By US Department of Energy
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
WASHINGTON, DC – U.S. Energy Secretary
Steven Chu today announced more than $18 million in funding from
the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to support small
business innovation research, development and deployment of clean
energy technologies. In this first phase of funding, 125
grants of up to $150,000 each will be awarded to 107 small advanced
technology firms across the U.S.
"Small businesses are drivers of innovation and are crucial to
the development of a competitive clean energy U.S. economy," said
Chu. "These investments will help ensure small businesses are able
to compete in the clean energy economy, creating jobs and
developing new technologies to help decrease carbon pollution and
increase energy efficiency.
The companies were competitively selected from a pool of 950
applicants through a special fast-track process with an emphasis on
near-term commercialization and job creation. Companies that
demonstrate successful results with their new technologies and show
potential to meet market needs will be eligible for $60 million in
a second round of grants in the summer of 2010.
Grants were awarded in each of the following ten topic areas:
- Advanced Building Air Conditioning and Refrigeration,
Thermal Load Shifting, and Cool Roofs (15 projects, for up to
$2,241,229 total). Projects in this area will seek
to improve efficiency of air conditioning and refrigeration while
reducing greenhouse gas emissions, reducing peak demand, and
reducing thermal loads on roofs.
- Water Usage in Electric Power Production (6 projects,
for up to $878,144). This effort will focus on
decreasing the amount of water used in thermoelectric power
generation, improving water quality through the development of
advanced water treatment technologies, and developing innovative
approaches to desalination using Combined Heat and Power
projects.
- Power Plant Cooling (1 project,
$150,000). This project will focus on advanced heat
exchange technology for power plant cooling.
- Advanced Gas Turbines and Materials (11 projects, for up to
$1,637,033). These projects will research high temperature
materials and component cooling techniques, high performance
materials for nuclear applications, materials that help save energy
and diminish carbon emissions, and novel designs for
high-efficiency and low-cost distributed power systems.
- Sensors, Controls, and Wireless Networks (12 projects,
for up to $1,787,061). Projects in this area will
develop building applications to minimize power use, sensors and
controls for efficient industrial processes, wireless networks and
sensors for monitoring nuclear power systems, and power line sensor
systems for the Smart Grid.
- Advanced Water Power Technology Development (12
projects, for up to $1,747,259). Projects will focus
on advances in hydropower systems or subsystems, as well as new
approaches to wave and current energy technologies and ocean
thermal energy conversion systems.
- Smart Controllers for Smart Grid Applications (8
projects, for up to $1,166,871). These projects will
help develop smart controllers for household appliance to enable
Smart Grid services, technologies to support electric vehicles, and
support of distributed energy generation systems.
- Advanced Solar Technologies (12 projects, for up to
$2,783,996). Projects will focus on achieving
significant cost and performance improvements over current
technologies, solar-powered systems that produce fuels, and
Concentrated Solar Power systems for distributed applications.
- Advanced Industrial Technologies Development (25
projects, for up to $3,709,564). Projects in this
area will focus on improving efficiency and environmental
performance in the cement industry, low-cost manufacturing
processes for innovative nanomaterials, novel approaches to water
heat recovery, and transformational technologies to address high
Global Warming Potential industrial gases.
- Advanced Manufacturing Processes (16 projects, for up
to $2,222,110). These projects will focus on
mitigating heat losses, fouling and scaling in unit operations, and
improving heat and energy losses in energy intensive manufacturing
processes, including distillation and dewatering systems.
View the
full list of awards (PDF).
SOURCE
