Join industry leaders for breakfast and an interactive conversation specifically tailored to the needs of public agencies evaluating P3s. This pre-summit session is designed for owners beginning to explore P3s, to help you understand where P3s can be applicable; and how they can save money and time when dealing with upgrades, repairs, and maintenance. Learn when P3s do or do not make sense, and what major considerations need to be made once choosing this route, in particular the crucial first steps.

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Two years in, America’s Infrastructure Decade sees an increasingly adaptive P3 model applied to more sectors than ever before. It’s not just charging for transit fleets. It’s new district energy projects on university campuses. It’s creative solutions for Corps of Engineers water resource challenges. It’s also municipal and statewide broadband. Hear from Industry experts how successful agencies are taking advantage of funding and tax incentives and applying the P3 model in new ways to solve their most pressing infrastructure challenges.

The first of three public sector exclusive bootcamps, this session will focus on the financial aspects of a P3 and examine the use of PABS, TIFIA, taxable debt, and other financing tools.

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The Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill and the Inflation Reduction Act added generational funding to annual agency appropriations for the development and management of federal water and energy infrastructure. Efforts by EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers though the Water Infrastructure Finance Investment Act (WIFIA), the Department of the Interior through the WaterSMART program and the Department of Energy through the Hydropower and Research offices, are providing leadership in supporting innovative approaches to support public-private partnerships in water and energy infrastructure and asset management.

The panel will explore ongoing application of federal policy for water infrastructure and energy investments and their management. The expanding need for enhancing the federally supported water infrastructure and power grid assets requires innovation and federal leadership. To meet the challenges of a changing climate and increasing user demand, the federal agencies need to develop expertise and financial and management support to work with the private sector in ways to prepare for the future and protect the public investment.

As environmental mandates evolve, wastewater utilities are faced with increasing costs of infrastructure and operations. Simultaneously, ratepayers note rising costs. Consequently, many wastewater utilities are seeking alternative sources of revenue, while reducing operating costs. One option is capturing biogas from wastewater treatment, and assessing whether it could be used within the facility. Another is further processing and upgrading it to pipeline quality natural gas, and selling it. This panel will discuss the feasibility of public wastewater utilities capturing biogas and processing it to renewable natural gas, or contracting with private parties to do same, and the associated pitfalls.

As tech increases and the government is incentivizing investment in EV and renewables, this panel will discuss options and concepts available to ports within America, both deep water and inland rivers, and consider what’s in store for the future related to economic and technological efficiencies, investment opportunities, and risks.

Infrastructure owners are increasingly making public commitments to meet aggressive decarbonization goals, often net zero carbon emissions before 2050, while being impacted by tremendous utilities demand from campus facilities. Universities, healthcare institutions, and public authorities have successfully partnered with the private sector to deliver and invest in needed on-site power generation and distribution capital projects. Comprehensive energy partnerships are also being implemented as decarbonization roadmaps to identify, fund, and execute energy conservation measures, green on-site energy generation, and cleaner lifecycle maintenance. This panel will discuss delivery models and payment mechanisms and also provide case studies for infrastructure owners to consider prior to entering into a campus energy partnership with a private developer.

How can Energy P3s be used to facilitate this energy transition in the United States to provide greater private sector opportunities to invest efficiently alongside public sector capital? A panel of highly credentialed, seasoned energy project development / finance experts will lead us through this discussion aiming to ascertain what the future holds for Energy P3s in the United States in this era of decarbonization.

The $1.2 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) includes $15 billion for EVs and buses. State DOTs have spent the past year developing NEVI plans and are now shifting to implementation through procurements for both grants and P3 agreements.  Market response has been extremely strong.  This panel will walk through key considerations for DOTs as well as suggestions for how the Joint Office of Energy and Transportation can continue to support state efforts to make the NEVI program more successful.

There are certain business considerations that a government must review before starting the P3 process. In this panel we will discuss the elements that should be considered as the public builds out the business case for a P3. In addition, panelists will share ways to effectively communicate the business case to the community at large.
 

The WIFIA program is a federal loan and guarantee program administered by EPA. In March the WIFIA program announced a $170 million loan to the Carlsbad Desalination Plant for the plant’s intake modification and wetlands projects. The federal loan, in combination with about $160 million of private activity bonds, will finance the final phase of the plant, which provides a drought-resistant source of water to the San Diego County Water Authority equal to about 10% of its annual needs. The project company utilized WIFIA’s flexibility as a federal lender to incorporate the loan into its P3 financing framework, providing a potential model for other P3 borrowers.

