Justice40 and Equity

In 2021, the federal government established the Justice40 Initiative (J40) that set a goal of having 40% of the overall benefits of certain Federal investments flow to disadvantaged communities that are marginalized, underserved, and overburdened by pollution.

J40 guidelines apply to almost all federal programs involving climate change, energy, transportation, housing, pollution remediation and reduction, water and wastewater infrastructure, or workforce development. Most federal competitive grant programs require applicants to address J40 criteria and equity in their applications, often referring to “disadvantaged communities.” Different federal agencies have created tools to measure “disadvantage” and to help applicants complete the J40 sections of their applications.

Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool

All federal agencies have been directed to use the Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool to determine which communities have disadvantaged status. If you are applying for a federal grant, this should be your first stop for J40 and equity data.

Find your community by entering the name or zip code or clicking and scrolling on the map. If your community is disadvantaged or partially disadvantaged, you can copy and paste the text from the tool into your grant application.

Different types of data are available to the right of the map by clicking the + buttons. Data highlighted in blue meet certain disadvantage thresholds and it may help your grant applications to cite those statistics.

Energy Justice Mapping Tool – Disadvantaged Communities Reporter

This tool can be used as a secondary source of data to use in grant applications. Clicking on the Full Report button will show even more data points than the home page. Many of the data points are relevant to all types of infrastructure, not just energy projects.

Electric Vehicle Charging Justice40 Map

Use this tool for electric vehicle and charging infrastructure projects.

EPA’s Environmental Justice Screening and Mapping Tool

This tool provides environmental, pollution, and climate change data. Unfortunately, some datasets do not include information for Alaska.

Navigating this tool can be trickier than some of the others. One way to make it easier is to click the piece of paper icon, and then select the census tract or city you’re looking for.