Today the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced $500 million to fund a new Century Aluminum facility. The funding is provided by DOE’s Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations’ Industrial Demonstrations Program (IDP). The project is expected to create roughly 1,000 permanent high-wage union jobs and 5,500 construction jobs. Century Aluminum will work with job training organizations for workers who have been displaced through the energy transition.

Per the announcement, “Century’s preferred site for The Green Aluminum Smelter is in Kentucky, but Century continues to evaluate sites in other states.” Workers at the new facility are expected to be represented by the United Steelworkers. This facility would be the cleanest and most efficient aluminum smelter in the world and would be the nation’s first new aluminum facility since 1980. The project would effectively double the size of the U.S. aluminum industry.

The IDP—made possible by initiatives championed by President Biden and Democrats in Congress and passed into law—seeks to help companies drive down emissions and reduce toxics and other pollutants in the U.S. industrial sector to make them more competitive—all while creating and sustaining good-paying, union manufacturing jobs. The award recipients were required to meet a robust set of criteria to ensure local communities and workers benefit from the proposed projects.

After the award announcement, the BlueGreen Alliance issued the following statement from Appalachian Regional Field Organizer Dan Taylor:

“Building the cleanest products possible and a strong domestic supply chain to manufacture the nuts and bolts of a new, clean economy in the United States is vital to the future of workers right here in Kentucky and across the nation. We have a rich tradition of innovation in our country and President Biden has set the stage for the revival that workers and communities have needed for decades. With the investments announced today, we see that Kentucky has a vital role to play in the industrial revolution of the 21st century.

“The IDP is proof that President Biden and Democrats are invested in rebuilding U.S. manufacturing to be the backbone of our economy, helping Kentucky’s workers get to and stay in the middle class with good union jobs and bringing equity and opportunities to communities that have been on the hurting end of the loss of manufacturing jobs.”