Funding Opportunities

Managed by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Grid Deployment Office and supported by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL), the Grid Resilience State and Tribal Formula Grants provide non-competitive funding to states (including U.S. Territories) and Indian tribes to improve the resilience of their electric grids. Administered by the National Energy Technology Laboratory and falling under BIL provision 40101(d), the program is designed to strengthen and modernize America’s power grid against wildfires, extreme weather, and other natural disasters that are exacerbated by the climate crisis.

The program will distribute funding to states, territories, and federally recognized Indian tribes, including Alaska Native Regional Corporations and Alaska Native Village Corporations, over five years based on a formula that includes factors such as population size, land area, probability and severity of disruptive events, and a locality’s historical expenditures on mitigation efforts. The states, territories, and Indian tribes will then award these funds to a diverse set of projects, with priority given to efforts that generate the greatest community benefit providing clean, affordable, and reliable energy.

The Administrative and Legal Requirements Document (ALRD) and associated resources below provide eligible applicants with program details and requirements.

The Water Conservation Grant Fund (WCGF) exists to provide financial resources to eligible entities for the purpose of conserving Arizona's water supply.

A wide range of projects and programs may be eligible for WCGF funding. Some examples include:
- Water use education and conservation research
- Community incentives for rainwater harvesting, gray water systems, and turf removal
- Widespread installation of drought-resistant landscaping and turf removal incentives
- Infrastructure efficiency upgrades
- Projects that promote groundwater recharge and imported aquifer health
- Construction of groundwater storage facilities
- Community education initiatives about wise water use
- Programs or projects to reduce structural water overuse issues

The DWSRF program helps public and private water systems across Arizona meet the objectives of the SDWA by providing a permanent, independent source of low-cost financing. Under the DWSRF, WIFA provides various types of assistance, including loans, technical assistance, and forgivable principal. Our loan terms vary and may include an interest rate discount and repayment periods of up to 30 years*. Much like the CWSRF, WIFA tailors all loan terms to the borrower's situation and needs.

*repayment period cannot exceed the useful life of infrastructure financed. For example, if a project has a maximum useful life of 15 years, the loan term cannot exceed 15 years.

The Clean Water State Revolving Fund (CWSRF) program is a federal-state partnership. WIFA is the administrator for Arizona's CWSRF program, providing communities a permanent, independent source of low-cost financing for a wide range of water quality infrastructure projects.

Under the CWSRF, WIFA provides various types of assistance, including loans, refinancing, purchasing, or guaranteeing local debt and purchasing bond insurance. Our loan terms vary and may include an interest rate discount and repayment periods of up to 30 years*. WIFA tailors all loan terms to the borrower's situation and needs.

*repayment period cannot exceed the useful life of infrastructure financed. For example, if a project has a maximum useful life of 15 years, the loan term cannot exceed 15 years

Amazon Research Awards (ARA) is announcing the spring 2024 call for proposals for the AI for Information Security and Sustainability research areas. The deadline for submissions is 11:59 p.m. Pacific time on May 7, 2024.

Proposals will be reviewed for the quality of their scientific content, creativity, and their potential for impact at scale. Proposals related to theory, practice, and novel techniques are all welcome.

ARA provides grant recipients unrestricted funds and AWS promotional credits. Funded projects are assigned an Amazon research contact, and recipients also receive training resources, including AWS tutorials and hands-on sessions with Amazon scientists and engineers.

Before applying, we encourage researchers to visit the ARA website and read our frequently asked questions for more specific program information. We look forward to receiving your submissions.

CDC announces the availability of supplemental funding for the 26 American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN) Tribes and regional AI/AN tribally designated organizations awarded funding under CDC-RFA-TO-23-0001: Strengthening Public Health Systems and Services in Indian Country. The CDC-RFA-TO-23-0001 recipients are eligible to submit applications for new FY 2024 Centers, Institute, and Offices (CIO) Project Plans according to the entity type, HHS Region, and/or IHS Area for which they received initial funding.

