In May, new announced investment and job kept steady, slightly increasing from April. Announcements spanned multiple sectors, including batteries, electric vehicles, minerals, solar, and transmission and grid.

Please find updates from the Clean Economy Tracker for the month of May below!

For more information or assistance, please contact [email protected].

May 2026

There were nine new clean economy investment announcements in May.

They add up to

• $1.8 billion and

• 3,150 new announced jobs across

• Seven states: Alabama, Louisiana, Michigan, Ohio, Texas, Utah, and Virginia.

In May, there were also approximately 1,120 jobs were withdrawn after Ebon Solar abandoned plans for a $940 million solar cell manufacturing facility in New Mexico.

2026 Announcements

In total in 2026 so far there have been:

• $19.7 billion new investments, representing 8,200 jobs

• $4 billion in canceled and retracted investments, representing 10,070 jobs

  • 6,100 jobs were retracted from VinFast’s EV plant in North Carolina in March of 2026, as construction on the plant continues to stall.

States leading in 2026

Announced Investments:

Tennessee leads all other states with the highest total newly announced investment, at $6.6 billion, followed by Texas ($5.0 billion) and Kentucky ($2.6 billion).

Announced Jobs:

Texas leads in 2026 with the most newly announced manufacturing jobs, totaling 2,420, with Alabama (1,240), and Ohio (700) following.

Investment Announcements

New Facility Announcements

““SEG Solar, a Houston-based manufacturer, has announced plans to establish a new 4 GW solar module production facility in its home city of Houston, Texas. The 500,000 square foot facility represents an investment of more than $200 million and is projected to create 800 jobs.” Announcement, 5/7/2026

“Qcells announced a collaboration with Jabil to deliver its first domestically assembled residential energy storage system (ESS) to the U.S. market. The system will be produced at Jabil’s Auburn Hills, Michigan facility—which has received $11.6 million in investment—and represents a domestic content–eligible version of Qcells’ third-generation residential ESS, the Q.HOME CORE G3” Announcement, 5/7/2026

“EnergyX and Compass Minerals announced an agreement to advance EnergyX’s planned 30,000 tpa commercial-scale direct lithium extraction (DLE) and refinery project—Project Powder Hound—near Utah’s Great Salt Lake. Backed by up to $400 million in investment, the project targets over $600 million in annual revenue at full build and is expected to create more than 200 jobs.” Announcement, 5/18/2026

“Tesla (TSLA) announced that it has invested $250 million to build its massive new solar panel manufacturing operation at its facility in Brookshire, Texas, near Houston. The factory will be co-located with the Megapack Megafactory Tesla is already constructing at the same site.” Announcement, 5/19/2026

“Virginia Transformer announced plans to build a new 600,000-square-foot power transformer plant at the Shoals Research Airpark in Colbert County, Alabama. Upon reaching full production, the plant will employ 1,100 people.” Announcement, 5/20/2026

“Jabil announced plans to establish a new U.S. manufacturing site to make critical power distribution systems and solutions for Siemens. The facility at Crosspointe Logistics Center in Prince George County, Virginia is scheduled to open in Fall 2026 and is expected to create 352 new jobs with $30 million invested into the facility, all in support of the energy infrastructure industry.” Announcement, 5/28/2026

New Updates and Expansions

“Illuminate USA, operating a solar panel manufacturing facility in Pataskala, Ohio, announced that they have brought their total employee count to 1,700, from an announced 1,000 jobs in 2023.” Update, 5/8/2026

“Microporous announced that after two years, it has finally broke ground on its Southern Virginia battery manufacturing facility expected to become operational in 2027. The company announced that the total investment into the facility is $1.6 million.” Update, 5/22/2026

“Ucore is designing the Louisiana SMC to consist of the initial ≈600 tonnes per annum (“tpa”) total rare earth oxide (“TREO”) Machine A plus three RapidSX™ Production Lines (or “Trains”), each capable of processing up to ≈3,000 tpa of TREO. Updated CAPEX costs are estimated at $135 million total.” Update, 5/28/2026

About the data

The Clean Economy Tracker (CET) tracks private-led investments and jobs in clean energy manufacturing, deployment as well as related public statements by lawmakers serving in the U.S. Congress. Clean energy manufacturing and deployment covers production facilities for batteries, critical mineral production and processing, electric vehicles, heat pumps, hydrogen electrolyzers, transmission and grid materials, and zero-emissions electricity generation (including solar, wind and nuclear). The tool was developed by Atlas Public Policy and Utah State University and is updated at least weekly.

Note the data cover manufacturing only and are through September 31, 2025. The jobs reflect direct, permanent manufacturing jobs and do not include indirect or construction jobs. Jobs canceled refers to clean energy jobs canceled. Where production is moved to another facility, production at the original facility is marked as canceled and investment and jobs are marked as canceled. If and when investment and jobs numbers at the new facility are announced, they will be added to the database.

Get in touch: [email protected]