The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) recently announced over $30 million in funding, matched by over $35 million in private sector funds, for 68 projects supported by the Office of Technology Transitions Technology Commercialization Fund (TCF).
August 3, 2021
minute read time
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) recently announced over $30 million in funding, matched by over $35 million in private sector funds, for 68 projects supported by the Office of Technology Transitions Technology Commercialization Fund (TCF). This funding will accelerate the commercialization of promising energy technologies ranging from clean energy and advanced manufacturing, to building efficiency and next-generation materials. These funding awards will help deploy innovative solutions from DOE’s National Laboratories into the marketplace to create new jobs and businesses, while strengthening the nation’s economic competitiveness and achieving President Biden’s goal of net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.
The Office of Electricity is funding the following TCF projects, totaling $1.69 million.
Rechargeable Energy Batteries with Urban Power Electric ($250,000): Sandia National Laboratories developed the first-ever alkaline rechargeable zinc/copper oxide batteries with high capacities. This effort will scale a laboratory-sized version of the battery, to commercially relevant sizes, to validate the power, energy density, cycle life, and/or cost benefits versus competing battery chemistries.
Terrestrial Heat Repository for Months of Storage with CSolPower, LLC. ($125,000): Sandia National Laboratories will develop a storage system comprised of inexpensive rock, gravel, and/or sand-like materials to store high-temperature heat for days to months. A demonstrated intermediate-scale system and design will make the technology ready for commercialization and deployment by industry partners.
Power Converters and Components for Resilient Medium-Voltage Direct Current Microgrids ($299,754): Sandia National Laboratories and Emera Technologies, LLC will develop the HyGaiN Direct Current (DC) power conversion circuit. This is a novel DC-DC converter topology and adaptation of the hybrid switched capacitor circuit that enables high-gain, high-voltage power conversion with high efficiency, high reliability, and superior power density.
Grid-Edge Intelligent Distribution Automation System for Self-Healing Distribution Grids ($550,000): National Renewable Energy Laboratory and Survalent will develop a platform to achieve self-healing, reliable and resilient distribution grids, which will improve the operations of distributed energy resources, especially in the event of major outages and blackouts.
Modeling and Simulation for Targeted Electrical Resilience and Reliability Improvements (MASTERRI) with Idaho National Laboratory ($125,000): MASTERRI prioritizes critical vulnerabilities by interdependently modeling three aspects of energy systems. The combined modeling of these three aspects yields straightforward predictions, of which, components will most likely lead to unacceptable performance, providing a much greater value proposition for energy industry decision support than the current practices enable.
Terrestrial Energy-Efficient Long-Range Network for Remote Monitoring with Los Alamos National Laboratory ($125,000): This research will further develop the low-power, long-range wireless sensor network for applications related to the security and resilience of critical infrastructure. This network will cost-effectively address a capability gap in monitoring infrastructure in areas that lack ready access to communication and power.
Common Information Model for Electromagnetic Transients (CIM for EMT) with Pacific Northwest National Laboratory ($100,000): The project intends to define CIM extensions that enable other market participants to adopt CIM for EMT as a standards-based best practice and to define public test cases that encourage adoption.
Transactive Energy Services System (TESS) with Stanford Linear Accelerator Center National Accelerator Laboratory ($115,000): TESS will use transactive energy systems to empower consumers to actively engage in local energy markets with the goal of making the electricity demand follow the supply of renewable energy. The structural platform and analytical frameworks could capitalize on the growing share of consumers who own distributed energy resources.