Editor's Note: A version of this press release was originally published by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). Details regarding what projects specifically were defunded have not been released.
DOE announced the termination of 321 financial awards supporting 223 projects, resulting in a savings of approximately $7.56 billion dollars. Following a financial review, DOE determined that these projects did not adequately advance the nation’s energy needs, were not economically viable and would not provide a positive return on investment of taxpayer dollars.
The awards were issued by the Offices of Clean Energy Demonstrations (OCED), Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Grid Deployment (GDO), Manufacturing and Energy Supply Chains (MESC), Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) and Fossil Energy (FE).
“On day one, the Energy Department began the critical task of reviewing billions of dollars in financial awards, many rushed through in the final months of the Biden administration with inadequate documentation by any reasonable business standard,” Secretary Wright said. “President Trump promised to protect taxpayer dollars and expand America’s supply of affordable, reliable and secure energy. Today’s cancellation’s deliver on that commitment."
In May 2025, Secretary Wright issued a Secretarial Memorandum entitled, “Ensuring Responsibility for Financial Assistance," establishing a new policy for evaluating financial awards. The policy authorized program offices to request additional information from awardees. It also required that awards be reviewed on a case-by-case basis to advance President Trump's commitment to traditional energy sources. Using this review process, DOE evaluated each of these awards and determined that they did not meet the economic, national security or energy security standards of the administration.
Award recipients have 30 days to appeal a termination decision. Some of the projects included in this announcement have already begun that process.
