Green Tech

The Department of Energy is making $100 million in government stimulus money available to researchers with ideas for radically different energy technologies.

The DOE on Monday announced the second portion of the ARPA-E program and said that "concept papers" for three research areas--fuels, capturing carbon dioxide from coal plants, and long-range electric vehicle batteries--are due by the middle of next January. Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Commerce Secretary Gary Locke unveiled the green-tech research program in conjunction with the start of international climate treaty talks in Copenhagen, which got under way Monday.

The research areas reflect the priorities of the administration for jump-starting innovation in the energy industry for both environmental and economic reasons. The three projects topics are called:

• Innovative Materials & Processes for Advanced Carbon Capture Technologies (IMPACCT). This program will seek to fund research in materials and catalysts to separate carbon dioxide from other flue gases at coal-fired power plants. With about half of the electricity in the U.S. made from burning coal, developing more energy-efficient and cost-effective technologies for carbon capture and sequestration is getting significant federal backing. On Friday the Department of Energy announced that $3.18 billion of stimulus money will be spent on accelerating the development of three carbon capture projects in the U.S.

• Batteries for Electrical Energy Storage in Transportation (BEEST) is a project aimed at developing battery technology that will extend the range beyond today's existing lightweight electric vehicles. There are a number of electric vehicles coming to market in the next year, such as the Nissan Leaf, but the driving range is limited to about 100 miles because of the limitations in battery energy density.

• The Electrofuels program at ARPA-E is seeking to fund research for methods of making liquid transportation fuels directly from carbon dioxide and sunlight. The program specifies that it is looking for methods that use biological processes using microorganisms, an area of research that could yield a 10 times efficiency improvement over traditional biofuels.

The first grant awards for DARPA-E, totaling $151 million, also went to research projects in liquid fuels and carbon capture but also included energy storage, LED lighting, and solar photovoltaics.

When it comes to the U.S. biofuels strategy, it's no longer just about ethanol.

The Department of Energy and Department of Agriculture announced on Friday that $564 million in stimulus act funding would be used toward constructing biorefineries to make liquid fuels from plants. Out of the 19 projects receiving funding, nearly half focus on the development of "drop-in" replacements for gasoline, diesel, or jet fuel. The rest focus on technologies for making ethanol or chemicals from sources other than corn. (Click this PDF for a full list of recipient projects).

In one example, San Diego-based Sapphire Energy, which counts Bill Gates as an investor, received a $54.5 million loan guarantee to build a pilot facility to convert algae into "green crude" that can replace jet fuel and diesel.

These fuels are the chemical equivalents of petroleum-based gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel so they can fit into the existing distribution fuels infrastructure, backers say.

The Energy Department-funded projects, which will be matched with private money for a total of $1.3 billion, are meant to test a number of biofuels techniques at demonstration scale. Chemical and energy company UOP, for example, received a total of $31.7 million to make a renewable diesel and jet fuel from wood wastes by treating biofeedstocks with hydrogen during its process.

Different methods to produce ethanol will also be tested through the Energy Department program. In the 2007 Energy Act, the federal government set an aggressive goal for production of advanced biofuels made from plants other than corn, such as agricultural residue and wood.

Algenol Biofuels received almost $59 million in total to produce ethanol from seawater algae and carbon dioxide in Freeport, Texas. Cellulosic-ethanol company ZeaChem, meanwhile, received $25 million from the Energy Department to supplement a planned project to make ethanol from poplar trees in Oregon using a microbe that breaks down wood. And waste-to-fuel companies BlueFire Ethanol and Enerkem received grants for their gasification-based systems for converting municipal solid waste into ethanol.

In a statement, Energy Secretary Steven Chu said advanced biofuels are a key part of the country's goal to create a cleaner, more sustainable transportation system and generate jobs.

In a statement, the Biotechnology Industry Organization said the government funding will help innovative companies attract capital from private sources to commercialize their technology.

The Department of Energy on Tuesday awarded $620 million in smart grid projects, the second major wave of government-led funding to modernize the electricity grid.

The money will come from the stimulus package and be matched by commercial companies, making the total spending $1.6 billion spread across 32 demonstration projects in 21 states. A total of $8.1 billion in smart-grid spending from public and private sources was announced late last month.

