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Creates a DOE demonstration program run by CESER to award National Laboratories for projects that test technologies improving electric-grid resilience to wildfires. Eligible projects explicitly include vegetation-management monitoring tools and technologies that enhance first-responder safety around electric-grid emergencies. The bill authorizes $10 million per year for each of fiscal years 2026–2029 to carry out the program.
The bill directs modest, predictable federal funding to National Laboratories to develop and demonstrate wildfire-focused grid-resilience technologies that can reduce outages and protect first responders, but it does so at a direct taxpayer cost, with a narrow award structure that may exclude other innovators and leave non-wildfire grid threats less addressed.
Residents, hospitals, and utilities will benefit from National Laboratories testing technologies aimed at reducing wildfire-related power outages and infrastructure damage, which could improve electricity reliability during wildfire seasons.
Rural communities and local governments could see lower wildfire ignition risk near power lines and reduced suppression and property-loss costs due to improved vegetation-monitoring technologies funded by the program.
Firefighters and EMS may have improved safety during grid-related emergencies because demonstration funding supports technologies that protect first responders.
All taxpayers bear roughly $40 million in new appropriations over four years for demonstration projects that may not scale to widespread operational deployment.
Limiting program awards to National Laboratories could exclude private-sector companies and universities, potentially delaying or narrowing access to faster-to-deploy commercial solutions.
Focusing the funding narrowly on wildfire-related threats may leave other grid resilience risks (like storms or cyberattacks) less addressed by this funding stream, leaving some communities and utilities exposed.
Introduced August 15, 2025 by Norma Judith Torres · Last progress August 15, 2025