WASHINGTON– The Biden administration is providing nearly $3 billion to boost climate-friendly equipment and infrastructure at ports across the country, including in Baltimore, where a deadly bridge collapse killed six construction workers in March and disrupted East Coast shipping routes for months.

President Joe Biden is expected to visit the city’s main port on Tuesday to announce grants that officials say will improve and electrify port infrastructure at 55 sites across the country while supporting about 40,000 union jobs, reducing the pollution and fighting the climate crisis. The presidential visit, a week before Election Day, aims to highlight efforts by Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris to promote clean energy while protecting and creating good-paying union jobs.

The Port of Baltimore, one of the busiest on the East Coast, is a major hub for the import and export of motor vehicles and agricultural equipment. More than 20,000 workers support daily port operations, including unionized longshoremen and truckers.

The grants announced Tuesday include $147 million for the Maryland Port Authority. The funds will support more than 2,000 jobs by enabling the purchase and installation of cargo and truck handling equipment to make the port a zero greenhouse gas emissions facility.

The Port of Maryland is among 55 ports in 27 states and territories that will receive nearly $3 billion under the Clean Ports program administered by the Environmental Protection Agency. Ports receiving money include the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the Detroit-Wayne County Port Authority, the ports of Savannah and Brunswick, Georgia, as well as Philadelphia, Los Angeles and Oakland , in California.

The grants are funded by Biden’s landmark climate law approved in 2022, the largest investment in clean energy in U.S. history.

On a White House call with reporters Monday, officials said the grants would also advance environmental justice by reducing air pollution caused by diesel from U.S. ports.

“Our ports are the backbone of our economy – essential hubs that support our supply chain, drive trade, create jobs and connect us all,” said EPA Administrator Michael Regan. “But we cannot ignore the challenges facing communities who live and work near these ports. Too often, these communities face serious air quality problems due to diesel pollution from trucks, ships and other port machinery.”

Protecting people and the environment “does not come at the expense of a thriving economy,” Regan said in an implicit rebuke to former President Donald Trump and other Republicans who have complained about the causes strict environmental regulations to hamper the economy. “In fact, healthy communities and a strong economy go hand in hand,” Regan said.

The grant announcements, which follow $31 million in federal funding to rehabilitate a section of Baltimore’s Dundalk Marine Terminal, come a week after the owner and manager of the cargo ship that caused the bridge’s fatal collapse agreed to pay more than $102 million in cleanup costs to settle a lawsuit filed by the U.S. Department of Justice.

The settlement does not cover any damages related to rebuilding the bridge, a project that could cost nearly $2 billion. The State of Maryland filed its own claim seeking, among other things, these damages.

Funding for the Clean Ports program will reduce more than 3 million tonnes of global warming carbon dioxide emissions, equivalent to the energy consumption of nearly 400,000 homes for a year. Regan said. This will also reduce emissions of nitrogen oxides and other harmful pollutants by 12,000 tonnes, he added.

John Podesta, senior adviser to the president for international climate policy, said the grants would help fulfill Biden and Harris’ promise to “rebuild our nation’s infrastructure and fight the climate crisis…and lift up communities that have borne the brunt of the climate crisis. pollution.”

In February, the EPA announced two separate funding opportunities for U.S. ports, a competition to directly fund zero-emissions equipment and infrastructure and a separate competition for climate change and air quality programs. More than $8 billion in applications were received from applicants across the country.

Vernice Miller-Travis, a longtime environmental justice advocate, welcomed the EPA grants, which follow years of complaints from environmental and public health officials that harmful pollution coming from the country’s ports was too often neglected.

“What an incredible moment this is,” she said. “Fifty-five projects, almost $3 billion in funding. That’s real money. And we know that when you see these kinds of investments, you can really transform local conditions, local operations and the people’s lives.”