United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lee Zeldin has cut $20 billion in grants awarded by the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF) through a “green bank.”
Zeldin notified recipients of the National Clean Investment Fund and Clean Communities Investment Accelerator that their grants awarded under the former Biden administration’s “gold bar” program were being terminated, a press release from the EPA said.
The EPA said the termination was based on “substantial concerns” regarding the integrity of the GGRF program, including “the award process, programmatic fraud, waste, and abuse, and misalignment with agency’s priorities, which collectively undermine the fundamental goals and statutory objectives of the award.”
Over the last month, Zeldin has criticized the program’s spending and made unsubstantiated claims that the program was riddled with fraud, reported Politico. The latest action came the day before a hearing in federal court over a lawsuit by one of the grant’s recipients who is seeking to access funds frozen by the Trump administration.
“The days of ‘throwing gold bars off the Titanic’ are over. The well documented incidents of misconduct, conflicts of interest, and potential fraud raise significant concerns and pose unacceptable risk. I have taken action to terminate these grants riddled with self-dealing and wasteful spending. EPA will be an exceptional steward of taxpayer dollars dedicated to our core mission of protecting human health and the environment, not a frivolous spender in the name of ‘climate equity,’” Zeldin said in the press release.
Established under the Inflation Reduction Act, the GGRF was created to fast-track clean energy technology deployment and lower greenhouse gas emissions, especially in disadvantaged and low-income communities, Inside Climate News reported.
The three main components of the GGRF are the National Clean Investment Fund, which makes available $14 billion in grants for climate projects; the Clean Communities Investment Accelerator with $6 billion in funds for community lenders to make sure clean energy funding reaches underserved and low-income areas; and the Solar for All program that offers $7 billion to expand solar access, lower energy costs and make renewable power more affordable.
Zeldin on February 12 said he would take action to immediately claw back GGRF funds and ordered the EPA to cancel its Citibank agreement for disbursement of the funding.
Zeldin said the grants had been rushed with “no real accountability,” citing “hidden-camera video” from Project Veritas, a right-wing group, that allegedly demonstrated mismanagement.
However, former high-level EPA officials say those claims are false.
Zealan Hoover, EPA’s former implementation director, said the U.S. Treasury Department has long used private banks as its financial agents. Hoover told Inside Climate News in an interview that Citibank had been chosen for the GGRF because it was seen as the best institution for handling the financial structure of the program.
EPA said in correspondence to the Climate United Fund that termination of the funds was based on concerns about the GGRF program’s structure, reported Politico. The agency said GGRF did not have “adequate” fund oversight and that it was concerned about “improper or speculative allocation of funds.”
“EPA has determined that these deficiencies pose an unacceptable risk to the efficient and lawful execution of this grant that cannot be remedied by imposing specific conditions, necessitating immediate termination to safeguard taxpayer funds and ensure compliance with federal financial assistance regulations,” the EPA wrote to Climate United, with similar letters sent to other recipients of the grant, according to the agency.
EPA has the authority to cancel contracts under legally defined and specific examples of fraud, waste and abuse by the grant’s recipients. However, one grantee said the agency had not identified any such instances.
“Their claims (of abuse) simply aren’t true,” the person said, wishing to remain anonymous. “[T]here is nothing that they can use from our terms and conditions — so our grant agreement — that can terminate the contract based on the claims that they are making.”
Democratic Senator from Massachusetts Ed Markey accused the Trump administration of using political ploys to do away with a program created by Congress.
“Zeldin and Trump are spreading lies in a last-ditch effort to terminate the climate bank because the truth is it will help households save money and deploy clean energy — exactly what Big Oil is afraid of,” Markey wrote in a post on X.
