The President’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law is Catalyzing Historic Investments That Will Tackle Harmful CO2 Emissions, Produce High-Quality Jobs, and Support Environmental Justice
WASHINGTON, D.C.— The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) today announced a nearly $4.9 billion set of funding opportunities to bolster investments in the carbon management industry and to significantly reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions released into the atmosphere through power generation and industrial operations. The funding from President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law will support three programs to help drive the demonstration and deployment of carbon capture systems, along with carbon transport and storage infrastructure. Large-scale deployment of carbon management technologies is crucial to addressing the climate crisis and meeting President Biden’s goal of a net-zero greenhouse gas emissions economy by 2050, which will both protect existing industrial jobs and create new ones.
“Nearly every climate model makes clear that we need to incorporate carbon management technology—especially in hard to decarbonize sectors and heavy industries such as steel and cement production—in our toolkit to tackle the climate crisis,” said U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm. “The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law is helping DOE pick up the pace on projects that can store tens of millions of tons of CO2 that would otherwise be emitted, which will bring jobs to our economy and deliver a healthier environment for all Americans.”
The Inflation Reduction Act, signed into law by President Biden, invests even further in building a domestic carbon management industry, with substantial improvements to the federal carbon capture tax credit (45Q/Sec. 13104). DOE’s analysis estimates that actions taken through the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law will drive 2030 economy-wide greenhouse gas emissions to 40% below 2005 levels.
DOE continues to prioritize federal investments in climate solutions that deliver broadly shared prosperity, minimize harms, ensure meaningful benefits disadvantaged communities, and support American workers and collective bargaining. As such applicants for funding will be required to submit Community Benefits Plans detailing their commitments to community and labor engagement, quality job creation, diversity and equity, and implementation of the Justice40 Initiative. Projects selected under these opportunities will be required to develop implementation strategies and report on activities, and outcomes related to community economic and other benefits and environmental impacts, such as investments in registered apprenticeships, hiring local workers, participation of minority-owned business, or changes to non-CO2 pollution.
DOE today is announcing three funding opportunity announcements (FOAs):
Since January 2021, DOE has invested more than $242 million in 55 research and development projects and front-end engineering design studies to advance carbon management approaches that include CO2 capture, transport, and storage. Visit the OCED and FECM websites for more information on how DOE is working to accelerate market adoption and deployment of carbon management technologies to support an equitable transition to a decarbonized energy system.
FECM funds research, development, demonstration, and deployment projects to decarbonize power generation and industrial sources, to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and to mitigate the environmental impacts of fossil fuel production and use. Priority areas of technology work include point-source carbon capture, hydrogen with carbon management, methane emissions reduction, critical mineral production and carbon dioxide removal. To learn more, sign up for FECM news announcements and visit the NETL website.
*FOA details are available on Fedconnect. Due to system maintenance, the Grants.gov site will not be available for submissions between Sept. 23 – 30, 2022. The site will resume normal operations on Oct. 1, 2022.