TERP-ish Grant Round Opens

The North Central Texas Council of Governments and TCEQ are funding a $5 million grant round for North Texas only. It is VERY similar to the TERP setup and is called the Heavy-Duty Vehicle and Equipment Grant Program.

Eligible counties include: Dallas, Tarrant, Denton, Collin, Rockwall, Parker, Kaufman, Johnson and Ellis.

Public and private entities can apply. They are using what they call a "modified first-come, first-serve" format. We've seen this one other time in North Texas and what it means is that instead of waiting for a single deadline months from now when everybody will submit their applications all at once the state will accept them each Friday.

In other words, get your act together and get in line.

The previous occurence I mentioned allowed people to sell their old machine out of the state, but that is not the case this time. You have to scrap it, but the maximum cost per ton has been raised to $10,000 like the ERIG program.

So, while this is not a TERP grant in the strictest of terms it is about as close as you can get. The main difference is that the funding does not come from the diesel tax, but from the ARRA stimulus money.

All purchases must be complete by April 30th of next year. Since the round is currently underway any machine purchased now is eligible assuming it meets the normal criteria.