2018 U.S. EPA Brownfield Grants Open for Applications with New Guidelines Released

WASHINGTON - Sept. 18, 2017 - PRLog -- EPA's Office of Land and Emergency Management Grants and Funding has released the guidelines to help grant applicants in the process of applying for ~$50 million in 2018 grant funding. EPA's Brownfields Program provides funds to empower states, communities, tribes, and nonprofits to prevent, inventory, assess, clean up, and reuse brownfield sites.

A critical part of EPA's assessment and cleanup efforts is to ensure that residents living in communities historically affected by economic disinvestment, health disparities, and environmental contamination have an opportunity to reap the benefits from brownfields redevelopment. EPA's Brownfields Program has a rich history of high returns and higher impact rooted in environmental justice and is committed to helping communities revitalize brownfield properties, mitigate potential health risks, and restore economic vitality.

EPA provides brownfields funding for three types of grants: Brownfields Assessment Grants, Brownfields Revolving Loan Fund (RLF) Grants, and Brownfields Cleanup Grants.  New in this brownfield grant cycle are three changes to the Cleanup Grant process, which are provided below:

FY 2018 Guidelines for Brownfields Assessment Grants

Under the Assessment Grants RFP, EPA provides funds to inventory, characterize, assess, and conduct planning (including cleanup planning) and community involvement related to brownfield sites.

The total funding available under the national competitions for Assessment, Revolving Loan Fund, and Cleanup Grants is estimated at $50 million subject to the availability of funds and other applicable considerations. EPA may expend up to 25 percent of the amount appropriated for Brownfields Grants on sites contaminated with petroleum. EPA anticipates awarding an estimated 198 grants among all three grant types. Under this competitive opportunity, EPA anticipates awarding an estimated 145 Assessment Grants for an estimated $33.5 million.

FY 2018 Guidelines for Brownfields Revolving Loan Fund Grants

Revolving Loan Fund (RLF) Grants provide funding to a grant recipient to capitalize an RLF program. RLF programs provide loans and subgrants to eligible entities to carry out cleanup activities at brownfield sites contaminated with hazardous substances and/or petroleum. Revolving loan funds generally are used to provide no-interest or low-interest loans for eligible brownfields cleanups and other eligible programmatic costs necessary to manage the RLF. An RLF grant recipient must use 50% or more of the awarded funds for loans. RLF grantees may not subgrant to themselves. However, the RLF grant recipient may subgrant to other coalition members. Subgrants are limited to $200,000 per site. Entities receiving RLF subgrants must own the site that is the subject of the subgrant. An RLF grant recipient cannot make a loan or a subgrant to a party potentially liable for the contamination at the brownfield site under CERCLA §107, nor may the RLF grant recipient make a loan or subgrant to clean up a site that it is potentially liable for under CERCLA §107.

Under the RLF Grants RFP, EPA provides funds to capitalize a revolving fund and to make loans and provide subgrants to carry out cleanup activities at brownfield sites.

EPA anticipates awarding an estimated 15 Revolving Loan Fund Grants for an estimated $9 million.

FY 2018 Guidelines for Brownfields Cleanup Grants

Cleanup Grants provide funding to carry out cleanup activities on brownfield sites owned by the applicant.  Under the RFP, EPA is seeking proposals for Cleanup Grants to provide funds to carry out cleanup activities at a specific brownfield site owned by the applicant.

NEW THIS YEAR
• Applicants may request funding to address either a single brownfield site, or multiple brownfield sites, within each proposal.
• An applicant may request up to $200,000 in each proposal.
• An applicant can submit up to three cleanup proposals.

Applicants that exceed the maximum number of proposals allowable for Cleanup Grants will be contacted, prior to review of any of the proposals by EPA, to determine which proposals the applicant will withdraw from the competition. An applicant cannot propose an alternate site(s) if the site(s) identified in the proposal is determined by EPA to be ineligible for brownfields funding. An applicant may request up to $200,000 to address hazardous substances and/or petroleum contamination at one or more site(s). If the site is co-mingled with both hazardous substances and petroleum contamination and the hazardous substances and petroleum-contaminated areas of the site are distinguishable, the proposal must address both eligibility criteria and indicate the dollar amount of funding requested for each type of contamination. If the petroleum and hazardous substances are co-mingled and not easily distinguishable, the applicant must indicate which contaminant is predominant and respond to the appropriate site eligibility criteria.

The Brownfields Law requires applicants to provide a 20 percent cost share for Cleanup Grants. Applicants may request a waiver of the 20 percent cost share requirement based on hardship. EPA will consider hardship waiver requests on a case-by-case basis and will approve such requests on a limited basis.

All application due: November 16, 2017

For additional details, including the grant applications packets, please visit: https://brownfieldlistings.com/blog/post/fy18-brownfield-...

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