Michigan opens $5M first round for brownfield clean energy grants

By Daniel Okafor

$5 million is available in the first funding round of Michigan’s MI Brightfields Pilot, a competitive grant program for renewable energy and energy storage on environmentally contaminated brownfield properties.

How much funding is available?

The Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE) opened its first Request for Proposals (RFP) for the MI Brightfields Pilot. The program offers $10 million in grants, with $5 million available in the opening round and a second round scheduled to open in spring 2027.

EGLE’s announcement commits funding to the program, not to a named operating facility. It identifies no individual brownfield, developer, generating capacity or completed award, so the $5 million represents money still available through the first competition.

In short, Michigan has put half of the pilot’s $10 million behind the first round.

Which projects can compete?

EGLE describes the pilot as “primarily designed to support the development of solar and/or battery energy storage.” It also invites applications from all competitive projects that would deploy renewable energy or storage technology on brownfield sites in Michigan.

Eligible technologies include:

• Ground-mounted solar
• Rooftop solar
• Carport solar
• Solar plus storage
• Standalone battery energy storage
• Wind
• Geothermal

The technology list makes the pilot broader than a solar-only solicitation, while solar and batteries remain its stated center.

Solar and storage anchor the competition, but wind and geothermal remain eligible under the same brownfield-site rule.

Which sites and applicants qualify?

Applications must concern Michigan properties with “known environmental contamination exceeding Part 201 criteria.” EGLE makes that contamination threshold a condition of grant eligibility.

Eligible applicants include local units of government and public bodies created under Michigan law:

• Counties, cities, townships and villages
• Municipal electric utilities
• Brownfield redevelopment authorities
• Economic development corporations
• Other public bodies created pursuant to state law

Governing bodies of federally recognized Indian tribes in Michigan are also eligible to apply.

The announcement centers the first round on public-sector applicants able to document qualifying contamination at a Michigan site.

The core test is straightforward: a public applicant needs a qualifying Michigan brownfield, and the project must put renewable energy or storage on that site.

How much can each project receive?

Grant awards are limited to $2 million per project. Applicants can use the money for a defined set of preapproved activities:

• Renewable energy and/or energy storage costs
• Site preparation costs
• Environmental assessment activities
• Due care activities
• Response activities beyond due care
• Grant administration costs

The award can cover both the energy technology and the environmental work associated with preparing a contaminated site.

A project can seek up to $2 million, including both power equipment and the site work needed to reach deployment.

What happens next?

EGLE will hold an informational webinar on Monday, November 9 at 11 a.m. The session will introduce the MI Brightfields Pilot, walk applicants through the application process and take questions. Interested parties can register through the link in EGLE’s announcement.

EGLE’s announcement does not state an application closing date, award schedule, list of proposed sites or power capacity. The first RFP award process will determine how much of the available $5 million moves into specific projects.

Those first-round awards are the milestone that determines which Michigan brownfields become hosts to funded renewable energy and storage projects; EGLE has scheduled the next application window for spring 2027.