Ford Motor Co. has decided to use 100 percent renewable energy to power its Dearborn Truck Plant, where it produces the top-selling F-150, and the Michigan Assembly Plant, where it makes the new Ford Ranger, and several other buildings in metro Detroit — including Michigan Central Station in Corktown.

About 500,000 megawatt-hours of wind power, enough to power about 225,000 homes, will come from DTE Energy Co.'s MIGreenPower program. The renewable energy will supply electricity for the truck and SUV assembly plants and to support Ford's Research and Engineering Campus in Dearborn and the train station, which Ford is renovating.

"Ford supports the implementation of renewable energy where the project can be tied to the customer's facility, either directly or through the local distribution utility, and we believe that supports local jobs, improves the local environment and adds resiliency to the local grid," George Andraos, Ford global director of energy and technology, said in a statement. "This project is a great investment for the state of Michigan and will have direct impact on our state."

Ford plans in June to announce a new global carbon reduction strategy that will focus on renewable energy.

"Ford is proud to be a part of this initiative, as it builds on the early achievement of our aggressive 30 percent per vehicle carbon reduction target," Andy Hobbs, Ford's director of environmental quality, said in the statement. "That early achievement has reduced the company's annual footprint by two million (metric tons) per year."

DTE said it plans to build or acquire new wind projects to source the MIGreenPower program that Ford has joined but did not say where they would be. The company now has 13 wind parks and 31 solar arrays. The wind parks are in the Thumb and mid-Michigan. The utility said it plans in March to commission its largest park so far, in Gratiot and Isabella counties in Mid-Michigan.

In January, the Michigan Public Service Commission approved a special rate structure for DTE to expand MIGreenPower, its voluntary renewable energy program for large corporate and industrial customers.

Ford is the first company to take advantage of this new structure. In 2017, DTE launched a slightly different MIGreenPower voluntary program to residential customers in which people pay extra on their monthly bills to support renewable energy capacity. Customers can invest in DTE-owned wind and solar farms by paying about $5 extra per month. Michigan's 2016 energy law mandated utilities to create a green pricing program for customers.

Once the new renewable projects supplying the program are online, Ford and other future industrial customers that subscribe to MIGreenPrower will pay an additional rate charge equivalent to construction and ongoing operation costs, DTE said. Customers also will receive a bill credit based on lower regional projected energy costs.

"Expanding MIGreenPower to help our largest corporate customers meet their sustainability goals is another milestone in our clean energy transformation," Trevor Lauer, president and COO of DTE Electric, said in a statement. "It's exciting that iconic Ford vehicles like the F-150 will be built in a plant powered by DTE wind energy, and we appreciate the leadership role Ford is taking in reducing its carbon footprint and supporting our state's clean energy economy."

DTE plans to double its renewable energy capacity over the next five years, investing in another $2 billion by 2024. It also proposes to build at least 3,000 more megawatts and solar and wind energy over the next 20 years. DTE currently produces about 1,000 megawatts of renewable energy, primarily wind. Each 1,000 megawatts powers about 450,000 homes.

Two thousand megawatts would power about 40 percent of the company's 2.2 million electric customers in Michigan. DTE said it will reduce carbon emissions by more than 80 percent by 2050.