DOE - FY 2026 Notice of Funding Opportunity: Grants for Buses and Bus Facilities Infrastructure Programs

Bus Program First Announcement

• In FY 2025, the program received applications for 300 eligible projects requesting a total of $3.7 billion.
• 62 projects were funded to 59 recipients totaling $398 million.
• Award sizes ranged from $256,000 to $36,000,000.

Bus Program Second Announcement

• 34 projects were funded to 34 recipients totaling over $388 million.
• Award sizes ranged from $205,000 to $28,800,000

Low-No Program

• In FY 2025, the program received applications for 179 eligible projects requesting a total of $3.1 billion.
• 103 projects were funded to 103 recipients totaling $1.6 billion.
• Award sizes ranged from $256,281 to $121,125,000.

• Complete proposals must be submitted electronically through the Grants.gov (Buses and Bus Facilities Competitive Program (Bus Program) or Low or No Emission Grant Program (Low-No Program) “APPLY” function by 11:59 pm Eastern time September 21, 2026.

Bus Program

• Eligible activities include capital projects to purchase, lease, or rehabilitate transit buses and related equipment; and acquire, construct, lease, or rehabilitate bus-related facilities.

Low-No Program

• Eligible activities include capital projects to purchase or lease zero-emission or low-emission transit buses; and acquire, construct, rehabilitate, and lease required supporting facilities such as recharging, refueling, and maintenance facilities.

• Instructions for applying can be found on FTA’s website and in the “FIND” module of Grants.gov.
• The Bus Program funding opportunity ID is FTA-2026-010-TPM-BUS.
• The Low-No Program funding opportunity ID is FTA-2026-011-TPM-LWNO.
• Mail and fax submissions will not be accepted.

• Email Kirsten Wiard-Bauer, Office of Program Management, at FTALowNoBusNOFO@dot.gov.

Bus Program

• Eligible recipients are designated recipients, states (including territories and Washington, D.C.), local government entities, and federally recognized Indian tribes.  Except for Indian tribes, eligible recipients must allocate funds to or operate fixed-route bus service.
• Eligible subrecipients are all otherwise eligible recipients and private nonprofit organizations engaged in public transportation.  Eligible subrecipients are not required to allocate funds to or operate fixed route bus service.

Low-No Program

• Eligible recipients and subrecipients are designated recipients, states (including territories and Washington, D.C.), local government entities, and federally recognized Indian tribes.

• Applicants must have sufficient legal, financial, and technical capabilities to receive and administer Federal funds under this program.
• Except for projects proposed by Indian tribes, all projects in rural areas (see 49 U.S.C. 5302(17)) must be submitted by a State either individually or as part of a consolidated State application.
• States and other eligible applicants may also submit consolidated applications for projects in urbanized areas.  The same project may not be submitted in multiple applications.

Bus Program

• Purchasing, leasing, or rehabilitating buses regardless of propulsion type or emissions.
• Purchasing, leasing, rehabilitating, or constructing bus-related facilities and equipment, regardless of propulsion type or emissions.

Low-No Program

• Purchasing or leasing low-emission buses (See 49 U.S.C. 5339(c)(1)(E)), which include, but are not limited to:
  • Propane buses
  • CNG buses
  • Hybrid-electric buses
• Purchasing or leasing zero-emission buses, which include, but are not limited to:
  • Hydrogen fuel-cell buses
  • Battery-electric buses
  • Rubber tire trolley buses powered by overhead catenaries
    • Acquiring low- or zero-emission buses with a leased power source.
    • Leasing, constructing, or rehabilitating public transportation facilities and related equipment to accommodate low- or zero-emission buses.

Both Programs

• For low- and standard-emission projects, up to 0.5 percent of the Federal request may optionally be used for workforce development training (See 49 U.S.C. 5314(b)) and up to an additional 0.5 percent may optionally be used for training at the National Transit Institute (NTI) (See 49 U.S.C. 5314(c)).
• 5 percent of the Federal request for zero-emission projects must be used for workforce development. Or for projects that contain both zero-emission and low-emission components, 5 percent of the Federal request associated with the zero-emission part of the project must be used for workforce development.
  • This is mandatory unless you certify in your application that less funding is needed to carry out your Zero-Emission Fleet Transition Plan. You must include an explanation of why less or no such funds are needed.
  • These amounts should be budgeted in addition to, not as a take-down from, other eligible project expenses.
    • For example, if you include a Federal request of $3,000,000 for zero-emission vehicles and associated equipment, you should include an additional Federal request of $157,895 in the budget for workforce development expenses for a total Federal request of $3,157,895 (to calculate = $3,000,000/0.95).
    • Local match is required for workforce development funds (see “Cost Sharing” below).
  • You must identify the proposed use of funds for these activities in the project proposal and identify them separately in the project budget.
  • Eligible workforce development activities include but are not limited to: retraining the existing workforce, registered apprenticeships, and other joint labor-management training programs. Activities should be outlined in your Zero-Emission Fleet Transition Plan.
• Projects may include incidental costs, such as administration expenses, if the project includes and results in an eligible capital asset being leased, purchased, or built.

