Cooperatives rely on loans and grants, as well as private financing both to maintain and modernize the existing system and to expand the system to meet the nation’s increasing demand for electricity.
Loans available from the Rural Utilities Service (RUS) continue a successful public-private partnership that extends back to the early 20th century, when President Roosevelt created the Rural Electrification Administration (REA), now RUS. Historians credit the REA program for making the nation’s electrical grid — one of the great engineering feats of the last century — possible.
Now, as then, financial investment in not-for-profit, member-owned electric cooperatives is an investment in the communities served by cooperatives.
Rural electric cooperatives rely on financing from the following sources:
- U.S. Department of Agriculture Rural Utilities Service
- National Rural Utilities Cooperative Finance Corporation
- U.S. Department of Energy