The U.S. Forest Service has introduced the provision of Hazardous Fuels Transportation Help grants, aimed toward supporting tasks that take away hazardous fuels from nationwide forests and grasslands. These grants are designed to reinforce forest well being and resilience, scale back wildfire danger, and assist native forest product services and rural economies.
Goal and Impression
The Hazardous Fuels Transportation Help program is a essential element of the Forest Service’s 10-year Wildfire Danger Discount Technique. By offering monetary assist for the transportation of hazardous fuels to places the place they are often utilized for wooden services and products, this system contributes to lowering wildfire danger and sustaining the well being of nationwide forests. This system additionally helps the forest merchandise business, which performs an important function in forest restoration efforts.
Funding and Eligibility
The Forest Service anticipates awarding as much as $25 million by way of this funding alternative. Grants will probably be supplied to various candidates, together with manufacturing services, wooden power suppliers, logging contractors, and organizations supporting underserved communities. Eligible entities embody for-profit and non-profit organizations, U.S. state and native governments, tribal entities, and academic establishments.
To qualify, tasks should deal with the removing of hazardous fuels from Nationwide Forest System lands or reveal a transparent profit to those lands. Functions could embody a number of contracts and agreements, with a most mixed funding request of $5 million per applicant. A 50% match contribution is required for every undertaking, and candidates should reveal that transportation prices are a limiting issue to undertaking viability.
Software Course of and Standards
Functions should be submitted by way of electronic mail to the Forest Service at NFSWOHFTA@usda.gov. The appliance package deal ought to embody a canopy web page, undertaking narrative, detailed price range, monetary statements, and different supporting paperwork. Proposals will probably be evaluated primarily based on a number of standards, together with the therapy of precedence hazardous fuels, quantity transported, profit to deprived communities, cost-effectiveness, and readiness for implementation.
Public Webinars
To help candidates, the Forest Service will host public webinars on August 16, August 21, and August 28, 2024. These webinars, held in partnership with the Nationwide Wild Turkey Federation, will present steerage on the appliance course of and provide alternatives for individuals to ask questions. Superior registration is required.
Background
This grant program is funded by the Inflation Discount Act and is permitted underneath the Wooden Improvements grant program of the Agricultural Enchancment Act of 2018. The initiative aligns with the U.S. Division of Agriculture’s Wildfire Disaster Technique, which was introduced in January 2022 to deal with the growing danger of wildfires and promote sustainable forest administration.
For extra data on the Hazardous Fuels Transportation Help grants and to entry software particulars, go to the Forest Service’s official web site or contact NFSWOHFTA@usda.gov.
