TDOT and TDEC released a Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) to solicit applications for grant funding in August, which resulted in 167 applications received from 23 different applicants, including both public and private entities. Ten of these applicants will be awarded contracts to establish 30 new fast-charging locations throughout the state. The funding recipients will purchase, install, own, operate, maintain, and report on the program-funded EV charging infrastructure.

For more information about TEVI, including a map of awarded EV charging station locations and a list of the selected recipients, visit the TEVI website.

Metro Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell recently announced that a transit referendum to pursue a dedicated funding source for transportation and infrastructure projects will be on the November ballot. The collective name for all Metro activities around promoting, passing, and implementing a transportation improvement program is Choose How You Move – An All-Access Pass to Sidewalks, Signals, Service, and Safety. The draft plan will be created with public input, feedback from Metro Council Members, and the work of two advisory committees: a community advisory committee and a technical advisory committee. The plan will also be informed by more than 70 existing plans and studies that include over 65,000 pieces of input from the community over the past ten years. Learn more about the Choose How You Move efforts here.

Drive Electric Tennessee and Tennessee Clean Fuels are undertaking a large-scale survey of EV owners across Tennessee. With more than 34,000 EVs on the road in Tennessee today, understanding how and where EVs are used is essential to better predicting how Tennessee’s transportation future will be affected by electric technology. Responses will be anonymized and utilized to provide insights on EV use across the state as part of an annual data collection process on alternative fuels and advanced vehicle technology use in Tennessee.

The survey should take about ten minutes to complete and can be found here. Responses are due by March 8.

TDEC invites Tennesseans to submit nominations for the 2024 Governor’s Environmental Stewardship Awards, which recognize outstanding achievements by individuals, local governments, businesses, organizations, educational institutions, and agencies for successful environmental projects and conservation measures. The honors include ten categories: Agriculture and Forestry, Building Green, Clean Air, Energy and Renewable Resources, Environmental Education and Outreach, Materials Management, Natural Resources, Water Quality, Sustainable Performance, and Lifetime Achievement.

The Energy and Renewable Resources award recognizes projects that further the widespread use and adoption of alternative fuels or novel domestic fuel sources, energy conservation and energy efficiency strategies, or innovative energy or alternative fuel devices or techniques. Additionally, the Clean Air award will demonstrate measurable progress in reducing hazardous air pollutants, volatile organic compounds, acid rain precursors, greenhouse gases and other air emissions sources, outdoor exposure to toxic air contaminants, and/or air deposition loading to land and water. Self-nominations are encouraged. For more information about each category, judging criteria, and nomination forms, visit the TDEC Governor's Environmental Stewardship Awards web page. Nominations will be accepted until March 15.

The Transportation Network Growth Opportunity (TNGO) initiative, supported by the Tennessee Department of Economic & Community Development in partnership with Launch Tennessee and TEAM (Technology Enabled Advanced Mobility) TN, is an economic development tool designed to connect statewide research assets, communities, and talent to spark new research and innovation in the transportation sector.

The TNGO Mobility and Automotive Discovery initiative aims to partner communities, companies, and/or economic development applicants with researchers across the state to provide innovative solutions to the state’s most pressing mobility and transportation-related issues.

TNGO Mobility and Automotive Discovery survey responses can be submitted here.

In episode seventeen, host Cortney Piper interviews Jennifer Safavian, President and CEO of Autos Drive America. Piper and Safavian discuss the international automotive presence in Tennessee, how the Inflation Reduction Act and other recent federal policies impact the sector, and Autos Drive America’s 2023 Economic Impact Report. The report found that in Tennessee in 2022, international automakers built 413,746 vehicles, employing 109,352 persons.

All episodes are available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts. Click here to listen.

America Walks will host a webinar, Funding for Active Transportation: What You Need to Know, on February 27 at 1:00 PM Central. Speakers will discuss upcoming federal and state funding opportunities and how your community can identify good fits for its plans and projects to improve safe, active transportation. Panelists include representatives from the Safe Routes Partnership, Smart Growth America, and the League of American Bicyclists.

The Greater Nashville Realtors will host a webinar, The Next Steps and Future of Mass Transit in Middle Tennessee on February 29 at 10:00 AM Central. The webinar will be hosted by Greater Nashville Realtors Vice President of Member Engagement, Jack Gaughan, Jessica Dauphin, President and CEO of the Transit Alliance of Middle Tennessee, and Erin Hafkenschiel, President of Think Tennessee, who will discuss transit-related issues, solutions, and next steps on the future of mass transit in Middle Tennessee.

