The Energy Department announced $10 million to test prototypes designed to generate clean, renewable electricity from ocean waves and help diversify America’s energy portfolio. The Energy Department-supported demonstrations at the U.S. Navy’s wave energy test site off Hawaii’s island of Oahu will help develop reliable wave energy options and collect important performance and cost data for wave energy conversion (WEC) devices. The U.S. Department of Energy also announced up to $10 million to demonstrate and deploy innovative alternate transportation technologies for cargo vehicles, designed to help reduce U.S. reliance on gasoline, diesel, and oil imports.
The Energy Department plans to test two WEC devices at depths of 60 and 80 meters at the open-water site offshore from Marine Corps Base Hawaii in Kaneohe Bay. These projects will enable the Energy Department to evaluate technology performance, reliability and cost of energy to achieve cost-competitive wave energy deployments in the future.
The two-phase demonstration projects will focus on WEC devices in the late stages of technology development–those ready to be tested at close to full-scale in the open-ocean environment. The first phase of this funding opportunity will optimize designs and plan for the deployment and testing of WEC systems. The second phase will support permitting, fabrication, deployment, retrieval, and decommissioning of these systems after 12 months of testing and data collection.
Electrifying cargo transportation vehicles and infrastructure will reduce petroleum use, carbon emissions, and air pollution at transportation hubs, such as ports. The Energy Department seeks applicants to demonstrate cost-effective zero-emission cargo transport systems and collect data on the performance and cost, to help clarify the benefits and viability of this approach. This funding opportunity is open to local governments and private companies, with federal funds matched at a 50% cost share.
Source: Dept. Of Energy
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