General Electric Co. and Rolls-Royce said Friday they will halt their self-funded development of an alternate engine for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, ending a multi-year battle between Congress and the White House over the project.

The Defense Department didn’t want the backup F136 engine, preferring to concentrate on the F-35’s primary engine being developed by GE rival Pratt & Whitney. Congressional supporters of the GE/Rolls-Royce engine, however, said it should be continued because it offered price competition and provided additional jobs.

GE Aviation said it won’t lay anybody off, but would have hired perhaps 500 additional employees in the Cincinnati area this year because of this project and a growth in the company’s commercial aircraft engine business, GE Aviation spokesman Rick Kennedy said.

“It’s a missed opportunity for the community,” Kennedy said.

GE Aviation employs approximately 7,500 people in the Cincinnati area, including at its main jet engine plant in Evendale and other operations in Springdale and West Chester. That doesn’t include the company’s Dayton-area employment.

GE and Rolls-Royce said they have spent at least $50 million this year on the project, and have received about $3 billion in federal funding since 1997 for the work. Development of the engine was almost 80 percent complete, the companies said.

The Defense Department wants the F-35 to modernize the strike fleets of the Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps. U.S. allies also want the plane.

GE and Rolls-Royce, partners in the project, said they have been transferring employees from the F-35 project to other engine work, in light of Washington’s decision in April to stop federal funding for it. The Defense Department said the spending wasn’t needed.

GE remains a major provider of military aircraft engines to the United States and allies.

GE had been doing the bulk of the F136 engine work at its Cincinnati-area facilities, and Rolls-Royce in its facilities in Indianapolis and in Bristol, United Kingdom.

“I am deeply disappointed that the resistance of the Obama administration’s Defense Department to support GE’s work on the JSF competitive engine has led to the company’s decision to halt its self-funding of the project,” said U.S. Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

The government has tried for years to cancel the project, but the program’s congressional supporters kept funding it. Since then, pressure has built on Washington to reduce the budget deficit.

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2242 or jnolan@DaytonDailyNews.com.