Local officials are encouraged by the recent news that the Cleveland Cliffs Butler Works plant will be receiving a massive federal grant.
Butler County Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Jordan Grady says the award for up to $75 million to create a more energy efficient facility shows an encouraging investment in the plant.
“To receive that large of a grant to upgrade some of their processes to make it more energy efficient and it’s definitely an investment in American manufacturing,” Grady said. “I was very excited to see that announcement.”
He also adds that the investment comes at a time when the future of the plant is in jeopardy. However, he is hopeful this is a sign of a commitment by the Department of Energy to amend the proposal.
“If the federal government is going to make of that dollar amount into a plant, you would think the two would be correlated in that the Department of Energy has heard industry stakeholders and feedback from the proposal and that there are adjustments coming,” Grady said.
Grady also said that he listened to Congressional testimony from the Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm and was encouraged by what she said.
“In that meeting Granholm was asked about and she said that they are court ordered to look at this rule,” Grady said, referecing the proposed DOE policy to mandate the use of amorphous steel in transformers instead of grain-oriented electrical steel, which is produced at the Butler Works plant.
“She said they produced these rules and receive feedback from industry stakeholders, labor unions, and the community at-large,” Grady said of Granholm’s testimony. “According to Granholm, they have taken that feedback very seriously and adjustments have been made. What those adjustments are, is still forthcoming but I think we should all be very confident locally that the adjustment will be favorable to our town.”
The money for the project comes from the Inflation Reduction Act, which was signed into law last year.
Listen to Jordan Grady’s full interview below:
