Opportunity Title: Concentrating Solar-Thermal Power Fiscal Year 2022 Research, Development, and Demonstration
Opportunity Number: DE-FOA-0002630
Description:
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Solar Energy Technologies Office (SETO) announced the Concentrating Solar-Thermal Power (CSP) Fiscal Year 2022 Research, Development, and Demonstration funding program, which will award up to $25 million for innovative projects in CSP technologies. These projects will accelerate the large-scale development and deployment of solar technology. CSP technologies offer a unique value as renewable energy resources that can readily deliver high-temperature heat and incorporate storage for on-demand solar energy.
This funding opportunity is designed to help decarbonize the energy sector by developing CSP technologies for carbon-free industrial processes in the United States, and next-generation plant designs that will operate at high efficiency with low-cost thermal storage. Projects supported by this opportunity will focus on lowering the cost of CSP technologies and creating new market opportunities for the industry, with the goal of enabling substantial deployment of CSP to decarbonize the electricity grid and energy system. These projects will work to apply CSP to new industries and advance the development of components for next-generation CSP systems based on solid particle heat transfer media.
Topic Area 1: Concentrating Solar Thermal for Industrial Decarbonization – 4-8 projects, $15 million To achieve a carbon-free economy, it is necessary to identify technologies that can eliminate the need to burn fossil fuels for heat-driven processes that produce essential commodities, refined products, and other goods. Projects in this topic area will enable concentrating solar-thermal technologies with thermal energy storage (TES) to be integrated with high-temperature process technologies to produce economically important products, like steel, cement, ammonia, fuels, and other chemicals and fuels. These products are responsible for approximately half of all emissions from the industrial sector. This topic seeks to develop solar-driven processes using directly heated on-sun reactors, indirectly heated TES-coupled reactors, recuperators for heating and cooling reactants and products, and the production and use of low-carbon fuels for use as a heat source or chemical reactant.
Topic Area 2: Concentrating Solar-thermal Particle Technologies for Generation 3 CSP and Beyond (Gen3++) – 4-7 projects, $10 million Particle-based systems for thermal energy storage have a number of advantages, require fewer components, and are less complex to operate than alternative pathways based on liquids, gases, or supercritical fluids. Additionally, particle-based systems need relatively few high-cost materials to collect and transport thermal energy. TES using solid particles is expected to be highly cost-effective due to stability at high service temperatures and the relatively low cost of the material. Projects in this topic area will identify opportunities to improve upon in the following technical areas of interest: Gen3 CSP component development and scaleup, receiver system (focusing on receiver and particle lifts), particle heat exchangers, particle CSP towers, solid particle media, particle-heated steam generation systems, and supercritical carbon dioxide power blocks for integration with particle based CSP.
Webinar to be hosted on 2/24/22 at 2PM ET. Register for the webinar.
Eligibility:
Individuals, Domestic Entities (For profit, educational institutions, and nonprofits), Foreign Entities, Incorporated Consortia, Unincorporated Consortia. See solicitation for more detail.
Award Details:
Total Amount Available: $25M
Maximum Award: $6M
Minimum Award: $750K
Submission Details:
Application Deadline: 3/16/22 5pm ET
Grant Management Associates has years of experience with opportunities like this one. Contact us today for a consultation.
Comments