The Pokagon Band of Pottawatomi has been awarded a $5 million federal Climate Pollution Reduction Grant to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Pokagon Tribal Chair Matthew Wesaw tells us the funds from the EPA can be used on tribal properties to make them greener.

“We’ll look to things like additional solar panels,” Wesaw said. “We use a lot of solar panels now, but we’ll probably increase the use of those. We’ll look at switching over a significant number of our fleet to electric vehicles from gas powered vehicles. We will look at changing over our maintenance equipment to battery powered. There’s a lot of our buildings, the HVAC systems need to be retrofitted to become more environmentally friendly.”

The band could also install more electric vehicle charging stations at its properties, including the casinos.

Wesaw says the Pokagon Band of Pottawatomi owns more than 6,000 acres of land and dozens of buildings, and it’s always strived to be energy efficient with them.

The EPA was in Dowagiac this past week to present the grant to the Pokagons, and it did so against the backdrop of a tribal solar array that helps power the band’s community center. Also on hand was a representative of the Nottawaseppi Huron Band of Potawatomi, which was awarded $1.1 million.

Wesaw says tribal leadership will be assessing the situation for about six months before settling on a final plan for using the grant.