ETCF is a designated DOE Clean Cities and Communities Coalition. These Coalitions support the nation’s energy and economic security by building partnerships to advance affordable domestic transportation fuels, energy-efficient mobility systems, and other fuel-saving technologies and practices. They also serve as the foundation of Clean Cities by implementing transportation projects in communities nationwide. Clean Cities and Communities Coalitions foster community-based partnerships through local Coalitions that work with stakeholders such as vehicle fleets, utilities, local governments, fuel providers, equipment manufacturers, and community organizations. Funding from this program is utilized in multiple projects and events that ETCF is involved in, such as Driving EV Leadership workshops, Vehicle and Station cost tracking, and many outreach, training, and awareness events.

Project Lead: Full team
Project Website: https://cleancities.energy.gov/

The Equitable Mobility Powering Opportunities for Workplace Electrification Readiness (EMPOWER) project is working to build a nationwide, sustainable workplace charging program. Clean Cities Coalitions and utility partners across 30 states will tackle direct outreach to employers and workplaces with the goal of engaging more than 2,000 employers and gaining more than 650 employer commitments to adopt workplace charging programs and install charging ports at their workplaces with the end goal of catalyzing more than 3,500 electric vehicle charging port installations (in Tennessee, those numbers are 30 workplace commitments and 24 installs). Through EMPOWER, ETCF provides no-cost technical assistance and consultation to businesses/workplaces to help with every step of the process of installing workplace charging units.

Project Leads: Danniel Siksay, Darcy Ayers, & Katie Davis
Project Website: https://www.workplacecharging.com/ 

Guaranteeing Access to Underserved and Marginalized Populations by Building Employment Opportunities (GUMBO) is a project led by the Louisiana Clean Fuels (LCF) Coalition with the overall goal of developing a curriculum for electric vehicle supply equipment (EVSE) technicians to educate and train a qualified workforce. LCF will partner with Cerritos College and the Baton Rouge Community College (BRCC) with the support of eight additional Clean Cities Coalitions and community partners to engage underrepresented and under-supported populations in skill building, education, and training that will allow them to enter the workforce and earn a life-sustaining wage. The EVSE installation, maintenance, and repair programs will be piloted in Louisiana and replicated across the country to allow individuals from disadvantaged communities to earn high-demand credentials in EV charging equipment installation, operations, and maintenance while supporting the nationwide rollout of National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) programs.

Project Leads: Wesleigh Wright & Danniel Siksay

The Medium Duty e-Truck project is a two-state project (Tennessee and Texas), led by the University of Texas and Tennessee Tech University, that aims to evaluate the performance of medium-duty electric trucks in various applications to a diverse range of trucking fleets. The project will focus on fleets with daily, return-to-base, urban and regional trucking operations with routes under 100 miles. Each fleet will have the opportunity to borrow the truck for up to one month at no cost, as a way to help fleet owners gain necessary electric truck knowledge and experience to allow them to make informed decisions regarding electric truck adoption in their fleets. The project will also provide important data to DOE on charging, routing, and fleet needs in order to be able to utilize more electric trucks in the future.

Project Leads: Mark Finlay, Katie Jauch, Darcy Ayers, & Jenni Kidd
Project Website: https://mdetruck.com/

The objective of this DOE-funded project is to build the underpinnings of a comprehensive EV ecosystem and green economy in the most economically distressed Appalachian region to transform the lives of rural and low-income communities through strong regional collaboration. This project aims to provide clean and affordable mobility options to underserved communities by developing needed charging infrastructure, and adopting and demonstrating various cost-effective EVs in diverse applications. In addition, by partnering with a broad set of EV stakeholders, this project aims to create outreach, training, and education opportunities to residents in rural and low-income Appalachian communities to kick-start electric vehicle adoption and clean-energy job opportunities where it is needed most.

Project Lead: Jenni Kidd & Katie Jauch
Project Website: https://rural-reimagined.com/

Drive Electric USA (DEUSA) is a DOE-funded project that consists of partnerships across 14 states with the goal of developing statewide, branded EV initiatives. Clean Cities Coalition leaders partner with electric utilities, state agencies, NGOs, municipalities, and more to develop sustainable partnerships to advance EV efforts into the foreseeable future. The project focuses on seven “Priority Areas” of work that are deemed the most important barriers to EV purchasing: 1) Building statewide, branded initiatives (Develop a statewide Roadmap or Plan); 2) Consumer Education & Chapter Development; 3) Engaging Electric Utilities & Regulators; 4) EV Charging Infrastructure & Planning; 5) Educating State & Local Government Officials; 6) Dealer Engagement (Develop “Certified EV Dealer” Programs); 7) Fleet Engagement & EV Adoption. DEUSA2 was funded as a continuation/expansion of the work started in the original DEUSA project, with 12 new states and the District of Columbia being included in the new project.

