Biden set to announce billions for rural energy in Wisconsin visit

President Biden is set to announce billions of dollars in federal investments for climate-friendly energy in rural America during a visit to the battleground state of Wisconsin on Thursday.

During a stop in Westby, Biden will announce $7.3 billion in federal funding for rural electric cooperatives around the nation to build or purchase climate-friendly power. 

These consumer-owned power providers will receive funds from the Inflation Reduction Act, which the administration says includes the largest investment in rural electrification since 1936.

One recipient of the funding is the Dairyland Power Cooperative, which is headquartered in nearby La Crosse. It will will receive $573 million. 

The Dairyland cooperative will put the money toward a larger $2.1 billion project to purchase wind and solar electricity from rural Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota and Illinois. The co-op estimates its power rates will be 42 percent lower over 10 years because of the funding.

The announcement comes as Biden visits several swing states this week — along with Michigan and Pennsylvania — that are critical for Vice President Harris’s candidacy.

Biden narrowly won Wisconsin in the last election, and his announcement Thursday will take place in Vernon County, which Trump won by roughly 5 percentage points in 2020.

While the trip is official travel organized by the White House, it provides Biden a platform to tout elements of his administration’s record that Democrats hope to leverage for Harris’s campaign.

The program being touted by the president Thursday is expected to power 5 million rural households, about 20 percent of the country’s total rural homes, the administration said.

It’s also expected to prevent 43.7 million tons of planet-warming emissions each year — the equivalent of taking more than 10 million gas-powered cars off the road. 

An administration official said all of the projects need to be built or dispersed by Sept. 30, 2031. 

In total, the funding is going to 16 cooperatives that operate across 23 states: Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, Nevada, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Texas, Wisconsin and Wyoming.