Mine Safety and Health Administration grants

The Secretary of Labor, through MSHA, may award grants to State, Tribal, and Territorial Governments (including the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, American Samoa, Guam, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands) to assist them in developing and enforcing State mining laws and regulations, improve State workers’ compensation and mining occupational disease laws and programs, and improve safety and health conditions in the nation’s mines through Federal-State coordination and cooperation.   MSHA encourages State training programs to prioritize health and safety training for new and small mining operations. MSHA also encourages grant recipients to address, in their training and education programs, contract employee safety and occupational health hazards, powered haulage and mobile equipment safety, mine emergency preparedness, mine rescue, electrical safety, training for new and inexperienced miners, managers and supervisors performing mining tasks, and falls from heights. Applicants are encouraged, where applicable, to support the President’s goals of increasing the discovery and mining of critical minerals, by developing or creating training and compliance assistance programs to assist operators extracting critical minerals, including coal. The President has declared a National Energy Emergency to discover and mine critical minerals. Executive Order (EO) 14156, Declaring a National Energy Emergency (2025). To increase the response, on March 20, 2025, the President also directed the appropriate federal agencies to take immediate actions to increase mineral production. EO 14241, Immediate Measures To Increase American Mineral Production (2025). In response, the mining industry may experience increases in the reopening of idled mines and developing new mines in the search for these critical minerals. With these increases, new and innovative programs to train new miners or retrain miners for extracting specific critical minerals are vital. The Department of Energy (DOE) published a list of critical materials for energy, Federal Register :: Notice of Final Determination on 2023 DOE Critical Materials List . On May 29, 2025, DOE added metallurgical coal used for steelmaking to the Critical Material list, 90 Federal Register 22711 (2025). The Department of Interior, U.S. Geological Survey, in consultation with other federal agencies published the list of critical minerals, What are Critical Minerals? | U.S. Geological Survey (usgs.gov) . Moreover, on April 8, 2025, the President amended EO 14241 and declared coal a critical mineral. EO 14261, Reinvigorating America’s Beautiful Clean Coal Industry and Amending EO 14241 (2025). On January 12, 2026, the President extended the National Energy Emergency declared in EO 14156 for another year. Notice of January 12, 2026, Continuation of the National Emergency with Respect to Energy, 91 Federal Register 1667-68 (2026). 

The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL, the Department, or we), Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA or the Agency), is providing notice of the availability of up to $250,000 in grant funds for education and training programs to help the mining community identify, avoid, and prevent unsafe and unhealthy working conditions in and around mines. The program uses grant funds to establish and implement education and training programs, to create training materials and programs, or both. Section 14 of the Mine Improvement and New Emergency Response Act of 2006 (MINER Act) requires the Secretary of Labor (Secretary) to give priority to mine safety demonstrations and pilot projects with broad applicability. The MINER Act also mandates that the Secretary emphasize programs and materials that target miners in smaller mines, including training mine operators and miners about new MSHA standards, high-risk activities, and other identified safety hazards. Applicants may be states, territories and tribal governments (including the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, American Samoa, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and Federally recognized tribes) and public or private nonprofit entities. Eligible entities may apply for funding independently or in partnership with other eligible organizations. For partnerships, a lead organization must be identified. Faith-based organizations are encouraged to apply, as are any eligible organizations, subject to any applicable constitutional, statutory, and regulatory protections and requirements. Those that meet the eligibility requirements may receive awards under this funding opportunity. DOL will not, in the selection of recipients and administration of the grant, discriminate on the basis of an organization’s religious character, affiliation, exercise, or lack thereof, or on the basis of conduct that would not be considered grounds to favor or disfavor a similarly situated secular organization. A faith-based organization that participates in this program will retain its independence from the Government and may continue to carry out its mission consistent with religious freedom and conscience protections in Federal law. MSHA may award up to five grants. An applicant may submit multiple applications, and MSHA will select the applications that are most advantageous in meeting the goals of this program. MSHA’s focus for these grants is effective emergency response and recovery training in various types of mine conditions. MSHA is interested in programs that focus on training miners on workplace safety, including training miners and employers about new MSHA standards, high-risk activities, or hazards identified by MSHA. Special attention will be given to programs that target miners at new, newly opened, and smaller mines, or create training and compliance assistance programs to assist new operators.