The FOA focuses on five areas of interest (AOI):

AOI 1A: Energy-Water Nexus Implications and Opportunities of a Hydrogen Economy

Projects under this AOI subtopic will support evaluating the water consumption and production of current and future hydrogen economy scenarios. Successful projects will help document a baseline understanding from which DOE and stakeholders could make investment decisions that take into account energy-water implications.

AOI 1B: Alternative Energy Approaches to Convert Fossil Fuels to Low-Cost Hydrogen

Projects under this AOI subtopic will support innovations in the use of alternative energy processes, including microwave, radio frequency, plasma, and other electromagnetic inputs for low-cost hydrogen production from fossil fuels. Projects will help supplement a lack of understanding surrounding the fundamentals of interaction between materials and alternative energy sources to help provide a critical pathway forward in using fossil fuels for low-cost hydrogen production.

AOI 1C: Process and Materials Co-optimization for the Production of Blue Hydrogen

Projects under this AOI subtopic will support research that will develop and apply an integrated framework for co-optimization of processes and materials that leverage the capabilities of the Office of Fossil Energy’s Institute for the Design of Advanced Energy Systems (IDAES) Integrated Platform. Projects will extend capabilities to support the co-optimization of materials and processes to enable low-carbon hydrogen production for industry, transportation, and other applications.

AOI 2: Addressing High-Temperature Materials Supply Chain Challenges

Projects under this AOI will support materials research, development, testing, and validation to enhance the Nation’s materials supply chain. Enhancing American supply chains will lead to broader deployment of advanced materials enabling higher performance boilers, steam turbines, gas turbines, and novel energy conversion systems such as supercritical CO2 power cycles. Broader deployment of advanced fossil energy power generation technologies has the potential to lead to lower electricity costs to consumers, maintaining highly reliable grid services, and improved environmental performance.

AOI 3: 5G for Coal-Fired Power Generation

Projects under this AOI will support fifth-generation (5G) wireless technology-based research and development projects related to coal-fired power generation that 1) conduct a paper-based assessment of 5G technology and 2) a laboratory-scale demonstration of a novel concept. As 5G wireless technology is poised to become an integral part of the ongoing digital transformation of coal-based power generation sector, DOE seeks projects that will help answer outstanding questions concerning the true implications of this technology specific to fossil energy generation.