President Donald Trump’s Department of Energy has halted more than $135 million in so-called “clean energy” projects across New Mexico—part of a larger $7.5 billion rollback of wasteful spending in 21 mostly Democrat-run states.
The decision scrapped 10 projects in New Mexico alone, ranging from carbon-capture schemes to taxpayer-backed solar and hydrogen startups—initiatives critics say could never survive without massive federal subsidies. Trump’s DOE said the move was about cutting political handouts and protecting taxpayers from funding experimental technologies that deliver little real energy value.
Democrats immediately fumed over the cuts. U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich called the move “unhinged and unlawful,” while Rep. Teresa Leger Fernandez complained that utilities might raise rates to meet contract obligations. “They can’t just say, ‘Sorry,’” she told KOB 4, warning that ratepayers could be left footing the bill for projects that were never economically viable in the first place. But the leftists messed around and apparently found out that the golden goose for wasteful projects was finally going away.
Among the projects canceled was a $6.6 million grant to the Navajo Transitional Energy Company for a carbon-capture experiment at the Four Corners Power Plant—a $13 million taxpayer-subsidized venture designed to “test” CO₂ reduction technology. The only reason such a project exists is because Democrats and some Republicans in the state Legislature passed teh “Energy Transition Act,” the state’s form of the Green New Deal, which is set to shutter the coal-burning power plant by 2031.
Also gone are millions in funding for Kit Carson Electric Co-op’s $29 million battery-storage system in northern New Mexico and PNM’s $72 million “virtual power plant” project.
The state’s taxpayer-funded universities and green tech firms were hit as well. New Mexico Tech lost roughly $56 million in projects tied to the Biden-era “Fossil Energy Carbon Management” program, including a carbon-storage hub, methane-emission projects, and direct-air-capture research. Albuquerque-based Pajarito Powder saw two heavily subsidized hydrogen-catalyst projects, totaling nearly $19 million in federal funding, scrapped.
Critics of the so-called clean-energy sector say these programs represent the very definition of corporate welfare—propped up by taxpayer dollars yet incapable of competing with affordable and reliable fossil fuels. Despite decades of government handouts, renewable projects continue to rely on subsidies, mandates, and inflated rate structures to stay afloat.
By contrast, Trump’s move reflects his administration’s return to energy realism. Supporters argue that ending politically driven renewable subsidies protects consumers from higher electric bills and keeps America’s energy grid reliable. “These projects aren’t about energy—they’re about ideology,” one energy analyst said. “When government picks winners and losers, taxpayers always lose.”
Even PNM, New Mexico’s largest utility, acknowledged the federal cuts wouldn’t stop its core operations. “PNM will continue to focus on providing safe and reliable power to the communities we serve,” company spokesperson Eric Chavez told KOB 4.
In the end, Trump’s decision underscores a fundamental economic truth: a healthy energy market doesn’t need handouts. While Democrats decry the move as political, millions of Americans see it as a long-overdue correction—ending the costly experiment of “green” projects that burn through tax dollars while delivering little more than higher prices and empty promises.
It’s lights out for New Mexico’s green energy scam. Thank youPresident Trump.
So, New Mexico’s green energy is not renewable after all; Trump just pulled the plug on it. Adios, greenies.
Green scam and ham.
Trump saw through the green energy bs.
Go woke, go broke.
Green chile, not green energy.
Elections Have Consequences!🇺🇸
Thank God! I hope we don’t see any more of those horrible un-recyclable windmill blades on our hyways that have decimated bird migration!!!
a federal judge and the courts will stop trump. because we all voted for a federal judge to run the country, didnt we ?
Good job Mr President. I wonder just how loud NM stupid govenor is going to cry. No more money in the dems pockets WAA WAA
It makes you wish we had a coal fired power plant. Oh right the Little Tyrant destroyed it.
My only hope is if NMs are forced to cover the costs that NMs realize the democrats were the cause of the cost. Please remember only about 42% of NMs are registered democrats, as none democrats we should no longer allow the tail to wag the dog!
As a nation and as a state we should focus on fiscal responsibility we need to get our finances in order to remain a strong country, in the mean time let the market figure out better cleaner cheaper power.
