Funding Wizard

Challenges and Opportunities for Building-Integrated Photovoltaics The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) Solar Energy Technologies Office (SETO) and Building Technologies Office (BTO) are requesting information on technical and commercial challenges and opportunities for building-integrated photovoltaic systems. This RFI is intended to identify and quantify remaining barriers and explore key opportunities to inform future strategy program development in this area.

The RFSP supports partnerships that connect public and private resources to plan and develop local or regional food systems. The RFSP focuses on building and strengthening local or regional food economy viability and resilience, and this includes pandemic response and recovery.Applicants will work with their partners to catalyze the development of local or regional food systems. Applicants will coordinate efforts within the partnership to set priorities, connect resources and services, and measure progress towards common goals.Partnerships are authorized to:•Determine the size and scope of the local or regional food system in which the project’s goals, outreach objectives, and eligible activities are to be carried out.•Coordinate with AMS to receive technical assistance; and•Conduct outreach and education for potential participation in the partnership agreement and eligible activities.Partnerships must bring a variety of financial and technical capabilities, demonstrate experience or readiness to work effectively and collaboratively with public and private entities across sectors, and present innovative, sustainable, and measurable approaches to achieving the project’s goals. RFSP grant recipients may apply for other LAMP programs on behalf of producers or eligible entities that desire to participate in eligible activities under the partnership agreement.

The objective of this grant program is to assist viable Independent Producers, Agricultural Producer Groups, Farmer and Rancher Cooperatives, and Majority-Controlled Producer-Based Businesses in starting or expanding value-added activities related to the processing and/or marketing of Value-Added Agricultural Products. Grants will be awarded competitively for either planning or working capital projects directly related to the processing and/or marketing of value-added products. Generating new products, creating and expanding marketing opportunities, and increasing producer income are the end goals of the program. All proposals must demonstrate economic viability and sustainability to compete for funding.

Program Overview: The Mining Innovations for Negative Emissions Resource Recovery (MINER) program’s aim is to support the development of commercial-ready technologies that give the United States a net-zero or net negative emissions pathway toward increased domestic supplies of copper, nickel, lithium, cobalt, rare earth elements, and other critical elements required for the transition to clean energy. The lack of a secure domestic supply of these minerals poses a significant supply chain risk for the United States, especially with regard to batteries, renewable energy generation, and transmission. Meanwhile, the domestic mining industry faces the rapid depletion of high-profit deposits, increased cost of mining and processing, expensive, management, and accumulation of tailings, resulting in an overall reduced return of investment by conventional mining methods. Consequently, the Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA–E) is issuing this Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) with objectives to support the development of technology and approaches to: (1) decrease comminution energy by 50% compared to state-of-the-art; (2) increase yield of energy-relevant minerals by reducing unrecovered energy-relevant minerals in the tailings by 50% compared to state-of-the-art; and (3) enabling the negative emissions production of key minerals by sequestering >10 wt.% CO2e per metric ton of ore processed. Four categories have been identified as necessary to achieve these goals and are discussed in detail later: I. Mineral comminution II. Improvements to beneficiation and processing to increase mineral yield III. Carbon negative reactions IV. Sensing, analyzing and enabling carbonation potential and mineralization This FOA supports the development of viable technologies to achieve these goals cost-effectively with the potential to reach commercial scalability. Identified within this FOA are technical categories of interest in Section I.F. Also provided within this FOA are performance targets for the technical categories of interest in Section I.G. Lastly, Sections I.H and I.I of the FOA provide information on technoeconomic analysis (TEA) and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) requirements, respectively. To view the FOA in its entirety, please visit https://arpa-e-foa.energy.gov.