Energy Secretary Steven Chu announced the awards at Ohio-based utility AEP, whose GridSmart program is considered one of the more technically advanced.

The bulk of the DOE awards--$435 million--will be aimed at adding communications to the transmission and distribution grid through the installation of two-way meters, sensors on the transmission lines, and in-home energy displays.

By networking devices along the grid and adding digital controls, utilities can more easily locate and fix outages and use their energy supply more efficiently. For consumers, in-home displays will allow them to get a real-time readout of their electricity usage to help ways to cut down consumption. Some utilities also offer programs where consumers can get cheaper rates to shave power use during peak times.

The rest of the DOE funding will go toward testing a range of energy storage technologies, including flow batteries, flywheels, and compressed air storage. With storage, utilities can more easily use solar and wind power by better managing the flow of energy on the grid.

BOSTON--If you attached a cost to putting greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, how would the energy business change?

Steven Koonin, the undersecretary for science at the Department of Energy and former chief scientist of BP, has thought this question over. Koonin was the keynote speaker Thursday at the Fifth Annual Conference on Clean Energy here, where he offered a big-picture analysis of how the U.S. should convert to low-carbon energies.

The main drivers toward cleaner energy are efforts to improve the country's energy security and to cut greenhouse gas emissions. But there are many paths to that destination and we won't get there by only putting a price on carbon, Koonin said.

"Now the economists will tell you that all you need to do (is put a price on carbon emissions) and the market will take care of itself after that," Koonin said. "And that may be true, but as a technologist I have the ability and in fact the responsibility to look ahead and ask what the likely responses will be if there is a carbon price."

Establishing a significant, long-lasting, and universal carbon price would act as a "supply side" signal to the energy industry and favor certain technologies, he said.

One clear implication for the U.S. would be a greater shift toward natural gas, which is significantly less-polluting than coal for making electricity. Recent drilling improvements allow for capturing large amounts of natural gas from shale in the U.S., Koonin said.

Onshore wind is economically competitive in many areas in the U.S. and has the potential to supply 20 percent of the country's electricity by 2030. Another clean source of power is small and medium-size hydro power, which can supply tens of gigawatts from small dams.

Nuclear fission, which now supplies about 20 percent of the electricity in the U.S., is also poised to expand in an economy with a carbon price because there are no emissions during power generation. Carbon capture and storage facilities attached to coal-power plants, too, are needed because existing coal plants will continue to operate, he said.

Finally, increased conservation and efficiency are required in both the transportation field and for heating and power, he said.

Not just about technology
Koonin favors a cap-and-trade system to regulate carbon emissions, a system proposed in the energy and climate legislation now being debated in the Senate. Under cap and trade, heavy polluters such as utilities are given pollution permits and can buy additional permits to stay under a government-set limit on carbon.

But other policies are required, in part because the energy industry by its nature changes very slowly. Koonin specifically mentioned portfolio standards, where utilities need to get a portion of their electricity supply from renewable sources or a "low carbon" portfolio standard.

"One of the most important things we need to do beyond technology is to accelerate energy change," he said. "It takes decades to affect significant changes in the energy system."

It's a mistake to look at the IT industry as a model for how quickly energy can change, Koonin said. Whereas digital technologies evolve very quickly, energy changes slowly because power plants and buildings last decades and even cars last 15 years.

The first hybrid passenger car came to the U.S. in 2001, and even now, eight years later, there are fewer than 1 million sold, out of a total 150 million cars, he noted.

The scale and investments required to adopt different energy technologies is much bigger in than IT, and the energy industry is dominated by incumbents with well-optimized processes, he added.

To accelerate changes in energy, the DOE has established different types of research centers. This year, there will be $25 million a year to fund three "innovation hubs" at universities focused on specific problems, such as advances in nuclear. The DOE also recently awarded grants for ARPA-E, research aimed at breakthrough technologies.

The Department of Energy on Wednesday announced which U.S. companies have been awarded grants to build manufacturing plants for electric vehicle batteries.

The $2.4 billion program, established as part of the stimulus plan, sets aside funds for auto battery manufacturing and related components, such as electric motors. (Click here for a PDF to see the full list and for a map of the awards).

President Obama, appearing in Elkhart, Ind., and Vice President Joe Biden, in Detroit, were scheduled to announce the recipients and specific amounts. Energy Secretary Steven Chu is scheduled to speak Wednesday in Charlotte, N.C., and visit a battery supplier.