Tennessee Tech University and the Middle-West Tennessee Clean Fuels Coalition will host a free in-person workshop on March 6 at 12:00 PM Central at the Sonny West Conference Center in Nashville to highlight the current state of EV battery recycling and re-use technologies and markets, battery second-life applications, and an overview of both public and industry perspectives. Speakers will also highlight some of the work being done in this field in Tennessee, including Tennessee Tech’s Second-life Battery in Mobile EV Charging Application for Rural Transportation (SMART) project. Private, public, and academic sector representatives will provide insights and engage in discussion and open Q&A with participants.

Please RSVP here to secure your spot as space is limited. The event agenda is still being finalized and will be shared with invitees and participants soon.

The 2024 Appalachian Carbon Forum, hosted by the University of Kentucky and Oak Ridge National Lab (ORNL), will take place March 7-8 in Lexington, KY. The two-day forum brings together a diverse range of thought leaders and innovators to identify and develop energy solutions for the Appalachian region. 

The forum will feature discussions on the representative needs, challenges, and opportunities unique to the area with participants from local communities, private industry, national laboratories, academia, and government located along the Appalachian mountain range. A session on mobility and buildings in Appalachia will highlight the EV ecosystem, emerging construction technologies, and innovative processes to reduce emissions in both sectors.

View the agenda here and register for the 2024 Appalachian Carbon Forum here.

The U.S. DOE Loan Programs Office (LPO) will host a webinar, Amplifying Industry Investments in Clean Transportation, Charging Infrastructure, and Energy Projects, on March 13 at 12:00 PM Central. The webinar will provide information on LPO financing opportunities for charging deployment, as well as decarbonization efforts for fleets, ports, and more. Financing is available for stakeholders across the board, including private entities and local government, to decarbonize transportation systems and energy infrastructure. LPO will share use cases, project structure examples, and requirements about their application process.

Register for the webinar here.

The TAEBC Annual Meeting will take place in Franklin on March 26. This annual event allows TAEBC members, stakeholders, and potential members to gather and discuss the growing advanced energy economy. Speakers include Marc Gibson from TEAM TN, who will speak on positioning Tennessee as the nation’s leader in transportation electrification and digitization, and TDEC OEP Director Molly Cripps, who will speak on siting solar in Tennessee.

Register for the TAEBC Annual Meeting here.

Drive Electric Tennessee will hold its second annual DriveElectricTN Momentum Summit on May 9 at Middle Tennessee State University in Murfreesboro. The Momentum Summit will focus on transportation electrification efforts, including workplace charging, economic and environmental benefits, and workforce/manufacturing efforts in the EV industry across Tennessee. The event will also include an EV demonstration and ride and drive.  View the draft agenda and register here.

The Advanced Clean Transportation (ACT) Expo will take place May 20–23 in Las Vegas, NV. The Expo unites the transportation sector in an effort to reduce emissions from goods movement, the service industry, and passenger transportation while also driving economic sustainability. This annual event offers attendees access to the latest technologies, services, and vehicles driving the transition to low- and zero-emission transportation solutions.

The 2024 agenda will feature case studies from fleets that have deployed low- and zero-emission vehicles across applications; the lucrative financial incentives available to reduce total cost of ownership for advanced clean vehicles; climate and environmental policy developments being driven by federal, state, and local agency commitments; and technology advancements taking place with battery technology, charging infrastructure, biofuels, hydrogen, and autonomous vehicles. 

View the agenda here and register here.

The Tennessee Department of Health (TDH) has appropriated $860,000 to fund approximately 15 projects under the Healthy Built Environment Grant Program, which seeks to advance health equity by creating or supporting a healthy built environment. TDH will fund built environment projects at varying stages of development, and projects must be completed within 24 months. Example projects include assessments, planning, design, or construction of sidewalks, bikeways, and greenways.

Local and State government entities, American Indian tribes, and non-profit entities with 501(c)(3) status are eligible to apply. Additional information can be found in the request for applications available here. Letters of intent to apply are due March 1, and full applications are due May 10.

The U.S. DOE Vehicle Technologies Office recently announced $15 million in funding for projects that will advance the deployment of technologies critical to reducing emissions in the transportation sector. The funding will drive innovation in equitable, clean transportation and is aligned with strategies detailed in the U.S. National Blueprint for Transportation Decarbonization.

The top areas of focus in the funding opportunity include:

Eligible applicants include institutions of higher education, for-profit entities, nonprofit entities, state and local governmental entities, and federally recognized Indian Tribes. View the Notice of Funding Opportunity for additional information. Concept papers are due March 12, and full applications are due April 30.

