Federal grant programs / Environmental Protection Agency

Technical Assistance for Treatment Works (Clean Water Act [CWA] Section 104(b)(8)) (66.446)

• Awarded, FY 2021 to 2025$102 million
• Grant awards27
• Typical award$3.0 million
• Awarded in FY 2025$49.3 million
• Size rank806 of 1824
• Type of assistanceGrant

Key findings

• It is the 806th largest of 1,824 federal grant programs by five-year awards.
• The 10 largest recipients received 100% of the money.
• Awards went to recipients in 10 states and territories.

What the program funds

The objective is to provide technical assistance and training to rural, small, and tribal municipalities to: (1) plan, develop, and obtain financing for Clean Water State Revolving Fund (CWSRF) eligible projects; (2) protect water quality and achieve and maintain compliance with the requirements of the Clean Water Act; and (3) provide information on planning, design, construction, and operation of publicly owned treatment works and decentralized wastewater treatment systems.

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

Assistance under this program is generally available to public or private nonprofit organizations, subject to CWA 104(w), and the regulations at 2 CFR 200. Nonprofit organization, as defined by 2 CFR Part 200, means any corporation, trust, association, cooperative or other organization that: (1) is operated primarily for scientific, educational, service, charitable or similar purposes in the public interest; (2) is not organized primarily for profit; and (3) uses its net proceeds to maintain, improve and/or expand its operations. Note that 2 CFR Part 200 specifically excludes the following types of organizations from the definition of nonprofit organization because they are separately defined in the regulation: (i) institutions of higher education; and (ii) state, local and federally-recognized Indian tribal governments. Institutions of Higher Education are defined at 20 U.S.C. 1001. Nonetheless, institutions of higher education who otherwise qualify as nonprofit organizations are eligible to apply as indicated in the Office of Management and Budget’s July 2017 Frequent Questions on the Uniform Grant Guidance. Nonprofit organizations described in Section 501(c)(4) of the Internal Revenue Code that engage in prohibited lobbying activities as defined in Section 3 of the Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995 are not eligible to apply. Institutions of Higher Education and Hospitals are not eligible.

Continue reading on SAM.gov

What the money can and cannot pay for

Grants and cooperative agreements are available to support recipients' allowable direct costs in approved scopes of work plus allowable indirect costs, in accordance with established EPA policies and regulations. Funds may be used to support: (1) training to operators, staff, managers on the sustainable and effective management of small wastewater treatment systems; (2) assist operators to manage small wastewater treatment systems to achieve compliance; and (3) perform onsite training or technical solutions that focus on improving performance at local facilities. Specific uses and restrictions on funds will be described in detail in the competitive announcements. Assistance agreement awards under this program may involve or relate to geospatial information. Further information regarding geospatial information may be obtained by viewing the following website: Geospatial Resources at EPA. This program makes Federal awards on a discretionary basis. A discretionary award means an award in which the Federal awarding agency, in keeping with specific statutory authority that enables the agency to exercise judgement (“discretion”), selects the recipient and/or the amount of Federal funding awarded through a competitive process or based on merit of proposals. A discretionary award may be selected on a non-competitive basis, as appropriate. For further information, please contact the Headquarters or regional office.

Matching requirements

This program has no statutory formula. Matching requirements are not applicable to this assistance listing. MOE requirements are not applicable to this assistance listing.

Deadlines

For competitive awards, deadlines will be specified in the NOFO.

Award range and average, in the agency's words

Range: $1,000,000 to $6,000,000/Priority Area; Average $2,288,937.

Examples of funded projects

Fiscal Year2025: Funding supported projects to provide training and technical assistance to small, rural, and tribal publicly-owned wastewater systems and to small, rural and tribal communities served by onsite/decentralized wastewater systems. Training and technical assistance to communities was related to the acquisition of financing and funding for publicly owned treatment works projects and to build technical, managerial, and financial capacity in system operations and maintenance at rural, small and Tribal publicly owned treatment works or decentralized wastewater treatment systems.

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 72% of the money, colleges and universities 26%.

By state

8 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.