CMS Energy Corp. and General Motors are teaming up to allow GM to operate factories in Flint, Michigan, including the company’s enormously profitable truck assembly plant, and another plant in Wyoming, Michigan, just outside Grand Rapids, exclusively on electricity generated by the wind.
GM and CMS said in a statement they pledge to power three Michigan automotive plants with clean energy. CMS, the parent company of Consumers Energy, is Michigan’s largest provider of energy.
The 20-year agreement calls for the auto company to use clean energy at its Flint Assembly Plant, Parts Processing Center in Burton and GM Components Holdings Plant in Wyoming. This commitment supports roughly 70 megawatts of emission-free renewable energy in Michigan.
Through the pact with Consumers Energy’s Renewable Energy Program, GM is offsetting 235,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide annually, which is equivalent to greenhouse gas emissions produced by 51,000 cars, according to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency calculations, the utility noted.
GM vows to be part of fight against climate change
The move underscores GM’s effort to become carbon neutral by 2040. The company said a year ago it would source 100% renewable energy to power its U.S. factories, warehouses and offices by 2030 and global sites by 2035, moving up its original goals by five years. GM is the 10th largest purchaser of renewable energy in the world.
“General Motors is committed to combatting climate change and transforming the communities where we work and live by striving toward zero crashes, zero emissions, and zero congestion,” said Rob Threlkeld, senior manager of energy strategy and grid decarbonization at GM.
“Procuring renewable energy is key to accomplishing these goals. Our collaboration with Consumers Energy brings us closer to our target of sourcing 100% renewable energy in the U.S. by 2025 and will advance our local Michigan communities’ transition to a clean grid.”
The company uses renewable energy in several other places across the U.S., including Michigan. In 2018, GM’s Flint Metal Center and Flint Engine Operations began operating entirely with energy produced by Cross Winds Energy Park II, which is located in Michigan’s Thumb region to the east of Flint.
GM uses electricity generated with gas from nearby landfill to provide about 50% of the electricity for the Orion Assembly in Orion Township, Michigan, where the Chevy Bolt EV is built and will be revamped to produce the company’s Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra battery-electric models.
Additionally, in Fort Wayne, Indiana, the company’s big factory for building pick-up trucks co-generates about 20% electricity using landfill gas.
GM’s big SUV plant in Arlington, Texas is already using 100% wind-generated power, which began in 2016. The company signed up with the TVA in 2020 to deliver 100 megawatts of solar energy by 2023. That same year, it expects about 800 mW of clean electricity for its Michigan plants, with a goal of 60% renewable power for all operations in the U.S.
Michigan utilities under fire
CMS and DTE, Michigan’s two largest utilities, came in for criticism from state officials last fall after executives from the Ford Motor Co. cited the high costs of electricity in Michigan as one of the reasons for electing to place a new manufacturing complex and battery plants in Tennessee and Kentucky where the cost of electricity.
Since then, the Michigan’s Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer and Republican legislature collaborated on new programs to encourage new investment in the state. GM is expected to get nearly $1 billion in tax breaks and other incentives as GM spends another $7 billion in Michigan to refurbish the Orion assembly plant outside Detroit and to build a new battery plant in the CMS service area outside of Lansing, Michigan.