The Bay Area Air Quality Management District announced the availability of $5 million in Volkswagen Environmental Mitigation Trust funding for hydrogen refueling stations.

The VW funding will augment the $45.7 million that is currently available through the California Energy Commission’s grant funding opportunity, GFO-19-602 - Hydrogen Refueling Infrastructure.

To be eligible to participate, station developers must apply to the GFO-19-602 - Hydrogen Refueling Infrastructure competitive solicitation by 5 p.m., Thursday, 30 April 2020. Eligible applications that propose to purchase and install publicly available light-duty hydrogen refueling infrastructure that meets the requirements of the California Energy Commission’s solicitation may be awarded VW funding.

The VW Environmental Mitigation Trust is a nationwide program that provides funding for California to fully mitigate the excess NO x emissions caused by VW’s use of illegal emissions testing defeat devices in VW diesel vehicles. More than 20% of the total project funds available for hydrogen stations are expected to benefit disadvantaged and low-income communities.

The $5 million in VW funding for hydrogen refueling stations is part of the Light-Duty Zero-Emission Vehicle Infrastructure category, which is one of five categories that will provide funding through the VW Environmental Mitigation Trust program in California.

The four other project categories under the VW Environmental Mitigation Trust program in California and the regional air quality agency assigned to administer the funds statewide on behalf of CARB, are: