Wanted: Companies hungry for a piece of a $300 million pie EPA’s slicing up to pay reduce pollution created by 11 million diesel-powered engines.

This money, part of the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act (ARRA) funding approved by Congress, is available for upgrading or even replacing diesel engines with cleaner burning fuels, such as compressed natural gas (CNG).

The money’s intended for:

• businesses with truck fleets
• diesel truck operators and owners
• school districts, and
• state and local government fleets.

The types of vehicles that are covered by the ARRA funds include:

• buses
• medium- and heavy-durty trucks
• marine engines
• locomotives, and
• non-road vehicles used in construction, airports, shipyards, agriculture, mining and energy production.

Besides cleaning up local air quality, companies and organizations can accumulate greenhouse gas emission reduction credits by converting vehicles from diesel to CNG. For example, the Tulsa Public School District (TPS) has announced that it will convert 140 diesel buses to run on CNG this year. Click here for details.

The funding can also be used to create and enforce vehicle idling laws.

The EPA’s interested in funding diesel retrofit or replacement projects to reduce air pollution, especially particulate matter and nitrogen oxide pollution. In addition to these clean air benefits, EPA’s promoting the diesel upgrade funding as offering cost savings to companies and job creation and retention to those that do the diesel replacement work.

EPA will funnel the money to businesses through grants to state and local governments. The agency’s offering $206 million through competitive grants to state and local governments, nonprofit organizations and tribal agencies. Another $88 million is earmarked for state programs. The balance covers administrative costs.

Click here for more details on EPA’s diesel retrofit program.

Tags: CNG conversion, diesel retrofit, greenhouse gas emissions, job creation, nitrogen oxides, particulate matter