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Up to $5.8 million available under California grant program

Up to $5.8 million available under California grant program Ormesa 1 geothermal plant, Imperial Valley, California (source: Ormat)
Alexander Richter 14 May 2014

Up to $5.8 million in funding for R&D projects has been made available under the Geothermal Grant and Loan Program of the California Geothermal Resource Development Account.

The California Energy Commission’s (Energy Commission) Geothermal Grant and Loan Program was created in 1980 by Assembly Bill 1905 (Bosco, Chapter 139, Statutes of 1980) and has been in operation since 1981. The overall mission of the program is to provide funding to promote development of California’s vast geothermal energy resources, mitigate any adverse impacts caused by geothermal development, and help local jurisdictions offset the costs of providing public services necessitated by geothermal development.

The purpose of this PON is to solicit grant funding applications from eligible local jurisdictions and private entities for geothermal energy-related projects in California. The proposed projects must not exceed twenty-six (26) months in length and must undertake activities addressing one or more of the functions allowed by the statute (including, but not limited to, local and regional geothermal planning; resource assessment and exploration; geothermal direct-use and electric generation technology research and development; mitigation of geothermal development impacts; and provision of public services necessitated by geothermal development).

This is a competitive solicitation. Applications will be competitively scored and ranked based on the evaluation criteria identified in the PON. Of the applications receiving a passing score, applications with the highest overall average total score will be funded by rank until available funds are allocated. Grant agreements for the applications recommended for funding will then be developed and considered for approval at an Energy Commission Business Meeting.

Up to $5.8 million is available for grant agreements resulting from this PON. There is no maximum award amount; funding amounts will be based on the amount of funding requested in the project application.

Details and documents about the opportunity can be found here.

Program & Opportunity documents

 

Official Program Opportunity Notice