Award Data

"Given the exigency to rein in our nation’s energy consumption and carbon emissions, a nationwide deployment of Geothermal Heat Pumps (GHPs) would help mitigate our demands on the earth’s resources by reducing energy requirements for heating and cooling. Geothermal Heat Pump systems are a proven renewable energy resource that provides significant energy savings as compared to typical heating ...

"Since March 2006, Boulder, Colorado based Cool Energy, Inc. (CEI) has prototyped three generations of a novel low-temperature Stirling engine to generate electricity for low-to-medium temperature (100°C to 250°C) heat sources including solar thermal, geothermal and waste heat. With a marketing name for the SolarHeart® Engine, in its most recent operation in April, 2010, over 1800 watts of out ...

"The large-scale production of nanoparticles of the highest purity will be accomplished by the Eltron Solvent-free Powder Synthesis (ESPS) system described in this proposal. Since conventional particle size reduction methods are unable to reduce particles to the nano-scale and tend to reduce the purity of the powders, the ESPS system has been designed for direct yield of high purity and nano-size ...

"As part of its mission to protect human health and the environment, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is dedicated to developing and promoting innovative cleanup strategies that restore contaminated sites to productive use, reduce associated costs, and promote environmental stewardship. However, in adopting this strategy there will be an increasing need to implement a more cost effective, ...

"The oil refining industry is one of the most significant sources of greenhouse gas emissions, with considerable contribution from downstream activities. CO2 emissions from refineries rank third among the stationary producers (after power and cement industries), accounting for about 4% of the global CO2 emissions, approaching 1 billion tons per year. In addition, the oil refineries also emit sig ...

"The environmental Protection Agency is soliciting innovations for the development of small unit drinking water systems that will inactivate contaminants including pesticides, organic pollutants, pharmaceuticals, personal care products, and pathogens. In the US, 85% of all public water systems serve fewer than 3,300 people, thus these water systems are considered small. For providing these small ...

Aerodyne Research Inc. (ARI) and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) plan to develop an efficient catalytic system to convert biomass into olefins for the production of hydrocarbons in the gasoline, diesel, and/or jet fuel range by way of catalytic fast pyrolysis. Conversion of lignocellulosic feedstocks from resources as varied as corn stover, grasses, wood, and sugar cane bagasse is ...

One effective way to lower the weight, thus decreasing the carbon fiber usage and lowering the cost, of a CFRP tank is to improve the mechanical properties of the CFRP composite resin matrix using nano-reinforcement. Using the resin matrix itself as a source of composite strength, along with the carbon fiber reinforcement, results in a tank that requires less carbon fiber material. This solution d ...

Current efforts of DOE to create future lightweight systems in order to attain significant energy saving, cost reduction and improved efficiency requires development of advanced nanostructured lightweight composite materials with improved ductility and high tensile strength. Magnesium (Mg) with a density of approximately two-thirds of aluminum is the lightest structural material. Despite this adva ...

III-V semiconductors based solar cells display the highest sunlight conversion efficiency. Nevertheless, the material cost of current III-Vs and their fabrication process is very high which impedes their use for flat panel, large market applications. This project aims to explore, evaluate and implement defect tolerant high efficiency tandem solar cells based on more earth abundant III-V materials ...