Award Data

The primary challenges for creating renewable fuels are the ability to process inexpensive non-food feedstocks into biofuels that meet all quality specification, perform indistinguishably from petroleum-based fuels and are compatible with current infrastructure.Our Phase I project demonstrated the feasibility of producing biofuels from waste greases using a novel hydrothermal, continuous-flow cata ...

In topic 11.b, Dispatchable Geothermal Operations, DOE seeks to enable more widespread deployment of geothermal as a dispatchable energy source.TerraCOH’s CO2 Plume Geothermal (CPG™) and Earth Battery™ technologies are ideally suited to meet DOE’s needs.Conventional geothermal power technology has generally been limited to use as a baseload power source, but with increasing penetration of ...

Automobiles (cars and trucks for instance) are the predominant mode of transportation in the United States. These vehicles are powered by internal combustion engines that consume fossil fuels such as gasoline. Improving the efficiency of internal combustion engines is an ongoing challenge of enormous impact to energy consumption in the world. In order to improve engine efficiency and thus fuel eco ...

75243-This project will develop a non-intrusive two-phase flow sensor as part of an intelligent diagnostics system to increase the safety of existing and future nuclear power plants. The electromagnetic flow sensor will meet the requirement of two-phase flow measurements and provide critical hydrodynamic parameters to the diagnostic system. To achieve this objective, an existing single phase flo ...

75333-Nano-indentation is the primary technique for assessing the nanomechanical behavior of small volumes of materials. With this technique the load required to produce a given displacement into the sample by a sharp diamond tip is measured, and the hardness of the material is derived. However, the microstructural behavior that causes the mechanical response of the material is not often readily ...

75320-New types of neutron detector technologies are required for the next generation of neutron sources in the United States, embodied at two extremes in size by the SNS national laboratory and the regional university-based LENS facility. For many neutron scattering instruments, detector specifications call for high rate capability, large area coverage, high spatial resolution, and low gamma sen ...

75585-The U.S. uses over 3.5 trillion cubic feet of hydrogen annually. This project will demonstrate the feasibility of producing low-cost hydrogen from natural gas by eliminating the expensive catalyst and complex CO removal processes in conventional hydrogen production. The process will increase hydrogen quality, reduce the production cost, and be more competitive. Furthermore, the process wi ...

75534-High energy electrical transformers, underground oil-filled cables, switch gear, and related devices are critical parts of the electrical energy grid, which transmits and distributes electrical energy. While excess heat generated in the operation of these devices makes their performance less efficient, such heat is also capable of doing work. Therefore, this project will develop a new appa ...