In a legacy steel town, energy is now king — just don't call it ‘green'

Washington Post

9 hours ago

WEIRTON, W.Va. — Ray Larkey's new job is drastically different from the one he had in the gritty steel mill for which this city is named.
He used to walk on wobbly catwalks that hovered above 900-degree ovens and was on high alert whenever cranes moved 30,000-pound steel coils overhead.
Now when Larkey arrives at Form Energy's sprawling 500,000-square-foot building next to Weirton Steel's rusty and abandoned plant, he's greeted by lush indoor gardens in a bright, pristine space.
'It's like night and day,' Larkey said of the energy-storage company that hired him last year after he was laid off from the steel plant. 'We are growing this company, and as it grows, we grow.'
Form Energy makes batteries that have been marketed as vehicles for stabilizing the electrical grid, including by strengthening solar- and wind-energy sources. The company benefited from tens of millions in investments and clean-energy tax credits during the Biden administration, helping it revive this former steel town after opening a factory here about a year ago.
Form Energy has already hired 440 people, including dozens of former Weirton Steel employees, and plans to add hundreds more to its workforce in coming years.
But its leaders don't want Form Energy to be typecast as green, as the Trump administration takes aim at clean-energy initiatives. Some in Weirton also remain skeptical that a battery company fits into the culture of an increasingly conservative city built around a steel plant.
Mateo Jaramillo, Form Energy's co-founder, said seeing the company and its iron-air batteries as environmentally friendly or green is too restrictive. Its products can help store energy from an array of sources, including those that run on fossil fuels, for about four days.
'I think we are part of clean energy in America, and that is broadly how we think about it,' Jaramillo said. 'But I think if you call us green, that is too narrow of a term to describe the value of this product.'
Regardless of how Form Energy defines itself, many city leaders here say they have no choice but to accept it as the future, even as President Donald Trump tries to reinvigorate steel production in Rust Belt cities.
'As far as it being green energy, I don't care what they are. They are jobs,' said Weirton Mayor Dean M. Harris, who worked at Weirton Steel for 48 years. He added: 'When you look at the future heavy industry in the country, I don't think you are going to see a rebound. … We have sold that part of our history to the Chinese, Japan and other countries.'
Throughout Weirton, a confluence of economic events has forced residents and local officials to acknowledge that steel jobs are unlikely to rebound here, setting off a broad debate about how the city can reinvent itself before even more of its residents move elsewhere for work.
Cleveland-Cliffs, the steel manufacturer that operated Weirton's legacy mill, idled the plant and laid off the remaining 900 workers in February 2024. The steel producer quickly vowed to return to Weirton to rehire many of the workers at a new transformer plant it planned to build.
Then Cleveland-Cliffs, which suffered a $700 million loss last year, abruptly announced in May that it was abandoning that plan. The announcement crushed local leaders and steelworkers, forcing many to acknowledge that the city's history and its heritage were being threatened.
'This whole time I was like, 'This is going to happen and I am going to go back to work,'' said Jo Smith, a steelworker who had been laid off but expected to be rehired at the transformer plant. 'Now, it's just broken hearts, and a whole lot of families are like, 'What are we going to do now?''
Located about 35 miles west of Pittsburgh, this city of 18,000 residents traces its birth to industrialist Ernest T. Weir's decision to construct Weirton Steel next to a bend in the Ohio River in 1909.
The work opportunities drew immigrants from Europe, who built homes and businesses near the factory. The neighborhoods incorporated to form the city of Weirton in 1947. For decades, the steel mill helped maintain streets, built community pools and recreation centers, and provided steady work for many residents.
Weirton's population peaked at about 30,000 residents in 1960, and by the '70s, the steel plant employed about 12,000 people. As it grew, Weirton Steel became known as a source of pollution, with longtime residents recalling the need to sweep their porches daily or feeling grit caking their teeth after walking down Main Street.
The pollution gradually subsided, as did Weirton Steel's fortunes. But what drew its founder to this place are some of the same factors that attracted Form Energy: its spot along a major river, its strong workforce and its reasonable cost of living.
In addition, West Virginia offered Form Energy a $290 million incentive package to come to the state, which allowed it to rapidly build a massive production facility on land once owned by Weirton Steel.
