Image

U.S. DRIVE stands for Driving Research and Innovation for Vehicle efficiency and Energy sustainability. It is a non-binding and voluntary government-industry partnership focused on advanced automotive and related energy infrastructure technology research and development (R&D). Specifically, the Partnership is a forum for pre-competitive technical information exchange among partners to discuss R&D needs, develop joint goals and technology roadmaps, and evaluate R&D progress for a broad range of technical areas.

For more information about U.S. DRIVE, and to access Partnership documents including technology roadmaps, please see the U.S. Department of Energy web site, energy.gov/eere/vehicles/us-drive or USCAR web site, www.uscar.org. For information about collaborating with U.S. DRIVE, please contact usdrive@ee.doe.gov

By providing a framework for frequent and regular interaction among technical experts in a common area of expertise, the Partnership:

  • Accelerates technical progress. Peers in the technical community discuss pre-competitive, technology-specific R&D needs and challenges, identify possible solutions, and evaluate progress toward jointly-developed technical goals.
  • Helps avoid duplication of efforts and ensure that publicly-funded research delivers high-value results and overcomes high-risk barriers to technology commercialization.

Government-industry collaboration benefits from diverse perspectives and unequivocal technical expertise. These characteristics enable efforts to remain at the forefront of the changing world of automotive and related energy infrastructure technology development.

For more about the Partnership's vision, mission, and scope, as well as information about its organizational structure and operating principles, please see the U.S. DRIVE Partnership Plan. For highlights of technical accomplishments, please see the 2021 Technical Accomplishments Report or past years' technical reports. For the Fuels Working Group's 2019 High-Octane reports, please see U.S. DRIVE Fuels Working Group High-Octane Reports.

U.S. DRIVE Partners

  • Automobile industry: U.S. Council for Automotive Research LLC (USCAR, the cooperative research organization for FCA US LLC, Ford Motor Company, and General Motors Company)
  • Electric utility industry: DTE Energy Company, Southern California Edison Company, Electric Power Research Institute, American Electric Power, Duke Energy
  • Federal government: U.S. Department of Energy
  • Fuels industry: BP America, Chevron Corporation, Phillips 66 Company, ExxonMobil Corporation, Shell Oil Products US

Technical Focus Areas

The Partnership focuses on the following technical areas:

  • Vehicles:  Advanced combustion and emission control, electric drive and power electronics, electrochemical energy storage, fuel cells, lightweight materials.
  • Fuels:  Hydrogen production, hydrogen delivery, hydrogen fuel pathway integration, low carbon fuels for future high-efficiency engines, or other sustainable mobility fuel as agreed to by the Partnership.
  • Cross-cutting: Analysis, energy efficient mobility systems, hydrogen codes and standards, hydrogen storage, vehicle-grid interaction.