Federal tax credits for manufacturing in coal communities announced
KAYLEE LINDENMUTH / SHENANDOAH SENTINEL - A dragline and a strip mine operation can be seen in the distance from West Centre Street in the Brownsville section of West Mahanoy Township on Feb. 15, 2023.
SHENANDOAH – Tax credits intended to incentivize clean manufacturing in coal communities were announced this week by U.S. Senator Bob Casey.
The credits, a provision of the Inflation Reduction Act, can be used to build, expand, or retrofit clean manufacturing facilities, recycling, industrial decarbonization, and more.
“As we work to build a clean energy economy, I fought to ensure that manufacturing jobs end up in the communities who powered our Nation for generations,” Casey said in a press release. “These credits will bring new, cutting-edge jobs to Pennsylvania’s coal country, revitalizing our communities and helping our workers to earn the family-sustaining wages they deserve.”
Casey’s office said in the release that the tax credits “will bring good-paying energy jobs to communities that have powered the U.S. for generations.”
Over the next ten years, the credit is projected to create 36,800 jobs in coal communities, Casey’s office said.
Ten Billion in funding were earmarked for the Qualifying Advanced Energy Project Credit, $4 Billion of which must be spent in communities with closed coal mines or retired coal-fired power plants. The first round includes $4 Billion, $1.6 Billion of which is reserved for coal communities.
The application process will begin on May 31, 2023.
Casey’s office confirmed Wednesday that northern Schuylkill County is an eligible region where projects can utilize the tax credits, as are southern Columbia and Northumberland counties.
Eligibility is determined by census tract. Census tracts where at least one coal mine has closed since Dec. 31, 1999, or where a coal-fired generator has been retired since 2009, and neighboring census tracts, are eligible. This includes the entirety of the Sentinel‘s coverage area.
According to Casey’s office, the credits can be awarded to any project that:
- re-equips, expands or establishes an industrial or a manufacturing facility for the production or recycling of advanced energy property including:
- (1) property designed for use in the production of energy from the sun, water, wind, geothermal deposits or other renewable resources; (2) fuel cells, microturbines, or energy storage systems and components; (3) electric grid modernization equipment or components; (4) property designed to capture, remove, use, or sequester carbon oxide emissions; (5) equipment designed to refine, electrolyze, or blend any fuel, chemical, or product which is renewable, or low-carbon and low-emission; (6) property designed to produce energy conservation technologies (including residential, commercial, and industrial applications); (7) light-, medium-, or heavy-duty electric or fuel cell vehicles, as well as technologies, components, or materials for such vehicles, and associated charging or refueling infrastructure; (8) hybrid vehicles with a gross vehicle weight rating of not less than 14,000 pounds as well as technologies, components, or materials for such vehicles; or (9) other advanced energy property designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions
- B: re-equips any industrial or manufacturing facility, with equipment designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 20 percent through the installation of—
- (i) low- or zero-carbon process heat systems; (ii) carbon capture, transport, utilization and storage systems; (iii) energy efficiency and reduction in waste from industrial processes; or (iv) any other industrial technology designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions
- C: re-equips, expands or establishes an industrial facility for the processing, refining or recycling of critical materials
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