The grants, which will be matched by $2.4 billion in private investment, will go to battery and component suppliers as well as the big U.S. automakers--General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler--which will receive over $400 million for manufacturing and to test the performance of electric vehicles, such as the Chevy Volt.

In all, there will be 48 funded projects, with many--18 out of the total--located in the traditional auto manufacturing states of Michigan and Indiana.

The grants are meant to jump-start the U.S. industry for auto batteries, which is now dominated by Asian suppliers. The Obama administration has set a goal of putting 1 million plug-in electric vehicles on the road by 2015.

Of the total, $1.5 billion is available for U.S. battery manufacturing and $500 million for related technology, such as electric motors. Another $400 million is dedicated for federal agencies to purchase fleet plug-in electric vehicles and to develop the infrastructure needed for plug-in electric vehicles, such as charging stations and training for technicians in electric vehicles.

The White House said that the companies were chosen in a "highly competitive process" where applications were evaluated by the DOE.

Battery makers
For the individual companies involved, the grants can be a lifeline to bigger things, such as volume production. The credit crisis on Wall Street has made it difficult to secure the significant amount of money needed for constructing new manufacturing facilities, particularly for new battery technology.

The top recipient is Johnson Controls, which will receive $299 million to produce nickel cobalt metal battery cells and packs. A123 Systems will get $249.1 million to go ahead with plans to build a factory in Michigan for its lithium ion battery packs and related components.

Dow Koman is set to receive $161 million for its batteries, and Compact Power, on behalf of Korean company LG Chem, will produce the lithium ion battery cells that will be used with General Motors' Chevy Volt electric car.

Another recipient is EnerDel, which received $118.5 million that it intends to match with the same amount to expand lithium ion battery manufacturing in its home state of Indiana. EnerDel has supply agreements with Fisker Automotive and Think. Saft America will receive $95.5 million to produce lithium ion cells and batteries for industrial, agricultural, and defense vehicles.

EnerDel CEO Charles Gassenheimer said that the grant will allow the company to double the volume at its existing auto battery plant in Indiana. "What this money does is accelerate our business plan tremendously," he said.

The company has also applied for a $480 million loan under the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program, which is expected to be announced in the coming weeks. Without the grant or loan, the company projected revenue of $700 million by 2015, but if it receives both it expects it can get to $2.25 billion.

Having a domestic auto battery supply chain will allow auto battery makers to lower the cost by as much as 40 percent in that time frame, EnerDel projects.

"The U.S. taxpayer can expect the United States, which is playing second seat to Asia and Europe in electric drive trains, (to produce) cheaper, more fuel-efficient cars faster," Gassenheimer said. "We strongly believe that on a total cost of ownership basis, electric cars can be significantly cheaper today than gasoline cars."

Charging stations
Hybrid vehicles now use nickel metal hydride batteries but many new models of electric cars set to come to market over the next two years will use lithium ion batteries, which are already widely used in consumer electronics. Although there are different types, lithium batteries are preferred because they are lighter and allow for higher energy density.

But there were two battery companies--East Penn Manufacturing and Exide Technologies with Axion Power--in the program that received funds to advance lead acid batteries for "micro and mild hybrid applications."

The largest grant for developing a charging infrastructure went to eTec, a subsidiary of Ecotality, and Nissan which will test a network of fast-charging stations in cities in Arizona, California, Oregon, Washington, and Tennessee.

The DOE will invest $99.9 million, which will be matched by participating companies, to test the performance of 5,000 of Nissan's all-electric Leaf sedan with eTec's charging stations, in different climates and use patterns.

The DOE's goal is to have 70 percent of funds spent by the end of September next year and have nearly all the money spent by the following year, Energy Department senior adviser Matt Rogers told reporters on Tuesday, according to Environment & Energy Daily.

A "public-private partnership" is required to speed the transition to new auto technology, said Brian Wynne the president of the Electric Drive Transportation Association industry group. Pumping money into the sector will help auto makers meet demand for electric cars over the next two years and lessen the premium consumers need to pay for the new technology, he said.

"There's the immediate impact of jobs--it's all about green jobs--and we want to invest in a sector that will pull us into a new era. That's what essentially investing in here," said Wynne.

