👀 First look: The Energy Department is steering around $50 million into six states to help small- and mid-sized auto suppliers convert facilities to serve EV value chains.

🗞️ Why it matters: The money for states with large auto workforces is the latest of many White House financial carrots to help the industry go electric.

Michigan, a critical swing state, is getting the largest share. But money is going to several very red states, too.

• It's an example of what backers hope makes the IRA durable — the billions of dollars flowing into GOP-leaning states and congressional districts.

Driving the news: Today DOE is announcing the eligible states and amounts, which enables specific applications to start flowing in.

• Michigan: $18.4 million
• Ohio: $9.4 million
• Indiana: $8.8 million
• Kentucky: $4.9 million
• Tennessee: $4.5 million
• Illinois: $4.1 million

🖼️ The big picture: Smaller and mid-sized firms are the bulk of U.S. manufacturers, and these suppliers are especially important to the auto industry's evolution, according to DOE.

• The money comes from the 2022 climate law, and it's under DOE's Office of Manufacturing and Energy Supply Chains.
• It launched in 2022 as part of the department's work to implement the big 2021 infrastructure law.

"By helping states and manufacturers navigate the emerging EV manufacturing industry, today's announcements will help ensure the workforces that defined America's auto sector for the last 100 years will have the opportunity to shape the next 100 years," DOE boss Jennifer Granholm said in a statement.

State of play: The money could be used for things like a high-tonnage press that makes EV components, or technical assistance, DOE tells Axios.

• Another example: work on marketing and sales contacts to meet the needs of the EV market.
• It's unclear how many projects the money will support, which depends on state-level implementation. But DOE estimates up to 25 conversions.
• This will help create and retain hundreds of well-paying union jobs, the department claimed.

Catch up quick: It comes a month after DOE announced $1.7 billion for large automakers and suppliers to convert at-risk or shuttered plants to serve the EV market.

• Overall, the White House is using money — think consumer subsidies and industry aid — and regulations to promote EV sales and domestic projects.
• The White House goal is EVs reaching 50% of passenger vehicle sales by 2030, while EPA rules seek even higher levels thereafter.

The intrigue: Under DOE's criteria, eligible states for the latest funding need an auto sector that's at least 0.5% of its workforce.

🔍 What we're watching: Whether the attempt to fuse climate policy and industrial policy bears political fruit.

Cuts in greenhouse gas emissions may soon begin slowing the rate of global warming, which some researchers say has been speeding up in recent years, according to a new study.

Why it matters: The research shows that a slowdown in the rate of emissions growth due to government policies, and eventual leveling off, could help arrest the rate at which the planet is warming.

• But scientists say it shouldn't trigger complacency.

What they're saying: "Although bad actors could misinterpret these results as yet another reason to continue to delay more climate action, in fact they emphasize even more strongly the efficacy of the actions taken to date and the urgency of more," climate researcher Katharine Hayhoe, who was not involved in the new study, told Axios.

Zoom in: The research, published as a viewpoint in the journal Environmental Research Letters, makes a simple — yet perhaps underappreciated — point.

• While the pace and scale of climate action are currently unlikely to be successful at limiting global warming to the Paris Agreement targets, national policies are becoming significant enough to slow the rate of increase in global average temperatures.
• In the analysis, two researchers from the Carnegie Institution for Science at Stanford University found that the rate of warming is anticipated to be around 0.21°C (0.37°F) per decade in 2025.
• This would decline to 0.15°C (0.27°F) per decade around the year 2050.

Between the lines: Future warming rates would depend on whether countries meet their climate change commitments and if more stringent emissions cuts are made.

Read more

💵 The offshore wind industry is down but hardly out, based on yesterday's sale of leases in federal waters off Delaware, Maryland and Virginia.

• State of play: Equinor had a winning bid of $75 million for one area, while a subsidiary of power giant Dominion won another for $17.7 million.
• Why it matters: The auction drew six bidders and shows interest in new development remains despite economic headwinds that have delayed or scuttled several projects. The latest problem: the blade failure in a project off Massachusetts.
• The big picture: Offshore wind is still growing, but the latest bids were far below some earlier auctions. The White House goal of 30 gigawatts of capacity in place by 2030 probably won't happen. The research firm BloombergNEF currently sees 13.1 GW by then.
• What we're watching: The election. Donald Trump has vowed to reverse federal support.

🥵 The Biden administration released a National Heat Strategy yesterday, noting that heat-related deaths and illnesses "have risen dramatically in the past four years."

• Why it matters: The cross-agency strategy aims to boost the country's resilience to extreme heat events, which are becoming more frequent, severe and long-lasting due to human-caused climate change.
• Zoom in: A focal point is the Heat Health Information System, or heat.gov, which is an interagency platform for heat-related health information and resilience.

Democratic VP pick Tim Walz's embrace of sustainable aviation fuel in Minnesota could shorten a long runway for the industry.

Why it matters: Aviation accounts for roughly 3% of global emissions and could reach 22% by 2050. The airline industry currently has few viable options to wean itself off conventional jet fuel.

The big picture: Walz's campaign with Kamala Harris will likely feature his goal of growing Minnesota's economy while decarbonizing a polluting industry, SAF supporters say.

• As governor, Waltz signed a SAF tax credit into law last year and launched an SAF hub with founding partners Delta, Bank of America, Xcel Energy and EcoLab.

Reality check: These fuels — now derived mostly from plant oils and cooking fats — face big hurdles.

• The IRA offers a $1.25-a-gallon federal tax credit for SAFs with at least 50% lower emissions than conventional jet fuel.
• But that subsidy expires this year and will be subsumed by a wider credit that may prove less supportive.

🔓 Unlock the whole story, and if you need more smart, quick intel on energy and climate policy for your job, get Axios Pro.

🛑 Ørsted is abandoning a big European project to produce "e-methanol" shipping fuel made from green hydrogen and biogenic CO2, it said today.

• Why it matters: The renewables heavyweight said the alternative fuels market is developing more slowly than expected. It comes weeks after Shell paused a Dutch project to make sustainable jet fuels and waste-to-diesel.

➡️ The battery startup Natron Energy plans to invest $1.4 billion to build a North Carolina factory that makes sodium-ion batteries, an alternative to lithium products, per the WSJ and Business North Carolina.