1 Create a ZoomGrants™ account (below) or log in to your existing account (above) 2 Select a Program to apply for, then click the Apply button to get started 3 Answer the questions and/or fill in the fields in each tab 4 If necessary, upload any requested documents 5 Submit your application and wait for a decision 6 If you are selected to receive funding, you might be required to submit invoices or reports through your application
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Read the Request for Applications (RFA) before you begin your application. The RFA includes important information about eligibility, preferences, and minimum requirements.
Complete application on ZoomGrants, answering all questions completely and uploading all required attachments. In ZoomGrants, the application is broken down into four tabs: basic information, application questions, budget, and attachments. If a question does not apply to your project, please enter N/A.
Submit your application by 11:59am (noon) on the application deadline. Applicants are strongly encouraged to submit the application early to allow any technical issues to be resolved.
This Pre-Application section must be submitted and Approved by the Administrator (not ZoomGrants) before you can fill out the rest of the application. Click the Submit Pre-Application button at the top or bottom of this tab to submit this section to be reviewed.
Applicant Questions
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Basic Information
1. Who is the primary technical manager for this project? Please provide contact information, including their name, title, and email address. (Mandatory, Not Scored)
2. Project address: Provide an address for the project site(s). If address is unknown, explain why. (Mandatory, Not Scored)
Applicant Information
3. Applicant Type: Applicants must be one of the eligible entitity listed below. (Mandatory, Not Scored)
4. Electricity Sales: Number of megawatt hours of electricity sold by entity. Applicants must be an electric utility selling not more than 4,000,000 megawatt hours of electricity per year. Attach data source for electricity sales. See attachments. (Mandatory, Not Scored)
5. Customers Served: Number of customers (i.e. meters) served by the applicant. (Mandatory, Not Scored)
6. Identify below if you are licensed in Washington State or a federally recognized tribe.
7. If you selected “The entity applying is licensed in Washington State”, please provide the UBI number below. (Mandatory, Not Scored)
8. Identify any state employees or former state employees employed or on the governing board
as of the date of the application. For state agencies, only identify former Commerce
employees. Include their position and responsibilities within the Applicant’s organization. If
following a review of this information, it is determined by COMMERCE that a conflict of interest exists, the Applicant may be disqualified from further consideration. (Mandatory, Not Scored)
9. Foreign Nationals Attestation: Are there any known foreign nationals participating in the proposed project?
10. Domestic Entities Attestation: Are the applicant and second-tier subcontractors Domestic Entities as defined in the RFA section 1.7? (Mandatory, Not Scored)
11. Davis-Bacon Attestation: Check yes to confirm that the applicant will pay all of the laborers and mechanics performing construction, alteration, or repair work in excess of $1,000 on projects funded directly by or assisted through funding under the award, wages at rates not less than those prevailing on projects of a character similar in the locality as determined by the Davis-Bacon Act (DBA). (Mandatory, Not Scored)
12. GRIP Program: Has your organization applied to or plans to apply to the U.S. Department of Energy, IIJA Section 40101(c), Grid Resilience Utility, and Industry Grants (FOA 2740) (GRIP) program? (Mandatory, Not Scored)
13. Cybersecurity Attestation: Does the applicant acknowledge that the primary purpose of the proposed project is not cybersecurity but that the implementation of the proposed project will adhere to any applicable cybersecurity requirements, and where possible, best practices in deploying technologies if awarded? (Mandatory, Not Scored)
14. Prior Clean Energy Awardee: Has the primary applicant previously received a Commerce Clean Energy grant under the Clean Energy Fund? Select the grant(s) previously awarded. (Mandatory, Scored)
Project Information
15. Eligible Activity: The following is a list of eligible activities. Select all that apply to the proposed work. (Mandatory, Not Scored)
16. Project Objective: Which objective(s) will your project accomplish? (select all that apply or add additional objectives) (Mandatory, Not Scored)
17. Project Summary: Provide a description of the project, including the purpose of the project, the needs that will be addressed by the project, the benefits the project will provide, and how the project relates to the program objectives and scope in RFA Section 1.2. Include details of the project approach and the services, activities, etc necessary to accomplish the scope of the project. (Mandatory, Scored)
18. Project Alignment with Objectives: How will your project result in accomplishing the selected objectives in question 16? Include explanations of how disruptions and outages are directly connected to weather, natural disasters and/or wildfire events in your service area. Include estimates of annual reductions in disruptions (SAIFI), outage durations (SAIDI), and/or customers impacted (CAIDI) as a result of the proposed project. (Mandatory, Scored)
19. Grid Resilience and Reliability: will your project add additional grid resilience and reliability benefits beyond those objectives listed in question 16? If so, please describe the added benefits and how they will be brought about by your project. (Mandatory, Scored)
20. Project Secondary Benefits: Will this project serve any additional benefits outside of the stated objectives found in question 16? Examples could include cost savings, investment in infrastructure, necessary maintenance, etc. (Mandatory, Scored)
21. Emissions Reductions: Will your project result in greenhouse gas emissions reductions? If so, please include estimates for GHG emissions reductions. Include any assumptions and calculation tools. (Mandatory, Scored)
22. Metrics: In addition to those developed by Commerce, have you developed methods to report build metrics, impact metrics, and equity and community benefit metrics according to DOE’s guidelines, referred to in Section 1.2 of the RFA? Describe how and what you’ll measure with each metric (Build metric, Impact metric, Equity and Community metric). (Mandatory, Not Scored)
Equity, Environmental Justice, and Community Impact For the following questions, use the Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool tool and follow the DOE’s guidelines as found here to illustrate the equity, environmental justice, and community impacts of the project to Disadvantaged Communities (DAC).