Building a successful procurement and delivering a project demands the right partners. When running a P3 procurement, the public sector project manager could potentially spend more time with your advisors than you will with you own family, so you need to pick your advisor carefully. In this session we explore the core skillsets and areas of expertise you’ll want to engage as you move your project forward.

We’ll address the types of risk, and best practices for allocation and mitigation to ensure project success.

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This panel will address how our build environment can help combat water scarcity and explore the challenges and solutions to water scarcity. We'll discuss the underlying causes of water scarcity, including climate change, overuse, and pollution, as well as the impact it has on ecosystems, food security, power, and public health. We'll also discuss strategies to address water scarcity within the build environment, such as water conservation, reuse, desalination, conjunctive use and infrastructure investments, emphasizing the opportunity for P3 to provide solutions, and the need for collaboration between different sectors and jurisdictions to ensure equitable and sustainable access to water resources. Water scarcity is a global challenge that requires urgent action based on innovative and socially equitable approaches.

An increasing number of water purification projects are not satisfied with simply providing additional water, but are also attempting to make the purification process more efficient and environmentally friendly with the utilization of and sale of biogas. This panel will explore sustainability and regulatory issues, co-digestion enhancements, government incentives and other drivers for Biogas projects, while also sharing lessons learned from current case-studies in California. 

Experts will examine the benefits of long-term operations and maintenance using the P3 structure to mitigate project risks. This boot camp will cover how P3 counterparties allocate and price risk and how approaching the topic of O&M early on drives value and appropriately addresses the asset’s long-term goals. This conversation is designed for audience engagement and dialogue is encouraged, so bring your questions!

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A precedent-setting water P3 transaction closed in Fort Lauderdale, Florida involving the development of a state-of-the-art water treatment facility that will replace the City’s existing plant. The transaction was implemented as an unsolicited proposal and took over two years to reach successful financial close with multiple lessons learned for other Cities and water authorities who are struggling with aging plants and new EPA regulations that will require massive reduction of PFAS in the country’s water supply. The transaction structure is unique combining tax-exempt debt raised by the City with a long term concession structure under which private capital is at risk for performance failures. This transaction establishes a new template for implementing water P3 transactions in the US.

Come learn about the development of the new, state-of-the-art 50 MGD Prospect Lake Clean Water Center.  Panelists will review key project drivers and lessons learned while offering an overview on the general scope of work, Florida’s unsolicited P3 process, involved parties/organizations/teaming structure, financial structure, and risk transfers.  The new facility is the result of a public-private partnership (DBFOM) between the City of Fort Lauderdale, IDE Technologies, LTD, and Ridgewood Infrastructure.  Kiewit Water Facilities Florida is the design-builder, Kiewit Engineering is the lead designer, and IDE Technologies will perform process design, procurement, and manage operations and maintenance with City employees over the 30-year term.  The project is slated to be complete by 2026.

In recent years, the power grid, water systems, and other U.S. critical infrastructure have been identified as key targets by a wide range of bad actors wanting to instill fear in modern society, threaten human safety, coerce national policies, or disrupt essential services. During this panel, attendees will hear about public-private partnerships in the energy sector to address the full range of threats to protect and secure critical energy infrastructure. Additionally, participants will be able to identify resources, training opportunities, and awareness products from the federal government that will be helpful to protecting their own organizations.

The SDCWA entered into a public-private partnership for the financing, design, permitting, construction and operation of the largest seawater desalination plant in North America in 2012. The 50 MGD Carlsbad Seawater Desalination Project (CDP) became operational in late 2015. The CDP is a drought proof supply that improved the water system’s reliability and supply diversity, making the County-wide service area less susceptible to drought shortage curtailments protecting its economy. From the outset, all of the PPP’s parties knew there would have to be a significant capital modification to the intake in the future. However, managing an operational critical infrastructure PPP water supply project while planning for a secondary financing for a capital modification presented a unique new set of needs and requirements, that necessitated a strong sponsor and project team focus and a determination to succeed. This presentation will discuss the project and how to collaboratively mange a secondary financing for a Capital Modification within a P3.