Award Data

C53-20b-271305The prospect of nuclear power produced with advanced molten salt-cooled reactor (MSR) designs has garnered the attention of the Department of Energy in conjunction with the private sector. The salts are used to transfer heat from the reacting fuel. All designs describe a chemically stable salt with a melting point near 500°C, heated by the nuclear reaction to a temperature near 700 ...

The prospect of nuclear power produced with advanced molten salt-cooled reactor (MSR) designs has garnered the attention of the Department of Energy in conjunction with the private sector. Modern designs describe a chemically stable salt such as FLiNaK with a melting point below 500°C, heated by the nuclear reaction to a temperature near 700°C. Continuous operation of MSR heat-exchange loops req ...

Access to the earth’s subsurface requires technologies that can operate at extremely high temperatures and pressures. Enhanced geothermal systems (EGS) require directional drilling deep (10,000 meters) into hot wells with temperature profiles exceeding 325 ºC; while making better use of each well through techniques such as fracking and zonal isolation. Establishing a well requires electronics t ...

Access to the earth’s subsurface requires technologies that can operate at extremely high temperatures and pressures. Enhanced geothermal systems (EGS) require drilling deep and hot wells; while making better use of each well through techniques such as fracking and zonal isolation. Establishing a well requires monitoring electronics that can produce temperature, pressure and flow profiles in the ...

Power generation and transmission limits manifest themselves in the inability to respond to dynamic peak power demand. Load leveling can effectively support dynamic demand changes by having additional standby power generating capabilities. This is achieved by either having a generation and distribution infrastructure that matches the peak demand and it is operated under its full capacity or having ...

In this Phase II proposal, APEI, Inc. will continue development of its patented high temperature gate driver technology, enabling the next generation of high-efficiency, high power density converters. At the conclusion of Phase II, APEI, Inc. will have designed, fabricated, and tested a high temperature (300 C) SiC application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) gate driver. The fabricated SiC ASIC ...

Arkansas Power Electronics International, Inc. will design and develop a high performance, high voltage ( & gt; 15 kV) SiC MCPM that is low cost, manufacturable, reliable and reworkable. The target utility scale energy storage applications include power conversion systems for grid-tie, solar array, wind turbine, and vehicle-to-grid to aid in load leveling, frequency control, voltage fluctuations i ...

Friction is one of the major reasons for failure of gears and bearing surfaces used in traditional and nonrenewable energy systems such as power generators and wind turbines, and in other vital industries such as transportation, mining and construction. A recent Department of Energy report noted that reliability of wind turbine gearboxes is one of the major challenges to delivering an efficient wi ...

This STTR project seeks to develop high-voltage, high-performance Solid-State Fault Current Controller (SSFCC) technology utilizing Silicon Carbide (SiC) super gate-turn-off thyristors (SGTOs). Due to improved technical advantages, the proposed SSFCC technology will minimize fault-related power quality issues (i.e., voltage sags, oscillations, harmonics, etc.), improve network reliability (i.e., m ...

There is immediate need for a new generation of scintillation materials for nuclear physics research, high-energy radiation (x- and gamma-rays) screening/imaging, and passive detection of nuclear materials with improved quality and low production cost. Inorganic scintillators have high output efficiency, but relay on the growth of bulk crystal that is still a challenging task. Due to their relati ...