Federal grant programs / Department of Agriculture

Affordable Rural Cooperative (10.758)

Also known as 22004

• Awarded, FY 2021 to 2025$7.2 billion
• Grant awards54
• Typical award$63.5 million
• Awarded in FY 2025$5.5 billion
• Size rank69 of 1,823
• Type of assistanceGrant, direct loan

Key findings

• It is the 69th largest of 1,823 federal grant programs by five-year awards.
• The 20 largest recipients received 93% of the money.
• Awards went to recipients in 24 states and territories.

What the program funds

RUS will utilize the Affordable Rural Cooperative (ARC) funds to assist eligible entities to achieve the greatest reductions as provided in Section 22004 of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) associated with rural electric systems by increasing the amount of emission-free nuclear power and increasing the efficiency of the transmission grid within such systems. These new sources of cooperative power supply and enhanced transmission efficiency will result in reduced future demand for other sources of power.

From the federal Assistance Listing. Read the full listing on SAM.gov.

Open opportunities

• Affordable Rural Cooperative (ARC) Energy Program
  Open · Closes November 20, 2026 (13 days left) · up to $20.0 million

Rules from the program listing

Who can apply

Eligible Entities are: (1) Operating Electric cooperative described in section 501(c)(12) or 1381(a)(2) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 who are currently or have been in the past a RUS or Rural Electrification Administration (REA) electric loan borrower pursuant to the Rural Electrification Act of 1936 (RE Act); (2) Electric cooperatives serving predominantly rural areas; or (3) Wholly or jointly owned subsidiaries of such electric cooperatives listed in (1) and (2). For the purposes of this program, the term “predominantly rural” as used in (2) in this paragraph shall mean a service territory that must include at least 50 percent Rural Areas.

What the money can and cannot pay for

The purchase of Eligible Nuclear Energy, eligible nuclear energy systems (or a share of such systems); the deployment of such systems, system improvements that result in the extension of the plant’s useful life or expansion of its power output; or the implementation of advanced energy efficiency improvements to transmission systems. Use restrictions include: projects that receive support from the New ERA Program for construction will not be eligible for support for the direct purchase of power produced by that supported project; the Agency will only finance Commercially Available Technologies; given the statutory focus on reductions in greenhouse gases, the Agency will not utilize funds made available under this funding notice to: 1) finance new investments in new sources of fossil fueled power; or 2) except for carbon capture storage systems, system improvements at existing fossil fueled generation plants, regardless of whether such improvement is incorporated in the scoring of the Applicant’s Portfolio of Actions; RUS will not provide funding under this NOFO for any project if construction of the project commenced before August 16, 2022, the effective date of the Inflation Reduction Act.;

Matching requirements

This program has no statutory formula. For Project and System loans, RUS will finance up to 75 percent of the total capitalized cost of the Project in the loan component of a Project and/or System Award. The Awardee will be required to initially provide and maintain for the term of the Project and/or System Award at least 25 percent of the Project’s total capitalized cost in the form of cash or an equity investment. As noted in Section 2.0 in the NOFO, the Agency may where Financially Feasible allow an Awardee to utilize the grant component of the Award and/or any applicable tax credit that it expects to receive (including credit amounts expected to be received through Elective Pay elections under section 6417 of the Internal Revenue Code) toward the 25 percent equity requirement for a Project Award. Such financial equity may not come from the proceeds of any loan from any creditor, including insiders of the Awardee.MOE requirements are not applicable to this assistance listing.

Deadlines

An applicant that is invited by RUS to proceed will receive an Invitation to Proceed and will have ninety (90) days to complete and submit an ARC application beginning from the date the Invitation to Proceed is emailed to the applicant. If the ninety (90)-day deadline to submit the completed application falls on Saturday, Sunday, or a federal holiday, the application is due the next business day. RUS reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to extend the ninety (90)-day deadline upon the written request of the Applicant if the applicant demonstrates to the satisfaction of the Administrator that exceptional circumstances exist to warrant the extension.

Award range and average, in the agency's words

The total appropriated funds in the amount of $9,700,000,000 is available through September 30, 2031. As provided in Section 22004 of IRA, no one applicant may receive an amount equal to more than 10 percent of the total $9,700,000,000 in funds appropriated under Section 22004, which equals $970,000,000. The section further limits the amount of a grant to no more than 25 percent of the total eligible award costs of the applicant in carrying out a project utilizing a grant.

Examples of funded projects

Fiscal Year2025: An electric cooperative in rural America was awarded a grant for the construction of new generation facilities, improvements to transmission systems, and the purchase of power through a Power Purchase Agreement.

Quoted from the program's federal Assistance Listing. The notice of funding opportunity is the official source for each competition's rules.

Who usually wins

Nonprofits received 83% of the money, colleges and universities less than 0.1%.

By state

23 states have a page for this program: those that received at least $1 million or 10 awards.

Award amounts are federal obligations reported to USAspending.gov for fiscal 2021 to 2025; see how our data works.