Purpose:
Eligible projects/programs will enhance connections to local cultural history, local parks, open space or natural areas through artistic community events, programming or art installations that help to build sustainable community connections, health and well-being. The Local Parks Grants Program will be managed and administered by Parks California https://parkscalifornia.org/

Description:
Both program operations and art installations in local parks are eligible. Project/Programs must be in a "local park". Local parks include land that is owned or managed by a local city, county, park or community service district, land trusts, regional park or open space district, non-profit organization or foundation, or any other entity other than federal and state agencies. For more information see https://artsincaliforniaparks.org/local-parks-grant-program/

Through this R-STEP Opportunity, The Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) is requesting applications from state-based collaboratives aiming to increase state and local capacity for large-scale renewable energy planning and siting. R-STEP will also serve as a platform for Collaboratives to share learnings and best practices with other stakeholders.

A single application should be submitted by a team of organizations interested in working together to form a collaborative. DOE highly encourages state energy offices (or equivalent state agencies) and university extension offices to lead or participate in applications but recognizes that the organizations best suited to perform these activities will vary from state to state. Applicants are encouraged to team with other organizations including, but not limited to: Tribal governments, universities, non-governmental organizations, and community-based organizations. DOE also recommends that teams include organizations familiar with the needs of local communities in the state. They should have experience providing educational or technical assistance services to local communities and have technical expertise on renewable energy siting topics (e.g., environmental impacts, tax policies, land use, zoning ordinance development).

Applications should:
1. Focus on plans to establish or expand a state-level initiative that improves decision-making by state, local, and/or Tribal governments on large-scale renewable energy planning, siting, and permitting;
2. Prioritize equitable and inclusive community engagement both to identify local needs and disseminate technical resources; and
3. Be submitted by cross-disciplinary collaboratives with experience engaging local communities and technical expertise on siting issues.

Applicants can request up to $2 million to execute proposed activities over the course of up to 3 years (36 months).

Applications should primarily focus on activities that expand the planning and evaluation capacity of state and local decision makers regarding the siting of large-scale wind, solar, and battery energy storage infrastructure. Where there is appreciable need within a state, proposals may include activities related to other clean energy technologies, such as geothermal power, agrivoltaics, offshore wind, and electric vehicle charging infrastructure. Applicants must provide sufficient detail and reasoning to justify the technologies included in the scope of activities. In addition, applicants are encouraged to consider whether and how software tools, including those that utilize machine learning (ML) or similar technology, could improve the efficacy, speed, and/or environmental justice outcomes of renewable energy planning, siting, and permitting.

The Joint Office of Energy and Transportation (Joint Office), through the Department of Energy (DOE), has made available $54 million in new federal funding for projects that will expand community e-mobility access and provide clean reliable energy. The funding will drive innovation in equitable clean transportation and is aligned with strategies detailed in the U.S. National Blueprint for Transportation Decarbonization. This program will make strategic investments at the local level that address key barriers to expanding access to electrified mobility options for individuals without home charging; accelerate the transition to electrified fleets; and mature the implementation of managed charging systems to mitigate impacts and optimize usage of the grid.

The funding is administered by the Joint Office through DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE). Topic areas in the Joint Office’s Fiscal Year (FY) 2024 funding opportunity include:

Solving for No-Home Charging: Expanding Charging Access for Privately Owned E-Mobility
Expanding E-Mobility Solutions through Electrified Micro, Light and Medium-Duty Fleets
Managed Charging for Clean Reliable Energy.

This FOA aims to help meet the goal that 40% of the benefits of the Biden-Harris Administration’s investments in clean energy and climate solutions are delivered to Disadvantaged Communities (DACs), as defined by the Department pursuant to the Executive Order, and to drive creation of accessible, good-paying jobs with the free and fair chance for workers to join a union.

Read the Joint Office’s FY2024 Communities Taking Charge Accelerator. Applicants must submit a concept paper by May 20, 2024, and full applications are due July 16, 2024.