When Form Energy was founded in 2017, the iron-air battery concept was closely linked to renewable energy. As it ramped up product testing, the company benefited from the Biden administration's push to expand green energy projects.
Form Energy received $150 million in federal funding under President Joe Biden to expand its operations in Weirton. The company also qualified for clean-energy manufacturing tax credits.
The Trump administration has gutted such programs, rolling back incentives for solar-, wind- and other clean-energy projects. Form Energy leaders said they were relieved that the signature policy bill Trump signed this month included the manufacturing tax credits.
Still, Jaramillo bristles at suggestions that Form Energy's batteries are part of the green energy portfolio.
'It's a valuable technology to increase reliability and lower costs for the entire electric grid,' he said, adding that you wouldn't 'call a transformer green energy.'
With Form Energy now in the process of nearly doubling the size of its plant, Weirton's economic future seems interwoven with the company's success. The company expects to ship iron-air batteries to its first customer this summer, and many employees are optimistic that the business can thrive.
But tensions remain over what kind of industry — and workplace culture — should represent the future of a region where fewer than 1 in 4 residents hold a college degree and about 70 percent of voters supported Trump. Form Energy's parking lot reflects that divide: Some employees park their hulking trucks alongside dozens of electric vehicles that charge in the lot.
Some here, including state Del. Pat McGeehan (R), have also questioned the company's stated commitment to inclusion and diversity as Trump and other Republicans try to end such initiatives. McGeehan, who represents part of Weirton and is majority leader in the House of Delegates, said Form Energy is focused on a 'progressive, liberal ideology' and doesn't represent the city's future.
One of Form Energy's core values, it says on its website, is 'humanity,' with 'cornerstones' of 'inclusion, diversity, empathy, and respect' to 'enable a good and just society.'
'Form Energy, that is a joke and not the future,' McGeehan said. 'The facility will probably be vacant in two or three years.'
Jaramillo scoffs at suggestions that his company is too liberal for Weirton and said none of its hiring decisions are based on quotas or diversity goals.
'We have values we state and try to imbue in a lot of different ways, and those are humanity, excellence and creativity,' said Jaramillo, describing those principles as 'fairly generic.'
Harris, the mayor, blasted McGeehan's criticisms of the company, accusing the legislator of 'reading from the playbook' of Republicans nationally. Harris noted that other local Republicans support the company, adding that Weirton is built too tough for its politicians to engage in talk of failure.
'And if we fail,' he said, 'we fail trying.'
On the streets of Weirton, most residents acknowledge that the city's future will not resemble anything like its heyday, when Weirton Steel sent trucks and railcars barreling through town at all hours.
Today, Weirton's Main Street consists mostly of social clubs, a few bars, a Dollar General store, and a museum that pays homage to the steel industry. Besides the Form Energy plant, the only new construction is a recently rebuilt Long John Silver's restaurant.
At Steel Town Auto Sales, used-car dealer Robert Kovalik said he has benefited from Form Energy because it has brought a more diverse workforce to Weirton. Although company leaders said about half the jobs at the plant do not require college degrees, the company has also brought in engineering talent from around the world to help it construct batteries.
'We've had guys in here from Brazil, India, who work there and come in here and buy a used car,' said Kovalik, 73.
A few doors away, at the 100-year-old Irish Pub, bartender Retta Summers has doubts that Form Energy is the answer to Weirton's challenges, because it appears too closely linked to Biden.
'They used all of that government money to build that just because of Biden, and it ain't going to work,' Summers said.
Other residents are less skeptical, noting they know relatives or friends who recently secured jobs at Form Energy.
Ted Zatezalo, 79, a retired steelworker, said he's convinced that 'steel is never coming back' because 'it would take a billion dollars to rebuild' what Weirton Steel once brought to the community.
'So, the battery plant is the future, and all the people supporting the battery plant are the future, too,' Zatezalo said.
Michael A. Adams, Weirton's city manager, agrees. Adams said his mood brightens every time he visits Form Energy and runs into a former steelworker who now works for the company.
'When we talk about Form, I think of one word, and it's 'hope,'' Adams said. 'I think there is hope here that now everyone doesn't have to move to some other place.'