Business Council for Sustainable Energy seeks clean energy solutions for FEMA disaster funding

Though encouraged by the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA’s) adoption of the Disaster Recovery and Reform Act (DRRA), the Business Council for Sustainable Energy (BCSE) is urging the agency to adopt clean energy infrastructure solutions as part of its broader disaster planning framework.

This request comes as FEMA works to implement the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) program, which was established under the DRRA. With the various development considerations the new program requires, BCSE wants to see the agency’s perception of preemptive disaster efforts widen to include measures beyond transportation, water, and waste.

“We are pleased to see FEMA move to implement the BRIC program and we encourage its use to help communities across the U.S. to deploy innovative energy programs and infrastructure that is clean and resilient, using readily available renewable energy, energy efficiency, natural gas, and energy storage technologies,” BCSE President Lisa Jacobson said. “As FEMA implements the BRIC program, and as the Agency funds projects through the program, the Agency should recognize that the energy system is critical infrastructure and that systems in the transportation, water, waste and the built environment overlap significantly with energy.”

These measures would include things like installation of new onsite energy systems at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in South Carolina to offset electricity purchases from the grid and improve resiliency, or the installation of a combined heat and power plant used by a hospital, complete with solar turbines.

The DRRA was passed during the 115th Congress and set aside six percent of disaster relief funds. Those funds have now formed the basis of BRIC.