(RTI) Economic, Engineering, and Environmental Modeling and Analysis for the Clean Air Markets Division

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) Office of Air Programs (OAP), Clean Air Markets Division (CAMD) anticipates awarding multiple award cost-plus-fixed-fee contracts with a one-year base and four one-year option periods. This procurement will be conducted as a partial small business set-aside competition under the Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) Part 15: Contracting by Negotiation. Up to three contracts will be awarded to small businesses and up to two contracts will be awarded to large businesses. The formal solicitation and other related information and items will be posted at the EPA website (www.epa.gov/oam) on or about September 7, 2007. The total labor hours estimated for this effort is approximately 350,000 hours. The solicitation is subject to full and open competition after exclusion of sources (power generation companies and point source emitters of Hg, SO2, NOx, and CO2). All responsible offerors may submit a proposal. Copies of the solicitation will be available on this site. Paper copies of the solicitation will not be provided. It is the responsibility of interested parties to regularly monitor EPA's website for updates to this procurement. Telephone inquiries will not be taken. The objective of this requirement is to design, develop, enhance, test, debug, quality assure, operationalize, document, peer review, and apply a broad range of advanced technical, analytical, and modeling tools used for economic, engineering, and environmental analysis. State-of-the-art modeling and economic analysis capabilities are required in order to carry out the mission of the Clean Air Markets Division. CAMD's mission includes operating and assessing regulatory programs like the Acid Rain Program, the Clean Air Interstate Rule (CAIR), and the Clean Air Mercury Rule (CAMR) and developing new programs for controlling emissions from large stationary sources. Modeling, analyses, and assessment will be needed for policy development, rulemaking, and impact evaluations related to power generation, energy consumption, and the pollutants associated with the power sector, including sulfur dioxide (SO2 ), nitrogen oxides (NOx), particulate matter (PM2.5), mercury (Hg), and other toxic air pollutants as well as emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases. Analysis and modeling projections are also likely to be required as technical support for U.S. international agreements, including the 1991 U.S. - Canada Air Quality Agreement, and air program development in China, India, Mexico, and other countries with rapidly advancing industrial growth. The requirement is broken into nine task areas: (A) Power Sector Modeling, Analysis and Assessment --- Bottom-Up Approach; (B) Power Sector Modeling, Analysis and Assessment --- Alternative Approach; (C) Modeling, Analysis and Assessment of Other Stationary Source Sectors --- Bottom-Up Approach; (D) Modeling, Analysis, and Assessment of Other Stationary Source Sectors --- Alternative Approach; (E) Sector Integrating Models; (F) Other Economic Modeling, Analysis, and Assessment; (G) Environmental Assessment, Evaluative Analysis, and Impacts Modeling (including Atmospheric, Ecological, Health Effects, and Cost/Benefits); (H) Expert Panels, Work Groups, and Special Studies; (I) Technical Support Activities. Offerors will NOT be required to respond to ALL task areas. However, at a minimum every offeror's submission must include proposals on four (4) stipulated required task areas, i.e., either on task areas A, C, F, and G or on task areas B, D, F, and G. In addition to the four (4) required task areas, offerors may submit proposals on as many of the remaining five (5) task areas as they choose, up to and including all nine (9) task areas. The point of contact for this procurement is Andrea Brunsman, Contracting Officer, at brunsman.andrea@epa.gov

Economic, Engineering, and Environmental Modeling & Analysis for the Clean Air Markets Division The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Office of Air Programs (OAP), Clean Air Markets Division (CAMD) is conducting a Sources Sought for information purposes only. THIS IS NOT A REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS. This request for information does not commit the Government to pay any cost incurred in preparation or any submission to this Sources Sought Notice or to a contract for services. The Government intends to competitively award a cost-plus-fixed-fee contract for Economic, Engineering, and Environmental Modeling & Analysis for CAMD. The intended contract is to have a one-year base period and four one-year option periods. The Government is considering the possibility of making award under a multiple award scenario. This competition will be held in accordance with Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) Part 15: Contracting by Negotiation. The formal solicitation and other related information and items will be posted at the EPA website (http://www.epa.gov/oam) on or about June 1, 2007. Interested parties are