, the Natural Resources Office’s executive director and Patrick’s brother. “It’s a huge loss.”

As the Northern Arapaho explore options for other funding sources, their neighbors in the Wind River Indian Reservation in central Wyoming, the Eastern Shoshone, are officially moving forward with a solar-powered microgrid.

On the last day of July, the Eastern Shoshone finally received grant money for the project from the Bureau of Indian Affairs through its Tribal Electrification Program, which was funded using Inflation Reduction Act Money but is unrelated to Solar For All, said Levi Purdum, director of Energize Wind River, a renewable energy company working on the reservation. The tribe had been unsure whether it would receive the already awarded funding during the beginning of President Donald Trump’s second administration.

“It’s a very unusual scenario,” Purdum said, reflecting on the period when the funding was in flux.

According to Purdum, the BIA could not confirm the tribe would receive money it had already been awarded, and told him the money was sequestered in the Office of Management and Budget, which oversees federal spending and is led by Russel Vought, the self-described Christian Nationalist and a co-author of Project 2025, a conservative blueprint for Trump’s second term. 

Now that the Eastern Shoshone have secured a little over $7 million, Purdum hopes construction can begin soon, though he noted that the tribe had planned to get additional funds from the Solar for All program to maintain the microgrid once it was built. 

With the Trump administration apparently intent on stymying renewable energy development, both tribes are dealing with how to work with a federal government they say has suddenly become much more unreliable. 

“Prior to the administration change, there were tons of grants available that would have been so appropriate, so in tune with our project and goal to be on our path towards energy sovereignty,” said Gilbert Richie, housing services director with the Eastern Shoshone Housing Authority.

“And then the administration changed. The funds are frozen or eliminated. And then they’re brought back,” Ritchie said. “We don’t know if we should apply for grants with the anticipation that they might not be available next year.”

Neither tribe is giving up on solar energy, particularly the Northern Arapaho, and both are determined to scour the private sector for funding to pursue a technology they see as supporting tribal sovereignty.

Taylor Rogers, a White House assistant press secretary, did not answer questions about how rescinding funding for low-income households aligns with the administration’s purported commitment to affordability, and did not respond to questions about how reducing energy funding helps the country stave off the “energy emergency” the administration has declared.

“We don’t know if we should apply for grants with the anticipation that they might not be available next year.”

— Gilbert Richie, Eastern Shoshone Housing Authority

Instead, she referred to EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin’s Aug. 7 announcement that the program would end. Zeldin claimed the agency “no longer has the authority to administer the program” after July’s spending bill ended the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, Solar for All’s parent program. 

“Administrator Zeldin is laser-focused on ensuring taxpayer dollars are managed properly, and this includes going after wasteful spending conducted by the previous administration,” said Cyrus Western, EPA’s region 8 administrator, who oversees the Mountain West, which has 28 federally recognized Native American tribes. 

Western did not respond to questions regarding affordability and energy concerns.

A Microgrid With Backup Power

With funding secured, Energize Wind River is working with the Eastern Shoshone Housing Authority to build a solar microgrid that could satisfy the electricity demand from up to 21 homes on the reservation. The system will use batteries to store electricity from the panels when they are producing more power than the homes demand, and it will also include a natural gas generator that would “literally just be an emergency backup option,” Purdum said. 

The gas facility is not covered by federal funding, and Purdum said the Eastern Shoshone are seeking support elsewhere to purchase the generator.

Energize Wind River, which is made up almost entirely of Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho tribal members, intends to conduct a complete environmental analysis of the project’s impacts. Purdum, who is not an enrolled member of either tribe, is proud of the scrutiny they are giving the project, given the Trump administration’s rollback of environmental regulations. 

“Even if we don’t need a detailed environmental impact study for our project, that’s still something that we want to produce, we want to have on hand and we want to be able to share with the community, with tribal organizations and tribal leaders, because that’s a matter of good stewardship,” Purdum said. “That’s the only responsible way to do a project like this.”

The energy savings for tribal members who get electricity from the microgrid could help them find financial stability after tribal benefits—royalties companies pay the tribe for drilling on its land—fell to only $50 a month per tribal member, according to Richie.

“The bigger picture is to create an energy source that provides more permanency here in the reservation,” he said. “We’re trying to open up other opportunities, which is kind of hard when you’re in a mineral state.”

Navigating the Fallout

Although the Northern Arapaho were not pursuing a microgrid of their own, the tribe’s plans for solar were no less ambitious. The tribe wanted to install solar panels for about 140 homes, creating potentially significant energy and financial savings. Eventually, Goggles hoped to bring the technology to municipal and civil infrastructure on the reservation.

Now those plans are on hold. 

“The Solar for All program would have had a huge economic impact on the energy cost savings for tribal members,” said Steve Babbits, an environmental scientist with the Northern Arapaho’s Natural Resource Office. “They would have had extra money in their pocket that they could have spent somewhere else. I guess that’s not going to happen now.”

“It’s a pretty big loss for everyone,” he added.

Using his home as an example, Patrick Goggles estimated that if he installed a solar system capable of offsetting 80 percent of his monthly electric demand, he would save $150 to $200   per month—this at a time when oil and gas royalties for the Northern Arapaho, a significant source of income for many tribal families, has dropped even lower than it has for the Eastern Shoshone, to about $10 a month per tribal member, he added.

In addition to hundreds of tribal members who now no longer have access to money-saving renewable energy, the EPA’s decision is financially impacting the men leading the project. Patrick Goggles had been working without pay, expecting to be reimbursed through the grant, he said. Now, a year’s worth of his time and labor will go uncompensated.

Dean Goggles and Babbits had planned to begin hiring more people to help administer the program, but now they can’t, and they noted that local contractors and builders had just lost an opportunity to bring in new business. 

“From the first day [the Trump administration] declared an energy crisis, they should be supporting all types of energy production but they’re not,” Babbits said. “I think it’s going to hurt the country as a whole.” 

Without Solar for All funding, the three men say they are turning their attention to building a planning document that the Northern Arapaho can use to help expedite any future solar power pursuits. But first, they will scour the private sector for any funding that could keep their current plans afloat.

“A lot of people were looking forward to this,” said Dean Goggles. “It’s a long shot, but we’re still going to look.”

Even if the EPA’s decision is challenged in court, without access to the money, the Northern Arapaho’s project is functionally stalled, the men said. But Patrick Goggles said that rooftop solar’s ability to lower energy costs will allow it to endure beyond the Trump administration, and his tribe remains interested in using solar to develop energy sovereignty. 

“I don’t think this stops anybody,” he said.