The USDA’s Forest Service on Oct. 18 announced it is making nearly $50 million in grant funding available through the agency’s Wood Innovations Grant, Community Wood Grant and Wood Products Infrastructure Assistance Grant Programs. The agency said the funding will spark innovation, create new markets for wood products and renewable wood energy, expand processing capacity and help tackle the climate crisis.&nbsp;The Wood Innovations Grant Program aims to stimulate, expand and support U.S. wood products markets and wood energy markets to support the long-term management of National Forest System and other forest lands. Focus areas of the program include mass timber, renewable wood energy, and technological development that supports hazardous fuel reduction and sustainable forest management.&nbsp;The Forest Service is expected to award up to $20 million under the Wood Innovations Grant Program, with individual awards ranging from $10,000 to $300,000. Applications for the program are due Dec. 15.&nbsp;The Community Wood Grant Program provides grants to install thermally led community wood energy systems or to build innovative wood product manufacturing facilities. The Forest Service said it expects renewable wood energy systems installed under the program to use the most stringent control technologies. The agency also noted that the program places extra emphasis on assisting sawmills in economically challenged areas to retool or add advanced technology. &nbsp;The agency is expected to award up to $6 million under the Community Wood Grant Program, with individual awards ranging from $10,000 to $1 million. Applications for the Community Grant Program are also due Dec. 15.&nbsp;The Wood Products Infrastructure Assistance Program aims to provide support for facilities that purchase and process byproducts of ecosystem restoration projects, including applications to establish, reopen, retrofit, expand or improve a sawmill or other wood-processing facility that is located in close proximity to federal or Indian lands that need ecosystem restoration and will generate byproducts. The program places emphasis on areas of unnaturally severe fire or insect or disease infestation with high or vey high priority for ecological restoration.The Forest Service is expected to offer up to $23.3 million under the Wood Products Infrastructure Assistance Program. Individual awards are expected to range from $50,000 to $1 million, with applications due Dec. 1.&nbsp;Eligible entities to apply for these three funding opportunities include those in the private, non-profit, and government sectors including Tribes, local and state governments, businesses and for-profit entities, institutions of higher education, as well as public utility, fire, conservation, and school districts, among others.Additional information on all three funding opportunities is available on the Forest Service <a href="https://www.fs.usda.gov/science-technology/energy-forest-products/wood-innovation">website</a>.

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The USDA’s Forest Service on Oct. 18 announced it is making nearly $50 million in grant funding available through the agency’s Wood Innovations Grant, Community Wood Grant and Wood Products Infrastructure Assistance Grant Programs. 

Forest Service offers funding to support wood energy projects

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