On March 8, 2023, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
announced the availability of $16 million for
two new grant opportunities to support states and Tribes in
providing technical assistance to businesses seeking to develop and
adopt pollution prevention (P2) practices that advance
environmental justice in underserved communities. The Request for
Applications for P2 investments include the Pollution Prevention Grant: Environmental Justice
Through Safer and More Sustainable Products. The goal of this
grant is to address environmental justice by providing P2 technical
assistance to businesses (e.g., information, training,
expert advice) to improve human health and the environment in
disadvantaged communities by increasing the supply, demand, and use
of safer and more sustainable products, such as those that are
certified by EPA's Safer Choice Program, or those that conform
to EPA's Recommendations for Specifications, Standards and
Ecolabels for Federal Purchasing (EPA Recommendations).
To allow a greater number of disadvantaged communities to benefit
from the results and lessons learned from projects funded by these
grants, EPA states that it is requiring recipients to develop P2
case studies on approaches to make safer and sustainable products
more available in disadvantaged communities where the approaches
are new, not widely known or adopted, or where the recipient
believes detailed information on the project could support more
widespread project replication. Recipients must develop at least
one case study during the grant period. According to EPA, it will
use these case studies to build and share a body of knowledge about
P2 approaches to make safer and sustainable products more available
in disadvantaged communities that could be implemented by other
enterprises.
Eligible entities include the 50 states, the District of Columbia,
the U.S. Virgin Islands, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, any
territory or possession of the United States, any agency or
instrumentality of a state or Tribe, including colleges and
universities, and federally recognized Tribes and intertribal
consortia. EPA "strongly" encourages applicants to
develop partnerships where they can strengthen their ability to
provide P2 technical assistance to businesses in disadvantaged
communities.
EPA will hold informational webinars on March 21, March 23, March 28, and March 30, 2023. Although EPA's press
release states that applications for the grant are due June
6, 2023, the information on grants.gov states that the closing date for
applications is June 20, 2023.
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