• Projects must relate to public transportation (See 49 U.S.C. 5302(15)).
• The development or deployment of prototype vehicles is not eligible.
• All new transit bus models must successfully complete FTA bus testing in accordance with FTA’s Bus Testing regulation (See 49 CFR part 665).
• All buses must be procured from certified transit vehicle manufacturers in accordance with the Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE) regulations (See 49 CFR part 26).
• Proposals may contain projects to be implemented by the recipient or its subrecipients.
• If a single project proposal involves multiple public transportation providers, such as when an agency acquires vehicles that will be operated by another agency, the proposal must include a statement detailing the role of each agency.

• In general, the maximum Federal share is 80 percent.  There are two exceptions (See 49 U.S.C. 5323(i)):
  • The Federal share is 85 percent for transit buses that are compliant with the Clean Air Act or are accessible to people with disabilities.
  • The Federal share is 90 percent for equipment and components of facilities related to low- or zero-emission buses or are to make the facility accessible to people with disabilities.  Applicants must itemize the cost of specific, discrete, equipment or facility components that perform these functions to be eligible for this higher Federal share.

More information about eligible sources of local match can be found in FTA Circular 9050.1A (urban applicants) and FTA Circular 9040.1H (rural applicants).

Low-No Program

• A minimum of 25 percent of awarded funds will go to low-emission projects that are not zero emission (see 49 U.S.C. 5339(c)(5)).

Bus Program

• A minimum of 15 percent of awarded funds will go to projects located in rural areas (see 49 U.S.C. 5339(b)(5)).
• No single grant recipient will be awarded more than 10 percent of the amount made available (see 49 U.S.C. 5339(b)(8)).

Both Programs

• You may submit a project to both programs or to just one program.  You are encouraged to submit projects under both programs when practicable. A project submitted to both programs must be eligible in its entirety under both programs, which means:
  • All buses must be low- or zero-emission and all facilities and equipment must directly support low- or zero-emission buses.
  • The full request or scalable amount must be no more than 10 percent of the funding available under the Bus Program.
    • If a project submitted under both programs is selected for funding, FTA will decide under which program the project is awarded.
    • If there are not enough eligible requests for either program’s statutory set-aside and there are eligible applications submitted only to the other program, FTA may request additional information and consider the application under the other program.
    • FTA may cap the amount a single recipient or State may receive as part of the selection process for either program. 

• Available at Grants.gov (Buses and Bus Facilities Competitive Program (Bus Program) and Low or No Emission Grant Program (Low-No Program).
• You must attach the Supplemental Form and any supporting documents to the “Attachments” section of the SF-424.
  • There is a limit of 15 total attachments per application.
  • If you are applying for a zero-emission project, you must attach the Zero-Emission Fleet Transition Plan.
  • You must describe and reference supporting documentation by file name in the Supplemental Form, or FTA may not review it.
• FTA will use the information entered into the Supplemental Form to evaluate the project and determine whether or not the proposal will be funded according to the selection criteria described in Section 6 (Application Review Information) below.
• You must complete all sections of the Supplemental Form unless the form states a section is optional.
• You will use the same Supplemental Form to apply to either program or both programs.
• If you are applying to both programs, you must submit the materials twice, once through each of the GRANTS.GOV opportunity IDs listed for the programs.
• Failure to submit the information as requested can delay review or disqualify the application.

• Register on the Grants.gov website well before the application deadline. Grants.gov registration is a multi-step process that may take several weeks to complete.
• If you have already registered in Grants.gov, you may still need to update your registration before you can apply.
• FTA strongly recommends you submit your proposal at least 72 hours before the due date. This allows time to correct any submission problems.
• FTA's system cannot accept Supplemental Forms that are: 1) scanned, a “print” to PDF, or a converted version using another text editor, etc.; or 2) from prior years. Use this year’s form and fill it out on your computer.
• Applicants can find more information on how to navigate Grants.gov on DOT Navigator.

• SAM registration usually takes about 3-5 business days.
• However, FTA recommends allowing several weeks for the registration process because there could be unexpected delays (such as needing to get an Employer Identification Number).
• For additional information on obtaining a unique entity identifier, please visit SAM.gov.