The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), under the Biden administration, was reported in late 2024 to have awarded Nashville Electric Service (NES) and its partners up to $4 million in funding.
Currently facing calls for accountability as more than 65,000 customers remain without power days after a winter storm, The Tennessee Tribune reported in October 2024 that NES partnered with Metro Nashville, the Urban League of Middle Tennessee, and Tennessee Clean Fuels to receive $500,000 from DOE “to upgrade technology that will provide more secure, reslient, equitable, affordable, and clean power to customers.”
According to the outlet, the grant money came from the Biden administration’s Clean Energy to Communities (C2C) program, which was part of former President Joe Biden’s effort to “decarbonize the electric grid by 2035 and achieve a net-zero emissions economy by 2050.”
$500,000 was disbursed immediately, and the grant allowed up to $3.5 million to be disbursed in subsequent years, according to the Tribune.
While the DOE announced last October that it cut $7.5 billion in financial awards made during the Biden administration, it is unclear whether these included grants through the C2C program.
The Trump administration appears to have renamed the program Energy to Communities (E2C), and the DOE did not immediately respond to a press inquiry from The Tennessee Star seeking to determine whether the NES grant was still active.
Despite President Donald Trump signing executive orders mandating an end to federal financial support for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programs shortly after beginning his second term in the White House, NES appears to have continued its DEI programs, and earlier this week, its board was recommended to extend a contract for a DEI consultant.
In the two years before Trump reentered the White House, the municipally owned power company also reported holding more than 100 DEI training sessions, with CEO Teresa Broyles-Aplin citing them in a letter included in NES’s 2024 Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) report.
“NES’ Human Relations Department implemented Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Accessibility, & Belonging (DEIAB) trainings,” wrote Broyles-Aplin. She wrote that NES ultimately held, “a total of 102 sessions in 2023 and the first quarter of 2024 for both organization-wide education and nuanced resources for leadership positions.”
Broyles-Aplin has also affirmed her commitment to sustainable and renewable energy sources through public remarks and interviews since she was appointed NES’ chief executive in 2022, and last year announced her personal support for the transportation referendum successfully championed by Mayor Freddie O’Connell in 2024.
In one such interview, Broyles-Aplin explained that NES took care to maintain the city’s “tree canopy” while trimming limbs to prevent outages.
“We care about the canopy. We have to live here too,” she said in August. “I don’t want us out destroying the canopy.”
Broyles-Aplin stated, “We do species specific trimming… We take a lot of pride in making sure that we are cutting the trees in a healthy fashion.”
In its Friday afternoon update, NES confirmed that more than 65,000 customers remained without power. Five residents of Nashville are reported to have died following the storm last weekend.
– – –
Tom Pappert is a 2025 recipient of the Dao Prize and the lead reporter for The Tennessee Star. He also reports for the Star News Network. Follow Tom on X. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Teresa Broyles-Aplin” by Nashville Electric Service.
1 Read the bios of the NES leadership and board on the NES website. All sound accomplished in their field but as per their bio, none have any experience in overseeing an electric utility. Even if the board’s composition is a product of a DEI mindset, has NES not produced any women or minorities who could have served in leadership backed by a record of accomplishment within the utility?
2 The Biden Administration passed the 370 billion dollar “Inflation Reduction Act,” which Biden later said was actually more about energy usage. Regardless of one’s disposition on the bill, can anyone site a way the 370 billion dollars of our tax money has changed the way they use energy? Can anyone site a related improvement in the meeting of their energy needs?