The Federal Transit Administration released a notice of funding opportunity for two programs, with approximately $1.5 billion in funding for the Low- or No-Emission Grant Program and the Grants for Buses and Bus Facilities Program.

The Low- or No-Emission Program will make $1.1 billion available to help transit agencies buy or lease U.S.-built zero- and low-emission transit buses along with charging equipment and supporting facilities. The Grants for Buses and Bus Facilities Program will make $390 million available to support transit agencies in buying and rehabilitating buses and vans and building bus facilities.

Eligible applicants include states, local government authorities or local government entities that operate fixed-route bus services, and Indian tribes. Additional information, including eligible projects can be found on the notice of funding opportunity. Applications for both programs are due April 25 on Grants.gov.

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) announced the Clean Bus Planning Awards Program (CBPA), funded by the Joint Office of Energy and Transportation. The CBPA program reduces barriers to zero-emission bus deployment by providing school and transit bus fleets with free technical assistance to develop comprehensive and customized fleet electrification transition plans. Fleets also have the option to receive free deployment assistance from NREL upon completion of their plan.

Applications are accepted on a rolling basis through September 30.

EPA announced $2 billion in funding from the Inflation Reduction Act for the Community Change Grants Program. Funding is available for projects that deploy clean energy, reduce pollution, increase community climate resilience, and build community capacity to address environmental and climate justice challenges. These place-based investments will be focused on community-driven initiatives to be responsive to community and stakeholder input.

There are two separate tracks available:

Eligible applicants include partnerships between two community-based non-profit organizations and partnerships between a community-based non-profit organization and a local government, institution of higher education, or federally recognized tribe. View the Notice of Funding Opportunity and the Grants.gov page for additional information. Applications are due November 21.

Tennessee Tech University and Tennessee Clean Fuels are actively welcoming fleets interested in testing a medium-duty, all-electric step van for their organizational operations. The Medium-Duty eTruck Pilot Project is a federally funded testbed initiative that offers the opportunity for Tennessee fleets to test the all-electric Xos FXSV01 at no cost to evaluate how it performs within their operations. Participating fleets will be able to trial the vehicle for up to one month and will be provided with Level 2 charging infrastructure at no cost.

Fleets will provide information and feedback to the project team on successes and challenges related to driving and charging the vehicle, as well as utilization data, and will receive valuable insight into how an EV can be the right fit for their organization. Interested fleets are encouraged to complete the form linked here. For more information or for answers to any questions, please contact Mark.Finlay@tn.gov.

Tennessee Clean Fuels announced the launch of the EMPOWER TN Workplace Charging assistance program. The program provides up to $2,000 in no-cost technical assistance and consulting to assist workplaces with implementing EV charging through funding from the U.S. DOE Vehicle Technologies Office. The first round will allow for 24 workplaces to participate.

Available assistance includes:

Complete the interest survey to get started. Additional workplace charging guidance is available on the EMPOWER TN Workplace Charging website, including the newly released Drive Electric Tennessee Workplace Charging Guide, which covers how employers can get started on a workplace charging plan.

The Transportation Research Board (TRB) has released a report, Critical Issues in Transportation for 2024 and Beyond, which calls for a reassessment of the role of transportation in addressing societal challenges and the research that informs the choices that society will need to make in 2024 and the coming years. For this edition, TRB’s Executive Committee chose to focus on five important societal goals to meet these major challenges facing society: mitigating and responding to climate change, promoting equity and inclusion, increasing road safety, advancing public health, and building and sustaining a strong, competitive economy.

Visit the TDEC Office of Energy Programs Website at http://www.tn.gov/environment/energy.

Past Monthly Newsletters: 

January 2024

December 2023

November 2023

For more information or to submit an idea for a future Monthly Transportation Edition, contact:

Audrey Jackson, Communications Officer
TDEC Office of Energy Programs
615-917-6683 or audrey.jackson@tn.gov

OR

Alexa Voytek, Deputy Director, OEP Programs
U.S. DOE State Energy Program / Innovation & Transportation / Communications
TDEC Office of Energy Programs
 615-613-1096 or alexa.voytek@tn.gov

OR

Mark Finlay, Senior Energy Analyst, TDEC Office of Energy Programs
615-772-6011 or mark.finlay@tn.gov

Acknowledgement: This material is based upon work supported by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) under the State Energy Program Award Number DE-EE0009487

Disclaimer: This report was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an agency of the United States Government.  Neither the United States Government nor any agency thereof, nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or implied, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial product, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the United States Government or any agency thereof. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government or any agency thereof.