Overview: The Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA-E), an organization within the Department of Energy (DOE), is chartered by Congress in the America COMPETES Act of 2007 (P.L. 110-69), as amended by the America COMPETES Reauthorization Act of 2010 (P.L. 111-358), as further amended by the Energy Act of 2020 (P.L. 116-260) to: “(A) to enhance the economic and energy security of the United States through the development of energy technologies that— (i) reduce imports of energy from foreign sources; (ii) reduce energy-related emissions, including greenhouse gases; (iii) improve the energy efficiency of all economic sectors; (iv) provide transformative solutions to improve the management, clean-up, and disposal of radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel; and (v) improve the resilience, reliability, and security of infrastructure to produce, deliver, and store energy; and (B) to ensure that the United States maintains a technological lead in developing and deploying advanced energy technologies.” ARPA-E issues this Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) under its authorizing statute codified at 42 U.S.C. § 16538. The FOA and any awards made under this FOA are subject to 2 C.F.R. Part 200 as supplemented by 2 C.F.R. Part 910. ARPA-E funds research on and the development of transformative science and technology solutions to address the energy and environmental missions of the Department. The agency focuses on technologies that can be meaningfully advanced with a modest investment over a defined period of time in order to catalyze the translation from scientific discovery to early-stage technology. For the latest news and information about ARPA-E, its programs and the research projects currently supported, see: http://arpa-e.energy.gov/. ARPA-E funds transformational research. Existing energy technologies generally progress on established “learning curves” where refinements to a technology and the economies of scale that accrue as manufacturing and distribution develop drive down the cost/performance metric in a gradual fashion. This continual improvement of a technology is important to its increased commercial deployment and is appropriately the focus of the private sector or the applied technology offices within DOE. By contrast, ARPA-E supports transformative research that has the potential to create fundamentally new learning curves. ARPA-E technology projects typically start with cost/performance estimates well above the level of an incumbent technology. Given the high risk inherent in these projects, many will fail to progress, but some may succeed in generating a new learning curve with a projected cost/performance metric that is significantly lower than that of the incumbent technology. ARPA-E funds technology with the potential to be disruptive in the marketplace. The mere creation of a new learning curve does not ensure market penetration. Rather, the ultimate value of a technology is determined by the marketplace, and impactful technologies ultimately become disruptive – that is, they are widely adopted and displace existing technologies from the marketplace or create entirely new markets. ARPA-E understands that definitive proof of market disruption takes time, particularly for energy technologies. Therefore, ARPA-E funds the development of technologies that, if technically successful, have clear disruptive potential, e.g., by demonstrating capability for manufacturing at competitive cost and deployment at scale. ARPA-E funds applied research and development. The Office of Management and Budget defines “applied research” as an “original investigation undertaken in order to acquire new knowledge…directed primarily towards a specific practical aim or objective” and defines “experimental development” as “creative and systematic work, drawing on knowledge gained from research and practical experience, which is directed at producing new products or processes or improving existing products or processes.”1 Applicants interested in receiving financial assistance for basic research (defined by the Office of Management and Budget as “experimental or theoretical work undertaken primarily to acquire new knowledge of the underlying foundations of phenomena and observable facts”)2 should contact the DOE’s Office of Science (http://science.energy.gov/). Office of Science national scientific user facilities (http://science.energy.gov/user-facilities/) are open to all researchers, including ARPA-E Applicants and awardees. These facilities provide advanced tools of modern science including accelerators, colliders, supercomputers, light sources and neutron sources, as well as facilities for studying the nanoworld, the environment, and the atmosphere. Projects focused on early-stage R&D for the improvement of technology along defined roadmaps may be more appropriate for support through the DOE applied energy offices including: the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (http://www.eere.energy.gov/), the Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management (https://www.energy.gov/fecm/office-fossil-energy-and-carbon-management), the Office of Nuclear Energy (http://www.energy.gov/ne/office-nuclear-energy), and the Office of Electricity (https://www.energy.gov/oe/office-electricity).
To obtain a copy of the Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) please go to the ARPA-E website at https://arpa-e-foa.energy.gov. To apply to this FOA, Applicants must register with and submit application materials through ARPA-E eXCHANGE (https://arpa-e-foa.energy.gov/Registration.aspx). For detailed guidance on using ARPA-E eXCHANGE, please refer to the ARPA-E eXCHANGE User Guide (https://arpa-e-foa.energy.gov/Manuals.aspx). ARPA-E will not review or consider concept papers submitted through other means. For problems with ARPA-E eXCHANGE, email ExchangeHelp@hq.doe.gov (with FOA name and number in the subject line). Questions about this FOA? Check the Frequently Asked Questions available at http://arpa-e.energy.gov/faq. For questions that have not already been answered, email ARPA-E-CO@hq.doe.gov. Agency

The DOE Office of Science (SC) program in Biological and Environmental Research (BER) hereby announces its interest in receiving applications for a Research Development and Partnership Pilot (RDPP) within BER’s Earth and Environmental Systems Sciences Division (EESSD). BER has a goal to broaden and diversify institutional representation in the EESSD portfolio with institutions that have limited familiarity and/or engagement with EESSD supported efforts. BER recognizes that there are many academic scientists at institutions not currently supported by BER who have limited familiarity with EESSD programs and research support mechanisms; and BER further recognizes that this lack of familiarity can be a significant barrier to participation in BER research activities, application to BER EESSD funding opportunities, and use of BER scientific user facilities. This barrier is exacerbated by limited opportunities to gain such familiarity. To help provide technical assistance to build capacity and achieve the goal of broadening institutional participation, this funding opportunity announcement (FOA) will provide seed funding for institutions to: 1) develop new partnerships with other academic institutions and/or national laboratories to enable future participation in EESSD-relevant research; 2) facilitate participation in planned EESSD research programmatic and user facility outreach and training activities; and 3) foster the development of climate and environmental science research and training capacity at under-represented institutions.

