Federal grant programs / Department of the Interior

Natural Resource Damage Assessment and Restoration (15.658)

Also known as NRDAR

• Awarded, FY 2021 to 2025$66.5 million
• Grant awards147
• Typical award$178,008
• Awarded in FY 2025$5.6 million
• Size rank936 of 1824
• Type of assistanceProject grants (discretionary)

Key findings

• Annual funding fell from $22.0 million in fiscal 2021 to $5.6 million in fiscal 2025.
• It is the 936th largest of 1,824 federal grant programs by five-year awards.
• The 20 largest recipients received 75% of the money.
• Awards went to recipients in 28 states and territories.

What the program funds

The purpose of the Natural Resource Damage Assessment and Restoration (NRDAR) Program is to restore natural resources and their services that have been injured by an oil spill or hazardous substance release for the benefit of the American people. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is a trustee for threatened and endangered species, migratory birds, at-risk species, and interjurisdictional fishes. We identify natural resources and their services that have been injured, determine the extent of the injuries, recover damages from responsible parties, and plan and carry out natural resource restoration activities.

From the federal Assistance Listing. Read the full listing on SAM.gov.

Open opportunities

No opportunity under this program is open or forecast on Grants.gov right now. Programs often post once a year, so the funding history below shows what to expect.

Rules from the program listing

Who can apply

Anyone/general public. Use of assistance is primarily for natural resources but also can be for public education and recreation.

What the money can and cannot pay for

Assistance is provided to fund NRDAR-related activities that fall under two main sub-activities: 1) assessment, and 2) restoration. Assessment activities are funded from either appropriated funds or recovered past assessment costs. While assessment funding is discretionary, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and other DOI Bureaus involved in NRDAR cases work as collaboratively as possible with our co-Trustees (e.g., states, federally-recognized tribes, and other federal agencies with natural resource management responsibilities that were impacted by the specific NRDAR case) when deciding what assessment activities to conduct and when to offer financial assistance for specific assessment activities. Assessment activities support the specific NRDAR case and legal claim, and can include identifying the natural resources injured and any loss of services they provide (such as recreation), determining the extent of the injuries, scaling restoration costs and projects to the injuries, and determining damages (i.e., cost) necessary to restore the injured natural resources and services. Restoration activities are funded from NRDAR case-specific settlement funds that were paid by the responsible party (or parties) to all Natural Resource Trustees that were part of the NRDAR claim. These funds are non-discretionary as their use is dictated by the court consent decree (CD) or the court-lodged settlement for the case.

Continue reading on SAM.gov

Matching requirements

This program has no statutory formula. There are no matching fund requirements, however, matching funds are encouraged to allow for additional restoration.MOE requirements are not applicable to this assistance listing.

Deadlines

Contact the headquarters or regional location, as appropriate for application deadlines Assistance may be available year-round but is on a case-by-case basis when specifically needed. Contact the headquarters or regional location, as appropriate for application deadlines.

Award range and average, in the agency's words

Projects may range from $1,000 to $1,000,000 or greater.

Examples of funded projects

Fiscal Year2025: Collecting baseline information to restore northern gannet populations in north America, Gulf Restoration: To prepare for future on-the-ground restoration work identified in the Deepwater Horizon Natural Resource Damage Assessment Open Ocean Trustee Implementation Group Final Restoration Plan 3 and Environmental Assessment: Birds, we will collect baseline information on gannet populations at their colonies in 2024, including abundance, productivity, and disease status. This work is especially critical given uncertainties in how the population has responded to the major HPAI die-off event. Without such baseline information, effective restoration activities in future years would not be possible to implement, nor would responses to those activities be measurable. Specifically, we will conduct aerial surveys and ground monitoring at gannet colonies including swabbing gannets for HPAI and assessing any ongoing mortality to determine how/if HPAI is affecting colonies. In addition, we will control predators on colonies if detected during monitoring, as predator disturbance can have a major impact on colony abundance and productivity (i.e., would affect our ability to obtain baseline data). California seabird restoration and monitoring, CA: The California Seabird Restoration and Monitoring project aims to restore seabird nesting populations, particularly those of the common murre (Uria aalge), along the central California coast.

Continue reading on SAM.gov

Quoted from the program's federal Assistance Listing. The notice of funding opportunity is the official source for each competition's rules.

Who usually wins

Nonprofits received 61% of the money, state and local governments 19% and colleges and universities 10%.

By state

12 states have a page for this program: those that received at least $1 million or 10 awards.

Award amounts are federal obligations reported to USAspending.gov for fiscal 2021 to 2025; see how our data works.