The Maryland Energy Administration (MEA) has announced awardees of the first ever Resilient Maryland program. This highly-competitive pilot program was developed in fiscal 2020 to drive economic growth through innovative clean energy technology, which will enable essential services, businesses and other organizations to resist power disruptions and outages.
A total of 14 grant applications have been awarded $1.05 million dollars in funding. “By funding vital infrastructure projects, Resilient Maryland will support our state’s clean energy future while securing affordable, reliable energy for Marylanders who need it most,” said Gov. Larry Hogan. “This is just one more way that we are delivering on our commitment to innovative, common sense initiatives that protect our environment and promote economic opportunity.”
“The Resilient Maryland pilot offers a unique opportunity for innovation in Maryland across a variety of clean energy alternatives, reducing both financial risk and total project costs,” said MEA Director Mary Beth Tung. “The response to this pilot was incredible, in fact, it was one of our most popular programs this year.”
Energy resiliency has taken center stage in the face of increasing global threats to grid integrity and severe storms, which can cause extended power outages. The goal of this program is to provide the state with replicable, scalable, and cost-effective solutions that will serve as models for wide-scale adoption. The high demand for this pilot program underscores the importance of state investment in innovation and why the programs like Resilient Maryland can help kick-start job growth.
Award winners include projects from across the state that address a variety of groups from low-to-moderate income communities and critical infrastructure facilities to commercial projects and government facilities. Here are two spotlight award winners:
Smart Electric Power Alliance (SEPA), is a nonprofit that helps electric utilities implement and deploy clean energy and distributed resources. SEPA will use their grant of $99,725 to join forces with Baltimore Gas & Electric Company, City of Annapolis and Gabel Associates to plan and design a community-scale microgrid for the Newtowne 20 multi-family housing community in Annapolis.
Howard County Government Campus will receive $109,000 via two Resilient Maryland grants, one for their Howard County Government Campus in the amount of $100,000 and one for the Howard County Detention Center in the amount of $9,000.
MEA congratulates its fiscal 20 grantees and looks forward to the partnership to come. For a full list of award winners, visit https://news.maryland.gov/mea/wp-content/uploads/sites/15/2020/06/MEA-Resilient-Maryland-FY-20-Award-List.pdf.