advised to periodically monitor that website for updates concerning this procurement. Telephone inquires will not be taken. Under NAICS Code 541620, the EPA is in search of businesses and other interested parties to provide state-of-the-art modeling and economic analysis capabilities for designing, developing, enhancing, testing, debugging, quality assuring, operating, documenting, peer reviewing, and applying a broad range of advanced technical, analytical, and modeling tools used by CAMD for economic, engineering, and environmental analysis. The models and analytical methods provided by the selected contractor(s) will be used by EPA for policy development, rulemaking, and impact evaluations related to power generation, energy consumption, and the emissions associated with the power sector, including sulfur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen oxides (NOx), carbon dioxide (CO2), particulate matter (PM2.5), mercury (Hg), and other air pollutants. The specific tasks include: (1) Power sector modeling, analysis, and assessment through bottom-up models with the capability of representing every existing generating unit and every emission regulation affecting the sector and producing detailed projections over a 20-50 year time horizon of power sector operation, capacity expansion, emission control decisions, associated costs. The power sector models must be able to provide the detailed outputs required by EPA?s air quality models. EPA requires both a model of the U.S. electric power sector in the 48 contiguous states and the District of Columbia and models of the power sector in other countries to be identified by EPA. (2) Modeling, analysis and assessment of other stationary source sectors. (3) Economic analysis and assessment using models that can be applied across sectors, to national and multinational economies as a whole, and to specific economic questions that do not lend themselves to analysis using the bottom-up sector models described above in item #1. The selected vender(s) should be capable of providing economic models or methods best suited to the issues being analyzed, including, but not limited to conceptual, mathematical, heuristic, econometric, computable general equilibrium, partial equilibrium, Monte Carlo simulations, optimization, multi-objective, and other operations research techniques. (4) Environmental assessment, evaluative analysis, and impacts modeling (including atmospheric, ecological, health effects, and cost/benefits analysis). (5) Organizing expert panels, work groups, and special studies performed by nationally and internationally recognized experts beyond the contractor?s immediate staff. (6) General technical support activities. The models and analytical techniques provided under this procurement must meet the peer review requirements specified in Office of Management and Budget?s Final Information Quality Bulletin for Peer Review (M-05-03), issued December 16, 2004 (www.whitehouse.gov/omb/memoranda/fy2005/m05-03.pdf) and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency?s Peer Review Handbook, 3rd Edition (EPA/100/B-06/002), issued May 24, 2006 (www.epa.gov/peerreview/pdfs/Peer%20Review%20HandbookMay06.pdf). All modeling assumptions and the complete model formulation and model code must be documented and available for peer review with provisions to protect confidential business information. Work products provided under this procurement must also meet EPA quality assurance and quality control requirements specified in Guidance for Quality Assurance Project Plans for Modeling (EPA QA/G-5M) issued December 2002 and available on the web at www.epa.gov/quality/qs-docs/g5m-final.pdf. Interested parties shall provide capabilities statements with information on technical capabilities to perform the tasks above and in the draft Statement of Work and provide information regarding past performance explaining or demonstrating how similar activities were performed on projects of similar size and scope. Capability submissions are limited to ten (10) 8 ?" x 11" pages, customary font typeface, no smaller than 10-point font size, and no less than ?" margins. Standard brochures will not be considered as a sufficient response to this notice. The capability statement should include the following: (1) Name of contractor; (2) Contact information (address, telephone, facsimile, e-mail); (3) Technical description of capabilities in meeting the requirement; (4) Technical support experience. Interested parties should submit an electronic copy of the requested information to Andrea Brunsman at brunsman.andrea@epa.gov by COB April 24, 2007. Telephone requests for information will not be honored. Questions regarding this notice or procurement may be sent in writing only to the Contract Specialist via email at brunsman.andrea@epa.gov. No contract will be awarded on the basis of statements received in response to this notice. No feedback or evaluations will be provided to companies regarding their individual capabilities statement. Suggestions and comments on the draft Statement of Work are also encouraged and should be sent via email to Andrea Brunsman.