Project Leads: Jonathan Overly & Jenni Kidd
Project Website: https://www.driveelectricusa.org/

Tennessee Tech University’s Second-Life Battery in Mobile EV Charging Application for Rural Transportation (SMART) project aims to address the urgent need to develop affordable Mobile Charging Systems (MCS) that can be deployed in rural America on a large scale by utilizing second-life batteries retired from EVs. The project objectives are to 1) design, develop, demonstrate, and validate four types of cost-effective MCSs to reduce upfront investment costs; 2) create and demonstrate first-of-the-kind affordable, resilient, and sustainable rural EV infrastructure in a multi-state region (TN, OH, VA, KY, WV, KS, and TX) by seamlessly integrating affordable MCSs into the existing charging network to support electrification in underserved rural communities; 3) collect and analyze the first-hand data of second-life-battery-integrated MCSs to assess the potential market and benefits; 4) create outreach, training, and education opportunities to help a broad range of EV stakeholders make informed decisions in adopting second-life-battery-powered MCSs and develop economically viable charging stations.

Project Lead: Mark Finlay, Katie Jauch, Darcy Ayers, & Jenni Kidd
Project Website: https://battsmart.com/

Clean Cities Georgia leads the Southeast Clean Cities Network Expansion (Southeast Network) of partner coalitions. The Southeast Network consists of Clean Cities coalitions representing all Americans in Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, Florida, South Carolina, and North Carolina. The Southeast Network Expansion aims to accomplish three main things within this project: 1) Expand the existing Clean Cities Coalition capacity; 2) Grow into new and hard-to-reach areas, and 3) Provide training to coalitions to be more effective by offering sessions on grant management, financial management, indirect cost rate, scaling team growth, membership recruitment, time tracking for project management, performance measurement and reporting. The Southeast Clean Cities Network Expansion project will culminate in a landscape where clean transportation is not only a reality but a vibrant and inclusive movement that has transformed communities, fleets, and individual lives. The project’s legacy will endure in the cleaner air, empowered coalitions, educated populace, and a future where equitable access to sustainable transportation is no longer a vision but a tangible and shared reality.

Project Lead: Danniel Siksay

Through utilization of 26 Clean Cities Coalitions spread across 23 states the Team-based Evaluation, Surveying & Training (TEST) Real-World Charging Project will work with Idaho National Laboratory to establish a baseline charging experience. It will then employ potential workforce individuals to receive training and complete assessments of current EV infrastructure. From these rich data points a training program for State DOTs will be developed and launched online and in-person intending to be used nationwide.

Project Lead: Danniel Siksay, Jonathan Overly, Darcy Ayers, Katie Davis, & Alex Strong

The Advancing Community Transportation Initiatives and Outreach in East Knoxville (ACTION East Knoxville) project will create a Community Transportation Solutions Council (CTSC) to prioritize input and involvement from community members and community-based organizations in East Knoxville in transportation planning. ACTION was granted through Community Initiatives for Transportation Equity (CITE) funding from NREL and the Joint Office, and built upon the extensive community outreach work done through CCEEJI. ETCF will work with the CTSC to develop engagement materials to identify community-driven project ideas, contribute to the Transportation Initiatives section of the EK-CTAP, and host relevant meetings with decision-makers to advance project development. The creation of the CTSC will ensure that the work of the EK-CTAP and the inputs from community members in East Knoxville will be available and used to inform transportation projects in East Knoxville.

Project Lead: Wesleigh Wright & Danniel Siksay

Charging Smart is a technical assistance and certification program to support local governments and recognize their progress in setting and achieving equitable EV-readiness goals, streamlining regulatory practices, and facilitating the adoption of electric vehicles and charging stations. The program will: 

• Facilitate technical assistance (TA) and designation of at least 60 EV Smart communities. 
• Prioritize key objectives identified in the Justice 40 Initiative by developing tools to support equitable access to EVs and EV charging.
• Collaboratively work with four Clean Cities Coalitions to provide TA across communities in Virginia, Colorado, north Texas, southern California, and continuation of GPI’s pilots in Michigan, Ohio, & Minnesota and MMC’s work in northern Illinois. 
• Develop and test an EV Smart Infrastructure Modeling Tool to enable local leaders and planning agencies to quickly and easily develop a sense of the EV charging infrastructure demand based on anticipated levels of EV adoption. 

Project Lead: Alex Strong & Wesleigh Wright

The PlugStar EV Consumer Education campaign is designed to provide socially and culturally relevant messaging that maximizes the impact on light-duty EV market transformation and helps the U.S. Department of Energy achieve its EV adoption targets. ETCF will host two events in our service area to either directly engage 1,000 participants or provide 50 rides and drives per event. ETCF is also managing the administrative work for 21 other Clean Cities and Communities Coalitions across the U.S.

Project Lead: Jonathan Overly & Jenni Kidd

ETCF and Drive Electric TN will work with multiple colleges and universities across the state to plan and host 15-20 Ride & Drive, experiential-based events on or near the campuses during opportunistic times in CY2025 and the first half of CY2026 (DEEM and NDEM) to reach as many faculty, staff, and students (and potentially parents and others) on each campus.

Project Lead: Alex Strong, Jonathan Overly, & Jenni Kidd