Oregon again has access to more than $450 million in federal funds awarded to two state agencies for climate action programs, after a confusing period in which the Trump administration repeatedly froze payments.
Staff at the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality said Wednesday the agency again has access to all federal climate funding it was granted through the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law in the last few years.
“All of our federal funding at DEQ is available, which is great news,” DEQ’s communication manager Lauren Wirtis said. “So that gives us access to buy lab equipment and do a wide variety of things that benefit our air, land and water here in Oregon.”
Last month, the state agency said at least six federal grants were frozen, including the state’s biggest award — the $197 million Climate Pollution Reduction Grant.
But determining exactly why and when the funds were frozen or unfrozen was a challenge. There were three instances when the grants were frozen, unfrozen and frozen again within a span of three weeks.
The first was when the Trump administration issued an executive order freezing the funds during the first day of the administration. After that, the federal Office of Management and Budget also froze funds more broadly, which impacted many federal government programs, including the climate funding but was quickly rescinded.
The most recent freeze of the climate funds was through an Environmental Protection Agency compliance review.
“We’ve been communicating with our partners just this morning that we are ready to keep moving forward and so now we’re going to proceed with different programs like the EV rebate program, home weatherization, all of the great services that are going to be provided by this grant program,” Wirtis said. “We’re going to start up those different projects and hopefully here soon in 2025, start making funds available to people in Oregon.”
To receive the federal funds, the agency needs to spend the money first and then wait to get reimbursed by the federal government.
There are several state programs that would see a financial boost under the Climate Pollution Reduction Grant. That includes the state’s electric vehicle rebate program, which has run out of funding two years in a row due to its popularity. The program would get a $31 million boost for rebates aimed at low-to-medium income households.
Staff at the Oregon Department of Energy, which oversees the nearly $87 million Solar for All grant, said they also have access to federal funding. The agency said most of the programs tied to federal funding are up and running, and it will continue to monitor federal actions and how it may impact the work within the state.
“In the meantime, we are committed to our mission of maintaining a resilient and affordable energy system in Oregon, and we will continue moving forward on implementation plans for our federal awards,” the agency said in a newsletter last month.
