New Jersey state Senators Paul Sarlo, a Democrat, and Steven Oroho, a Republican, introduced legislation on Sept. 17 that would encourage private capital investment to develop energy-related projects at government facilities that lack the ability to address the energy infrastructure needs. The bill seeks to leverage private sector financing and expertise at a time when the state is faced with budgetary constraints. The measure aims to lower the vulnerability of critical governmental facilities to threats posed by weather events such as Winter Storm Quinn that revealed the inadequacies of energy infrastructure. The bill would establish the criteria for governmental entities to award public-private partnership agreements and set competitive contracting procedures to govern these agreements. (S 2958)