Washington, D.C. – The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) today announced 20 selected projects for the fall round of the 2024 Energy I-Corps program. The Energy I-Corps program delivers intensive workforce development training and funding to our National Lab researchers to support clean energy technology commercialization.
"Our National Lab researchers are foundational to meeting the climate goals set by the Biden administration,” said DOE Chief Commercialization Officer and Director of the Office of Technology Transitions, Dr. Vanessa Z. Chan. “Through over 900 stakeholder interviews, these teams will learn what more research they need to take their technology out of the lab and into the market. The lessons learned here, and through the rest of the program, will make stronger researchers for years to come.”
In addition to OTT, 11 DOE program offices and the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) are contributing to the fall program with a combined funding total of over $1.6 million.
In this three-topic program, Topic 1 invites DOE National Laboratories, plants, and sites to propose programming that encourages their researchers to participate in future Energy I-Corps training cohorts. Five Topic 1 projects were selected from the Fiscal Year 2024 Fall Lab Call. The selected projects will provide entrepreneurial training to more than 40 researchers from five DOE National Laboratories and one site. This year’s projects include entrepreneurial training opportunities for researchers and collaborate with industry, universities, students, and Energy I-Corps alumni to provide additional commercialization perspectives to participants. Learn more about each selected Topic 1 project here.
Topic 2 offers a 10-week intensive program for DOE National Lab, plant, and site researchers to define technology value propositions, conduct at least 75 stakeholder discovery interviews, and explore viable market pathways for their technologies. Twelve teams have been selected to participate in this year’s Cohort 19. Learn more about the Cohort 19 teams here.
Topic 3 supports the advancement of technologies that researchers took through the Topic 2 training program and that demonstrated a high likelihood of commercialization. The funds are intended to cover costs of the next actionable step in their commercialization journey and to help awardees reach their next source of more substantive funding. The following three Topic 3 projects will go through negotiations towards receiving $100K each.Learn more about each selected Topic 1 project here.
- GridSense – SNL (Cohort 17): GridSense is a fast fault detection and location technology developed by Sandia National Laboratories, which aims to improve power distribution systems and microgrids’ resiliency by reducing the overall service restoration time and associated cost of electrical faults troubleshooting, and wildfire ignition risk. This project will allow the team to engage with utility end-users to refine and validate the user interface design. The project will help the team advance commercialization and address major adoption barriers as well as support ongoing code optimization, the addition of new features, and pilot testing. This project is funded by the Office of Electricity.
- P-Kelp Marine Energy Conversion Technology – NREL (Cohort 17): P-Kelp from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory is a novel kelp-inspired marine energy conversion technology that can generate electricity from moving water at a scale suitable for powering blue economy markets and applications, remote and disadvantaged communities, ecological restoration, and coastal resilience and protection. This project will allow the P-Kelp team to research various types of costs, develop cost models, perform a techno-economic assessment and scenario analyses, determine the optimal price point, perform competitor assessments, and identify strategic partners, suppliers, and manufacturers. This project is funded by the Water Power Technologies Office.
- PhotoSil – LLNL (Cohort 17):PhotoSil is a new photopolymerization method for curing silicones, which will allow for the printing of silicone materials using commercial 3D printers. This project aims to conduct a set of experiments that will validate results and allow for the finalization of a new patent. The team will then incorporate results into a new formulation and test its ability to cure on commercial printers and connect with potential partners to solve industry pain points. This project is funded by the Office of Technology Transitions.
Learn more about the program and selected projects by visiting the Energy I-Corps webpage.
About the Department of Energy Office of Technology Transitions
The Department of Energy Office of Technology Transitions (OTT) is one of the largest supporters of technology commercialization in the federal government. Founded in 2015, OTT bolsters the technology industry's market skills and enables clean energy technologies to progress through research, development, demonstration, and to deployment into the private sector to meet our nation’s climate goals. Visit us at energy.gov/ott to learn more, and subscribe to receive our latest opportunities and accomplishments via email. Follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn.
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