23. Is this project located in a Disadvantaged Community (DAC)? (Mandatory, Not Scored)
24. Environmental Benefits: Describe whether and how the project will provide environmental benefits to the community and/or DAC. Describe how the project will meet or go beyond the minimum 40% of project benefits/investments in DAC as demonstrated by the Climate & Economic Justice Screen Tool. (Mandatory, Scored)
25. Economic Benefits: Describe how the project will provide economic benefits to the community and/or DAC, such as supporting workforce development, expanding well-paying jobs and/or reducing energy burden. (Mandatory, Scored)
26. Community and Tribal Engagement: What community engagement and tribal engagement have you completed, or do you plan to complete to inform this project? Has community or tribal engagement impacted your project implementation, and if so, how? What elements of your project could be influenced by community or tribal engagement going forward? (Mandatory, Scored)
Management and Technical Proposals
27. Project Performance Status: Describe the project’s status, including steps that have already been completed and any work that will need to be completed before the project can begin. Identify any potential risks that are considered significant to the success of the project. Risks may include supply chain, skills/workforce development, siting and permitting, project schedules, project budgets, potential harms to communities, or other relevant risks. Provide a response to monitor and mitigate those risks. (Mandatory, Scored)
28. Project Schedule: Include a project schedule indicating when the elements of the work will be completed. If you prefer, you may attach a Gantt Chart or other schedule in the attachments section, with key milestones identified. (Mandatory, Scored)
29. Project Team and Partners: Provide a description of the proposed project team, including project partners. Describe lines of authority for personnel involved in performance of this potential contract and relationships of these staff to other programs or functions of the organization(s). Include who will have primary responsibility and final authority for the work. If the team may include subcontractors, describe the qualifications of the subcontractor or the method that will be used to secure a qualified subcontractor. (Mandatory, Scored)
30. NEPA and EIS: Does the project already have a completed NEPA Environmental Questionnaire or Environmental Impact Statement (EIS)? If yes, please attach the NEPA or EIS to the application. (Mandatory, Not Scored)
31. Existing Equipment replacement: Detail the project goals of replacing or updating existing equipment, if applicable. (Mandatory, Not Scored)
32. BABA Waiver: Do you plan to request a Build America, Buy America (BABA) waiver? If you have a completed BABA waiver, please upload in the attachments. (Mandatory, Not Scored)
Community of Practice
33. Community of Practice (COP) Attestation: Will your organization commit to attend a community of practice convening to exchange information and best practices with other grid resilience awardees? (Convenings likely to be held on a quarterly or semi-annual basis). See RFA Section 1.2 for additional information. (Mandatory, Not Scored)
34. Contributing to COP: Will your project provide a way to increase your sharing of outage data? If so, please describe your plan for sharing outage data with the community of practice convening. Examples of data sharing could include the creation of a public-facing map, the purchase of an Outage Maintenance System (OMS), and the sharing of report data to publicly accessible mapping systems. (Mandatory, Not Scored)
Budget
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Provide a response for all three components of the budget: Funding Sources, Project Costs, Budget Narrative. All three components in the Budget section are mandatory and scored.
Project Funding Sources
Provide all funding sources related to this proposed grid resilience project. (Mandatory, Scored) Include this grant request amount (which must be equal to the requested amount in application summary) and all other funding sources to be used in this project. Funding sources are defined as all eligible sources to complete the proposed project, including but not limited to confirmed Federal grants, other State grants, other public funds, private loans, applicant funds, investors or others. If possible, please differentiate the various funding sources in the table below, or list it out in the budget narrative.
The total Funding Sources should be equal to the total Project Costs.
Item Description
Funding (List $ amount)
Total $ 0.00
Project Costs
Identify all costs in U.S. dollars including expenses to be charged for performing the services necessary to accomplish the objectives of the contract. Include amounts related only to the proposed grid resilience project. (Mandatory, Scored) Total project costs are defined as all eligible costs to complete the proposed project, including but not limited to labor, project management, materials, sales tax, etc. If possible, please differentiate the various project costs in the table below, or list it out in the budget narrative.
The total Project Costs should be equal to the total Funding Sources.
Item Description
Costs (List $ amount)
Total $ 0.00
Budget Narrative (Discuss the items and amounts you entered above.)
Provide additional information on the funding sources and project costs for your project. (Mandatory, Scored) Include funding source specifics on grant programs and matching fund sources and if those funds are confirmed and secured. For unsecured funding sources, identify a timeline for securing and receiving the funds. If loans or other financing will be used, provide the amount financed, lender (if known) and whether the loans have been secured. Explain how the project costs were estimated. Attach proposals or estimates in the attachments tab, where available.
Tables
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