The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Technologies Office (HFTO) seeks input on priority areas that will advance domestic manufacturing and recycling of clean hydrogen technologies, including fuel cells, storage equipment, and other hydrogen related components as specified below; and on priority areas that will advance electrolyzer technologies for affordable clean hydrogen production, in alignment with the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) and the mission of DOE’s Hydrogen Energy Earthshot to reach the goal of $1 per 1 kilogram in 1 decade (“1 1 1”). This Request for Information(RFI) was developed in coordination with the Advanced Manufacturing Office. This RFI is issued to obtain feedback on the status of and opportunities for technologies that support goals in BIL section 40314, amending the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (EPACT). The BIL added a new section 815 on clean hydrogen manufacturing and recycling research, development, and demonstration (RD&D) and a new section 816 for the establishment of the Clean Hydrogen Electrolysis Program to EPACT. The EPACT Sec. 815 activities are grouped into a Clean Hydrogen Manufacturing Initiative (815a) focused on enhancing domestic manufacturing of clean hydrogen use, storage, and related equipment and a Clean Hydrogen Technology Recycling RD&D Program (815b) that covers recycling of equipment for clean hydrogen processing, delivery, storage, and use, including fuel cells. The Clean Hydrogen Electrolysis Program in section 816 expands on DOE’s existing, comprehensive Program on electrolysis and is a research, development, demonstration, commercialization, and deployment program aimed at improving efficiency, increasing durability, and reducing capital costs of electrolyzers, thus facilitating the commercialization of clean hydrogen electrolyzer technology. DOE does not intend to publish information collected through this RFI; input will be used to develop and refine the programs. The full text of this RFI is available on EERE Exchange (https://eere-exchange.energy.gov). Responses to this RFI must be submitted electronically to H2RFI@ee.doe.gov no later than 5:00 p.m. (ET) on March 29th, 2022. If possible, please copy and paste the RFI questions and use them as a template for your response. Responses must be provided as attachments to an email. It is recommended that attachments with file sizes exceeding 25 MB be compressed (i.e., zipped) to ensure message delivery. Responses must be provided as a Microsoft Word (*.docx) or Adobe Acrobat (*.pdf) attachment to the email. Only electronic responses will be accepted. DOE will not respond to individual submissions or publicly publish a compendium of responses. A response to this RFI will not be viewed as a binding commitment to develop or pursue the project or ideas discussed. Respondents are requested to provide the following information at the start of their response to this RFI: • Company/institution name • Company/institution contact • Contact's address, phone number, and e-mail address.

Community Air Protection funds allow for immediate actions to improve the air quality of the most impacted communities across the state, while the other aspects of AB 617 are developed and implemented. Partnering with communities is essential to the success of these incentives, and both the California Air Resources Board (CARB) and air districts are looking to local community members and groups to help identify funding priorities

