By Femi Akinola
The Joe Biden administration in the United States recently announced that it was awarding $4.3 billion in federal grants to projects in 30 states aimed at boosting clean energy development and other efforts to reduce the nation’s greenhouse emissions.
Recipients in 30 states will share from a pot of $4.3 billion to tackle clean energy and emissions reduction projects.
The grants are among the largest cash subsidies under the Inflation Reduction Act, the 2022 law that dedicated nearly $400 billion toward climate action and the clean energy transition.
The timing of the grants ensures that this part of President Joe Biden’s environmental legacy will remain intact even if the ruling party fail to retain control of the White House or Senate after the forthcoming November’s election.
According to the government, the grants will fund 25 projects, including efforts to electrify farming equipment in Minnesota, expand public transit in Texas and deploy new electric vehicle charging stations along the Interstate – 95 corridor in New Jersey, Connecticut, Delaware and Maryland.
The Americans Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) also plan to announce another $300 million in the climate related grants for Tribes and territories later this summer.
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The EPA estimated that the projects will reduce the nation’s climate population by nearly One billion metric tons through 2025. This is almost the same as slashing 25 years’ worth of greenhouse gas emissions from 5 million homes, the agency noted in its press release.
EPA Administrator, Michael Regan, said that the 25 grants recipients represented the ”cream of the crop” from more than 300 applicants, who proposed programs that would not only reduce greenhouse gas emissions but create jobs and otherwise benefit their communities economically.
Speaking with reporters, Regan said: ”We know that governors and mayors knows their communities better than the federal government ever could. So, we relied on their abilities to construct an application that would get the maximum greenhouse gas pollution reduction.”
He added saying, ”We wanted to be sure that we saw the diversity across various industries, whether it be transportation, building, agriculture, the power sector, electricity, gas, etc.
By announcing the grants now, the Biden administration is at least partially insulating them from being reversed should former President Donald Trump win in November, since the money will alredy be in the hands of local nd state governments.
Donaald Trump has pledged to reverse much of the Biden administration’s climate program, if he is re-elected in November.
Podesta said the EPA’s climate pollution reduction grants in the US ”put states and local governments in the driver’s seat so that as a nation, they can accelerate our progress toward President Biden’s climate goals.”
Regan was similarly cautious but optimistic. He said, ”We can’t speak too far into the future because none of us can predict the future. What we can talk about is what is hppening in the present.
”The money would be allocated by fall and we know that these recipients are ready to receive these dollars. An we’ll be off to the races immediately.”