This article was updated at 9 a.m. PDT with more details, and the corrected amount of EnerDel's grant and the number of awards in Michigan and Indiana.

The Department of Energy on Wednesday detailed $30 billion in loan guarantees available to promote renewable energy and grid upgrades.

The DOE is soliciting applications for projects in renewable energy and added electricity transmission. This phase of loan guarantees also makes loans available for "cutting edge" biofuels projects.

The solicitations for applications are the sixth and seventh step in the DOE's loan guarantee program, funded by the stimulus act. Billions of dollars of loans and loan guarantees had been authorized before the stimulus but few had been awarded until earlier this year.

Awards for projects to promote domestic car and auto battery manufacturing--the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program (ATVM) and Advanced Battery Manufacturing grants--are expected to be announced as early as this week.

Ford, Tesla Motors, and Nissan were the first awarded loans from the $25 billion ATVM program in June.

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management, in conjunction with the Department of Energy, this week released six maps that could help determine the location of the next big push in solar energy.

The BLM maps cover areas within the six U.S. states most suitable for solar energy generation and transmission as judged by the U.S. government: Arizona (PDF and below), California (PDF), Colorado (PDF), Nevada (PDF), New Mexico (PDF) and Utah (PDF).

"Only lands with excellent solar resources, suitable slope, proximity to roads and transmission lines or designated corridors, and containing at least 2,000 acres of BLM-administered public lands were considered for solar energy study areas. Sensitive lands, wilderness and other high-conservation-value lands as well as lands with conflicting uses were excluded," according to a BLM statement released with the maps.

The maps were release in conjunction with announcements from Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar and U.S. Senator Harry Reid (D-Nev.) that the U.S. government has decided to let public lands possibly be used for solar energy development. (The BLM is part of the U.S. Department of the Interior.)

As part of that push, the U.S. government is beginning several environmental impact studies, opening solar energy permitting offices, and overhauling the application and review process for utilities looking to develop land for solar energy generation.

"Currently BLM has received about 470 renewable energy project applications. Those include 158 active solar applications, covering 1.8 million acres, with a projected capacity to generate 97,000 megawatts of electricity. That's enough to power 29 million homes, the equivalent of 29 percent of the nation's household electrical consumption," according to the statement released Monday by the U.S. Department of the Interior.

The maps show Solar Energy Study Areas, 24 separate tracts of BLM-administered lands totaling 670,000 acres that the government sees as prime for development pending study results (dark blue stripe area on maps), as well as areas under review for Solar PEIS (Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement to Develop and Implement Agency-Specific Programs for Solar Energy Development).

Maps have been rolled out before in an effort to encourage alternative energy utility infrastructure and set-up.

In April, the NRDC--in conjunction with Google and the National Audobon Society--also offered a set of maps for to guide energy developers of both solar and wind. The Path to Green Energy maps, which cover the Western U.S. and the Dakotas, indicate areas where developers would likely be welcome to set up shop, and which areas the NRDC saw as controversial or arguably inappropriate for development.

At the time, they, too, said their maps were an effort to expedite alternative energy development. In the U.S.

The National Renewable Energy Lab and U.S. Department of Energy have launched a mapping tool on alternative fuels and vehicles.

Employing Google Maps, TransAtlas plots geographical locations of things like specific types of fuel stations and concentrations where certain types of alternative fuel vehicles are owned in abundance.

It plots points where production facilities and other infrastructure for alternative fuel transportation exist, as well as separate icons identifying projects under development.

The comprehensive tool allows users to turn layers on and off by checking boxes in a legend. It includes alternative fuels like hydrogen, liquefied natural gas, propane, compressed natural gas, E85, biodiesel, and electric charging stations

Layers are also used to see vehicle density for flex fuel, diesel, and hybrid electric vehicles, as well as production facilities for hydrogen and ethanol.

The TransAtlas lets you ask a specific site for more detailed information by hitting the query button and then clicking on a point of interest. One click can tell you the town where an ethanol production facility is located, what capacity it's operating at, and what kind of biomass it uses.

The tool's development was sponsored by the DOE's Vehicle Technologies Program, which includes the Clean Cities initiative, a program to encourage alternative fuel development and public/private partnerships on alternative fuel projects.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--Energy Secretary Steven Chu said the Department of Energy plans to establish research centers modeled on Bell Laboratories to spark the development of disruptive energy inventions.