Good news!
The most effective way to reduce Co2 emissions is to get liberals to just shut their mouth about green energy.
The companies should be eating any losses here, not the ratepayers – we never committed to the green BS.
Follow the money!
About time the “green new deal” scam comes to an end. For years now taxpayers have been scammed by vultures fixated in ridiculous ideology and the lie that the world was running out of oil & gas and drilling was bad for the environment. Those hideous wind farms and solar panels have done more to harm wildlife and the environment than drilling ever did, without ever lowering our electric and gas bills, and in fact increasing them!!
I applaud President Trumps efforts to end the wasteful spending on the Green energy front. The only renewable energy that has actually benefitted individuals were the solar panels in which the green new deal and energy companies themselves have been slowly killing off for years by ending tax credits and rebates. In many states (mostly Democrat controlled states on both coasts) the utilities have made it hard if not nearly impossible to hit the cost breakeven point on rooftop solar which had been lowering individual electric bills. Bottom line is green energy and carbon tax credits do little to clean the environment but make big money for rich democrats.
I bet MLG and her many minions are turning green and 🤮 barfing because the green bucks have dried up. No more travel to green energy conferences, which were paid by our taxpayers green bucks.
Thank you President Trump. Now how do we get rid of the unsightly wind powered battery operated structures that liter our beautiful country causing damage to our birds and animals.?
So our representatives in DC are spilling fake news because their grave train has ended.
Give them enough rope and they hang themselves as my dad used to say.
When I pay over $400 a month in winter to heat my rural home… and over $300 a month to cool it in summer… and the power I get comes from a co-op… who in turn gets the power from a nuclear power plant located in another State… And the DNC or Dead green new deal did absolutely nothing to off set the power cost adjustments over the past decades?
If you think I’m going to jump for joy with this slip and slide cash strip end and pay to play never finding the NM DNC and MLG the tolite queen of Santa Fe’s wallet… your dang right.
However… since the tolite queen and her medical fiasco has ruined the State for health care for senior resident retired citizens and promoted it greatly for illicit immigrants… I’m taking all my retirement cash to another State.
No more gross receipts taxes for you from me hunny tolite Queen of Santa Fe… No more .26 cents State tax per gallon for gasoline… no more taxes collected from me at the casinos, no more taxes for property, no more taxes for vehicle registrations, no more taxes for driver licenses, no more taxes at the restaurants, no more taxes for buying other than meds and food, no more health insurance money collected from the VA at the local stab and slab emergency rooms from me or the wife… I know that me and my wife alone are removing more than $153k a year from the tax rolls and it is now gone in a fricking snap of the fingers from, the State coffins of the DNC or Dead Communist Party of New Mexico… and I know I am not alone getting chased out due to sh*tty medical care and DNC or Dead voters with red and purple hair 67 years old holding up a sign in the middle of the street on Central or off University drive in Las Cruces supporting Hamas or executing children blocking traffic walking in the middle of the streets…
I’m taking my State PERA, and my wife is too, and we are removing it from the tax rolls Mrs. Tolite Queen of Santa Fe, my social security and my wife’s… my humble Veterans pension too… Its all gonna be gone… November 1st…2025… Car insurance premiums, taxes on local phones… all of it… gone.
Thanks to the DNC or Dead voters and the Tolite Queen of Santa Fe.
Does the list of cancelled projects include the AES Rancho Viejo Solar Project near Santa Fe (actually on Rancho Viejo land but the battery backup fire issue affects all of us in the US 285 corridor)?
Ha haa
It kills birds!!! Thank you Trump!!!!Get rid of Green SCAM!!!!
How much solar heat from the huge solar farms is going to burn up the ozone layer. I know for a fact these farms generate an enormous amount heat into the atmosphere. It’s easy to figure out, stand in front one of your windows with the sun blaring onto. Try staying in that heat for more than ten minutes.
I was observing the so-called “haze” today from the Sangres. Why oh why don’t people get upset about the geoengineering project that has turned NM into a polluted state. The sierra club likes to say it’s from all the industry in NM. HAHAHA. Now the faux environmentalists can claim it’s from Trump’s actions in stopping the “greens”.