Longer than the USS Constitution, taller than the Bunker Hill Monument, and coming to Charlestown

US Secretary of Energy Steven Chu is expected to disclose the funding today during a visit to the state. The money comes on top of a $2 million US Department of Energy grant awarded to Massachusetts for the proposed facility two years ago, as well as $13.2 million in grants and loans from the state's Renewable Energy Trust. Construction of the center is scheduled to get underway in September.

"This would really do a lot in terms of pushing us further down the road in terms of wind and harnessing the power of wind energy," said a federal official familiar with the project who was not authorized to speak in advance of Chu's visit. The Obama administration wants 10 percent of electricity generated in the United States to come from renewable sources by 2012. Currently about 2 percent of the nation's electricity is generated by wind, solar, and geothermal facilities.

Local government and business officials greeted news of the stimulus funding for the project enthu siastically, even though some had not been provided with the details yesterday.

"I imagine that's the reason Secretary Chu is coming to Charlestown," joked state Representative Eugene O'Flaherty, a Charlestown Democrat, who has been invited to attend Chu's announcement this morning at the center's site on Terminal Street, near a car-shipping company.

Though he didn't previously know the amount of money coming to the state for the facility, O'Flaherty said his office had been expecting the federal government to boost the project. Massachusetts has been in competition with Texas, which also received a $2 million grant in 2007 to help build a blade-testing facility.

"We were aware some time ago that we had beaten out Texas," O'Flaherty said.

Officials said they expected the center to create about 250 construction jobs and eventually employ about 10 people to run the facility, which will test blades for pressure and fatigue by using hydraulics and sensors.

"Initially, there are not going to be too many jobs available. It's not as if we have a factory moving in," O'Flaherty said. "I'm hoping that, potentially, businesses that are interested in learning from this wind turbine testing facility will locate nearby."

Senator Edward M. Kennedy and other legislators have long backed the Charlestown project, which will create the nation's first commercial "large-blade" testing facility. In a letter dated April 30, Kennedy and other Massachusetts congressional members urged the energy department to "expand its current commitment" to the testing center to cover the facility's estimated $25 million construction costs.

"Massachusetts leads the nation in the development of clean, safe technology for the future, and is uniquely qualified to develop this cutting-edge facility," Kennedy said in an e-mail to the Globe yesterday.

Another government official, who also was not authorized to speak prior to Chu's official announcement, said the additional federal funding signals that the administration considers Massachusetts a leader in the clean technology sector, and key to advancing the president's green goals.

"Our hope is that it will be a building block," the official said. "This turbocharges the wind industry in Massachusetts."

Hemant Taneja of the New England Clean Energy Council, a group that promotes renewable energy businesses, agreed.

"This test facility can be a great resource for the companies trying to develop in related areas," Taneja said. "That's really the whole objective: You want to attract industry here."

Paul Gaynor, chief executive of First Wind in Newton, called the center's presence in Massachusetts a coup.

"Everyone who is in the wind business" will benefit, he said.

Erin Ailworth can be reached at eailworth@globe.com.