Funding Available for Dairy Digester Installation
The California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) is now accepting grant applications for project funding from the Dairy Digester Research and Development Program (DDRDP). This program provides financial assistance for the installation of dairy digesters in California, which will result in reduced greenhouse gas emissions. CDFA-DDRDP will award between $29 million and $36 million.
Funding Levels: Up to $3 million per project for anaerobic digestion projects that provide quantifiable greenhouse gas reductions.
Project Duration: The maximum project term is two years and grant funds cannot be expended before October 1, 2017.
Eligibility: The project site must be located on a commercial California dairy operation. A dairy operation is defined as an entity that operates a dairy herd, which produces milk or cream commercially, and whose bulk milk or bulk cream is received or handled by any distributor, manufacturer, or any nonprofit cooperative association of dairy producers. Existing milk producers and dairy digester developers are eligible for this program.
An applicant may submit multiple grant applications; however, each grant application must represent an individual digester project at a unique project site.
A group of dairy operations can submit one grant application to develop centralized dairy digesters known as a “cluster” or “hub and spoke” project. The location of the centralized digester can be one determined appropriate by participating dairy operations.
Defunct digesters that were constructed in the past and have become entirely non-functional, or never became functional since their construction, due to technical or other (e.g., regulatory) issues are eligible for this program.
Match Requirement: The program requires a minimum of 50 percent of the total project cost as matching funds.
The full Request for Application can be viewed here.
Workshops: CDFA will hold two workshops and one webinar to provide information on program requirements and the application process. More information on the workshops can be found here.
For more information on this grant or how to apply with Morrison's assistance, please contact the Morrison Grants Team by email at grants@morrisonco.net or call us at 530.893.4764.