Chu delivered the Compton lecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on Tuesday, where he told academics and local green-tech business people that the world needs technology breakthroughs in energy to hedge against high fossil fuel prices, to improve national security, and to mitigate the effects of climate change.

During his talk, Chu singled out a number of energy technologies that demand more research, including batteries, solar cells that convert sunlight into electricity, bio-energy, and capturing carbon dioxide and storing it underground. Buildings equipped with sensors and better building material, for example, could be 80 percent more efficient, and synthetic biology could coax microbes into producing gasoline from plants, Chu said.

By pursuing these low-carbon technologies, researchers will undoubtedly invent technologies that will lead to different applications, much the way the development of the transistor for communications at AT&T's Bell Labs led to the computer revolution, Chu said.

"There's going to be very exciting science that will come out of this. And just like Bell Labs, where you wanted to deliver some goods in the end, but boy there is going to be a lot of very fundamental stuff you have to develop along the way," he said. "So you can have a Nobel prize and save the world at the same time."

The Energy Department's budget will balloon in the near future, with $37 billion from the federal recovery act coming in the next two years, on top of its existing $26 billion budget. There will be money dedicated to basic research, but Chu said that he intends to promote applied energy research as well with the creation of eight "innovation hubs."

These hubs will be modeled on three existing bio-energy research centers, but expanded to include centers for batteries, building science and other areas, Chu said. His 2010 budget calls for $280 million to create these hubs.

The three centers have adopted a Bell Labs-like structure where people work on different areas and there is meant to be collaboration with industry as well, he said. At Bell Labs in the past, managers were top-notch scientists which helped the lab to make decisions quickly and develop many basic technologies, such as the photovoltaic solar cell and the laser, Chu said.

"A lot of the best research started as mission-oriented, applied research," he said. "Even when they worked on commercial applications, the research led to other inventions."

Basic versus applied research
In response to a question from a student, Chu said that the DOE does not at all intend to shy away from basic science research. President Obama in March called for doubling the amount of spending on basic science over the next 10 years to address the need for new energy technology and spur economic development. The Energy Department has also created DARPA-E, an agency modeled after the defense agency that led to the creation of the Internet.

But the amount of money that the U.S. spends on R&D is tiny in relation to the trillion dollars spent on energy every year, Chu said.

"Energy of the future will certainly have to be more high-tech, so in a high-tech industry what you typically do is invest on the order of 10 percent or more of sales in R&D," he said. "Well, 10 percent of a trillion dollars is $100 billion a year. That's a lot of money and we're really investing a couple billion, so the scale is not proportional to what is needed."

That influx of money to the Energy Department, for both research grants and loans to companies seeking to bring new technologies to market, has people concerned in industry that the money will not be well spent.

Chu acknowledged that this is a serious challenge for the Energy Department. In an effort to streamline the bureaucracy, he has made some organizational changes including a board established to efficiently vet loan and grant applications.

In addition, Chu said that in the coming weeks he will be sending letters to university teachers and students asking for their help in assessing the merits of research applications.

"This is a huge load on the system and we need the best help we can get," he said. "The quality of reviews has to go up. It's very important we get it right."

Earlier on Tuesday, Chu held a press conference in Boston to announce the award of $25 million to a research center for testing wind turbine blades in Charlestown, Mass.

Economic growth
Chu started his talk reviewing the latest data on the effects of climate change, which is happening as fast as--or even faster than--scientists have predicted.

Polar ice cap coverage is decreasing and the rate of sea level rise has accelerated over the last two decades. In British Columbia, 2006 data showed that 40 percent of pine forests were killed by pine bark beetles, fewer of which are killed by winter frosts because of warming temperatures.

In addition, there is growing awareness of potential tipping points, such as the release of methane from permafrost in the tundra. "We're getting close to where it's a very nervous time," he said.

But Chu is hopeful that the world can move to sustainable energy because of the breakthroughs scientists have achieved in the past. The so-called green revolution allowed people in the middle of the 20th century to get more food from the same amount of land.

He said he is a strong believer that investments in science and technology are also the best way to spur economic growth.

"I'm a big believer in the fact that science and technology will be a cornerstone, if not the cornerstone, for how America will prosper in this century, so what we're investing now is nothing," he said.