Notice of Funding Opportunity (NFO) Summary Up to approximately $1 billion will be made available for the Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities projects through this funding opportunity, which will build markets and invest in America’s climate-smart farmers, ranchers, and forest owners to strengthen U.S. rural and agricultural communities. Through the Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities, USDA will support the production and marketing of climate-smart commodities through a set of pilot projects that provide voluntary incentives through partners to producers and land owners, including early adopters, to: a. implement climate-smart production practices, activities, and systems on working lands, b. measure/quantify, monitor and verify the carbon and greenhouse gas (GHG) benefits associated with those practices, and c. develop markets and promote the resulting climate-smart commodities. Grant agreements under this funding opportunity will be with a single entity, i.e., “partner”; however, USDA encourages multiple partners to coordinate on projects. A range of public and private entities are eligible to apply, as described in Section C of the Full Announcement which can be found in the Related Documents tab of this opportunity. Proposals must provide a plan to pilot implementation of climate-smart agriculture and/or forestry practices on a large-scale, including meaningful involvement of small or historically underserved producers, consistent with spirit of the Justice40 initiative; a quantification, monitoring, reporting, and verification plan; and a plan to develop markets and promote climate-smart commodities generated as a result of project activities. Funding will be provided through two funding pools. Proposals in the first funding pool (requests for amounts from $5 million to $100 million per proposal) will be large-scale pilot projects that emphasize the greenhouse gas benefits of climate-smart commodity production and include direct, meaningful benefits to a representative cross-section of production agriculture, including small and/or historically underserved producers. Proposals in the second funding pool (requests for amounts from $250,000 to $4,999,999 per proposal) are limited to particularly innovative pilot projects with an emphasis on · enrollment of small and/or underserved producers and/or · monitoring, reporting, and verification activities developed at minority-serving institutions. All projects must be tied to the development of markets and promotion of climate-smart commodities. For the purposes of this funding opportunity, a “climate-smart commodity” is an agricultural commodity that is produced using agricultural (farming, ranching, or forestry) practices that reduce greenhouse gas emissions or sequester carbon. Markets for climate-smart commodities may include companies or processors sourcing climate-smart commodities to meet internal targets or other supply chain goals, biofuel and renewable energy markets, companies seeking to sell branded consumer products, or other opportunities that could provide a premium or additional revenue for participating producers and land owners. Sufficient incentives to encourage producer participation, as well as, generation of verifiable greenhouse gas reductions and carbon sequestration are critical to project success and will be considered in the evaluation criteria. For new users of Grants.gov, see the Full Announcement located in the Related Documents tab of this opportunity for information about steps required before submitting an application via Grants.gov. Key Dates Applicants must submit their applications via Grants.gov by 11:59 pm Eastern Time on: · April 8, 2022 for the first funding pool (proposals from $5 million to $100 million) · May 27, 2022 for the second funding pool (proposals from $250,000 to $4,999,999). For technical issues with Grants.gov, contact Grants.gov Applicant Support at 1-800-518-4726 or support@grants.gov. Awarding agency staff cannot support applicants regarding Grants.gov accounts. For inquiries specific to the content of the NFO requirements, contact the federal awarding agency contact (found in section G of the Full Announcement located in the Related Documents tab of this opportunity.). Please limit questions to those regarding specific information contained in this NFO (such as dates, page numbers, clarification of discrepancies, etc.). Questions related to eligibility or the merits of a specific proposal will not be addressed. Information on available webinars and other supporting information for this funding opportunity will be posted at: https://www.usda.gov/climate-solutions/climate-smart-commodities The agency anticipates making selections by Summer 2022 and expects to execute awards by September 30, 2022. These dates are estimates and are subject to change. Federal Financial Assistance Training The funding available through this NFO is Federal financial assistance. Grants 101 Training is highly recommended for those seeking knowledge about Federal financial assistance. The training is free and available to the public via https://www.cfo.gov/grants-training/. It consists of five modules covering each of the following topics: 1) laws, regulations, and guidance; 2) financial assistance mechanisms; 3) uniform guidance on administrative requirements; 4) cost principles; and 5) risk management and single audit. USDA ‘s Farm Production and Conservation (FPAC) agencies also apply Federal financial assistance regulations to certain non-assistance awards (e.g., non-assistance cooperative agreements).

Through the Inclusive Energy Innovation Prize, DOE aims to fund organizations for ongoing and/or proposed activities related to climate and clean energy that support, build trust, and strengthen relationships and partnerships with disadvantaged communities. Specifically, this prize seeks to enable and enhance business and technology incubation, acceleration, and other community-based and university-based entrepreneurship and innovation in climate and clean energy technologies.

Up to 10 organizations will share a total prize pool of up to $2.5 million.

The goals of the Inclusive Energy Innovation Prize are to:

• Enable clean energy and climate innovation, and entrepreneurship programming and capabilities at colleges and universities that serve large populations of students underrepresented in STEM, Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs), community colleges, and undergraduate institutions.
• Create or increase participation in clean energy and climate-smart job training and job placement/hiring, including programs that target participation from disadvantaged communities, including formerly incarcerated individuals and youth transitioning out of foster care. Workforce training could cover identifying energy efficiencies and greenhouse gas inventories, renewable energy manufacturing, and deployment.
• Foster grassroots innovation related to just and equitable clean energy deployment through activities focusing on community-centric networks and bottom-up solutions for sustainable development, based on the needs of the communities involved
• Identify and fund activities that will help disadvantaged communities become aware of, apply into or otherwise secure DOE funding or other federal, state, local government or private (for-profit or nonprofit) funding, in support of the government’s Justice40 goals.
• Enable the development of replicable clean energy transitions that deliver just and equitable benefits to disadvantaged communities in support of the government’s Justice40 goals.

Important Dates

• Prize Opens: September 2021
• Prize Closes: 5 p.m. ET on February 25, 2022
• Phase One Winner Announcement & Awards: March 2022 (anticipated)
• Phase Two Begins: March 2023 (anticipated)

Replacing your old and inefficient air conditioner units can save more money than you think

Incentives are available for the installation of new high-efficiency air conditioner (AC) units replacing your existing and operating air conditioner units. As your AC unit approaches or reaches its useful life expectancy of 15 years, replacing it with a new high efficient AC unit can save 40-60% on electricity compared to the existing unit.

 
If you are ready to replace your old unit with a new high efficiency air conditioner unit, please download the following information and contact us about your project. (All Projects are subject to funding availability)

Program Steps
 

• Download the Program Guidelines and Air Conditioner Incentive Table documents.
• Download the Air Conditioner Application: (Re-name file using account address and Name)
• Please download and complete all required forms (including the tax forms - W-9 & 590)
• Questions about the program details simply fill out our online form. A representative will contact you within 2-3 business days.