WASHINGTON – In partnership with GE Vernova, Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions (CRES) released the following blog related to the 45X Advanced Manufacturing Production Credit:
Can you give us an overview of GE Vernova’s footprint, and how your company is scaling its domestic investments?
GE Vernova is the only U.S. headquartered energy manufacturer of advanced technology and cutting-edge equipment across all energy sources and the grid – offering gas, nuclear, wind, steam, and hydro power technology; as well as grid resiliency equipment, solutions, software, solar and storage. GE Vernova employs over 18,000 workers in the U.S—across all 50 states and Puerto Rico—with 18 major factories across the country. Globally, our technology helps produce 25% of the world’s electricity, our power generation equipment is deployed in more than 140 countries and equips 90% of transmission utilities worldwide, and 40% of the world’s electricity flows through GE Vernova software.
This year, we’ve announced over $600 million in expansion investments across more than a dozen U.S. factories and facilities over the next two years, creating more than 1,500 U.S. jobs. Of this investment, $300 million will be invested in gas turbine manufacturing to increase capacity by at least 35%, create hundreds of new factory jobs, and enable 500 new heavy-duty machines to increase efficiency.
This announcement is complementary of years of GE Vernova manufacturing investments for energy and grid equipment. For example, since 2022, we’ve invested $170M in our U.S. wind manufacturing facilities in Florida, North Dakota, Texas, and New York. Earlier this year, we dedicated $40M to our Pensacola, Florida, wind manufacturing facility, where 20% of our workforce is veterans. We’ve also expanded U.S. manufacturing capacity of critical grid infrastructure like transformers.
These are significant improvements to manufacturing processes and output that are necessary to meet rising electricity demand. These investments are also indicative of the demand for all types of electricity equipment to meet the needs of the American people and industry.
How are federal incentives, including the 45X tax credit, shaping investment in American manufacturing today?
The current global energy supercycle is the “space race” of our generation. Who manufactures and innovates the technology will succeed. As the nation’s leading energy manufacturer, 45X is critical to ensuring American competitiveness.
45X is a key catalyst for expanding domestic manufacturing and encouraging people to build, create jobs, and invest in communities in our backyards. Global energy needs are forecasted to double, with rapidly increasing U.S. growth due to AI and data centers, industrial manufacturing, crypto mining, and more. Manufacturers will have to increase output and expand operations to meet these demands. 45X enables U.S. companies, like GE Vernova, with the business certainty required to execute manufacturing expansions in the U.S.
If we want to reshore and expand U.S. manufacturing and job growth while meeting rising energy demand and ensuring U.S.-based supply chains, incentives like 45X are critical. It’s why we want to ensure the final version of the Congressional tax package includes parity for wind with other technologies within 45X.
Beyond economic benefits, how does this incentive impact America’s national security and energy independence?
Enhancing U.S. national security, achieving energy security, and exporting more U.S. energy technologies requires unlocking and preserving domestic manufacturing and American energy competitiveness. Targeted and U.S. production-tailored manufacturing credits like 45X are vital to advance the manufacturing capacity of U.S. technologies while helping lower electricity prices as electricity demand grows.
Additionally, incentives for U.S. energy companies to locate manufacturing in the U.S. strengthens American production while limiting the offshoring or general loss of U.S. manufacturing. We believe 45X enables the U.S. to become an energy manufacturing hub for both domestic and global markets. The credit does this by helping ensure that investments in new manufacturing by U.S. companies are not undercut by illegal foreign subsidies of key technologies targeted for import into the U.S. We have seen countries like China utilize a playbook of foreign subsidies and supply chain capture to become the predominate power in technologies like solar photovoltaics.
We know additional technologies are targeted for capture much like solar was. China, itself, has announced a target to become the exclusive global provider of wind turbine equipment. Incentives like 45X allow U.S. manufacturers to meet domestic demand and continue access to global markets. An example here is India. In India, the demand for wind is high. However, only one U.S. company—GE Vernova—is competing with Chinese manufactured wind turbines.
We want to export more from our factories in places like Pensacola, Florida; Grand Forks, North Dakota; Amarillo, Texas; and Schenectady, New York. We also want to strengthen domestic supply chains and continue developing cutting-edge American technology that helps power the world. This incentive enables investments that help us achieve those goals.
What’s one misconception you often hear about these tax credits or the technologies they support?
We’ve heard misconceptions regarding the timeline by which these credits are making positive impacts. To be clear, communities are feeling the impacts of these credits today; they’re benefiting from these credits today. For 45X, we’ve built the factories, hired the employees who are working today, and we are making and exporting products today. This is why we want to maintain these credits in workable ways – we want to preserve what we’ve grown and continue expanding capacity, adding employees, increasing output, and investing in our communities.
Another misconception we often hear is that what’s good for renewables is bad for gas or for fossil. We disagree. Our business spans across gas, nuclear, hydro, wind, and more, and each of these technologies has a role to play in serving the U.S. power system. Gas complements renewables, and vice versa. These credits offer a pathway in which renewables can supplement—not supplant—dispatchable power in the U.S.
What is one thing you would like to highlight about these tax credits and they technologies they support?
People often overlook the key players that enable these technologies, especially for wind. Wind turbines made in America are modern day marvels that are highly technical, advanced energy producing equipment, with a total of 300,000 employees in the U.S.
For GE Vernova, we have 3,000 U.S. employees in 20 states across the U.S., including in factories in Florida, Texas, North Dakota, and New York. Our Pensacola nacelle facility is the largest in the U.S., with a 20% veteran workforce. As well as a vast U.S. supply chain that includes over 300 U.S. manufacturing and services companies that support our technology. These technologies have significant impacts in their communities, and they can help the U.S. meet demand for power at a time when we need to inject as many electrons as possible onto the grid and fast.
Can you share a success story where the 45X credit helped transform a facility or boost regional economic development?
There are a number of examples for GE Vernova. In 2023, we started manufacturing a new line of wind turbine nacelles in Schenectady, New York, thanks to 45X. We invested $50 million and created 200 new jobs to build the new manufacturing line for our 6.1MW onshore wind turbine. We built the new line and completed the first product within a record-setting 6 months. In 2025, over 100 nacelles will be exported from the Schenectady facility that will ensure global competitiveness and close trade deficits.
We’ve also invested more than $70M in Pensacola, FL, since 2023, where 20% of our workforce is veterans. In Amarillo, Texas, we’ve retrofitted and upgraded our parts facility to start manufacturing drivetrains used for repowering. We’ve also invested more than $15M in our North Dakota blade facility for retrofits and equipment improvements.
In Newton, Iowa, the 2025 re-launch of the TPI Composites blade manufacturing facility, which exclusively provides blades to GE Vernova, enabled the onshoring of overseas blade production and created around 1,000 new jobs.
In January 2025, we announced a further investment of nearly $100M in our wind facilities across the U.S. 45X has also contributed to expansions at our power conversion and storage facility in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to support the growing demand for solar and energy storage in the U.S. We have plans to invest more than $10 million and create approximately 270 new jobs to operate a new domestic manufacturing line for the company’s FLEXINVERTER technology, which represents a significant technology leap forward in the utility-scale solar industry.
There are other investments being considered but are on pause until we have more clarity on the final structure of credits like 45X.