Background
The Office of Native Hawaiian Relations’ (ONHR) Heritage (Tourism) Opportunities in Hawaiʻi (HŌʻIHI) Grant Program serves to implement the Native Hawaiian Organization NATIVE Act Grants under CFDA 15.068 and the provisions of the Native American Tourism and Improving Visitor Experience Act (NATIVE Act), 25 U.S.C. 4351 et seq. The purposes of the NATIVE Act include establishing a more inclusive national travel and tourism strategy and providing opportunities, including funding, for Native Hawaiian organizations (NHO) as distinctly defined in the NATIVE Act, with the potential to deliver significant benefits, including job creation, elevated living standards, and expanded economic opportunities, for the Native Hawaiian Community.Tourism in Hawaiʻi has grown over the last century as visitor arrivals surpassed 10 million in 2020 and has seen a recovery since the drop in arrivals during the pandemic, with 9.4 million visitor arrivals in 2022 in a state whose population is less than 1.5 million people. This volume of visitors has led to excessive pressure on Hawaiʻi’s natural and cultural resources, including many long held sacred by members of the Native Hawaiian Community. Tourism in Hawaiʻi relies heavily on the Native Hawaiian culture as its overarching theme and draw and has operated as an extractive industry, depleting resources and often displacing Native Hawaiian Community members from their traditional lands, homes, and places of worship. Frustration amongst Native Hawaiian Community members has resulted in urgent calls to reevaluate priorities and to transform tourism into a regenerative industry, one that invests back into restoring and sustaining resources, including human resources, in Hawaiʻi. Given that tourism will remain a major economic driver for many states, including Hawaiʻi, the NATIVE Act plays an important role in promoting heritage and cultural tourism opportunities through the self-determining participation of Native American communities, including the Native Hawaiian Community, in the visitor industry.The Hawaiian value of hōʻihi (to treat with reverence or respect), as reflected in the ʻōlelo noʻeau (Hawaiian proverb) “E hōʻihi aku, e hōʻihi mai,” meaning “show respect, get respect”, represents the core principle of ONHR’s HŌʻIHI Grant Program. Through showing respect, visitors (tourists) can then be welcomed as guests with a shared kuleana (responsibility) in perpetuating the values and importance of Native Hawaiian traditional knowledge and cultural practices. This ʻōlelo noʻeau serves as a foundational guide for ONHR’s HŌʻIHI Grant Program to aide in actions that:Showcase the heritage, places, arts, foods, traditions, history and continuing vitality of the Native Hawaiian Community;Identify, enhance, revive, or maintain loea (cultural traditions and practices), wahi kūpuna (ancestral spaces) and wahi pana (sacred spaces) that are important to sustain the distinctiveness of the Native Hawaiian Community; andProvide for authentic and respectful visitor experiences in Hawaiʻi.These grants and subsequent actions by NHOs are also expected to facilitate job creation, stimulate economic activity, and contribute to elevating the living standards in the Native Hawaiian Community. Program Priorities for 2024For fiscal year 2024, ONHR will fulfill the core principles of the HŌʻIHI Grant Program by providing grant funding to successful NHO applicants who meet the criteria for one or more of the following priorities:Uplift, perpetuate, and in some cases revive, traditional Native Hawaiian practices (e.g., ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi, kapa making, lauhala and kaula weaving, hula, amongst many others including lesser known practices) by creating opportunities for demonstrations, visitor education on history, usage, and protocols, or hands-on visitor participation experiences in the cultural practice;Support the maintenance, enhancement, and protection of Hawaiʻi’s natural resources, wahi kūpuna, and wahi pana at areas impacted by tourism;Enhance the entrepreneurial capacity for the Native Hawaiian Community by helping create business opportunities in the visitor industry, offering business development training, or stimulating economic activity; AND/ORUndertake related activities with visitors that convey respect and reaffirm the principle of reciprocation to the place, resources, and traditional knowledge holders and practitioners.For the purposes of this notice of funding opportunity (NOFO), Native Hawaiian cultural practices may include, but are not limited to, traditional: farming practices, food preparation, material gathering and production of implements, products, and adornments, and cultural activities such as moʻolelo, dance, chant, song, arts, construction, and recreation.