Across tribal nations, hosting a convening with dinner and a tour of an ambitious new project is a familiar scene. But for David Harper, a member of the Colorado River Indian Tribes and CEO of the newly created tribal energy financing organization Huurav, a recent gathering felt different. Last week, at the Bluewater Resort and Casino on the Colorado River Indian Tribes reservation in western Arizona, Huurav met with tribal leaders, investors, and farmers to kick off the tribe’s first agrivoltaics project: a practice that allows for growing crops beneath solar panels.

The project marks a significant breakthrough for the tribe and the broader tribal clean energy landscape, arriving on the heels of a devastating blow to federal support. In October of last year, the passage of President Donald Trump’s tax bill, colloquially known as the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” stripped roughly $1.5 billion in federal funding earmarked for tribal renewable energy and climate resilience projects.

“Were we surprised by the claw back? No, they’ve done it before,” said Huurav’s Harper. “Have they reneged on their promise of our treaties? Yes, of course. So does that immobilize us and not be able to survive? No, what it does is it helps us, it makes us create a better pathway for ourselves.”

With nearly 1,600 projects by tribal governments and Native entities losing some or all of their federal funding, tribes have been forced to get creative. To keep clean energy projects alive, tribes are turning to philanthropy, low-interest loans, and nonprofits to bridge the massive financial gap.