105 Grants Will Support Scientific Innovation

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, U.S. Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette announced that the Department of Energy (DOE) will award 105 grants totaling $116 million to 92 small businesses in 31 states. Funded through DOE’s Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs, today’s selections are for Phase II research and development (R&D). Small businesses that demonstrated technical feasibility for innovations during their Phase I grants competed for funding for prototype or processes development during Phase II. In addition, prior Phase II awardees competed for second or third Phase II awards to continue prototype and process development. The median Phase II award is $1,100,000 for a period of two years.   

“As our country reopens, small businesses will play a critical role in the Nation’s economic recovery,” said Secretary Brouillette. “I am pleased the Department can aid in this recovery through the SBIR and STTR grant programs, which are helping spur growth by providing meaningful financial investment for innovative energy and science R&D at American small businesses.”

Selected grants from each of the R&D program offices that provided funding for the 105 projects:

  • Office of Cybersecurity, Energy Security, and Emergency Response
    • Physical Layer Authentication of Wired Networks 
  • Office of Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation
    • A Compact, Low Power Device Using Mie Resonance for Multispectral Polarization Image Detection
    • Multimodal Sensor Fusion and Exploitation for Proliferation Detection
  • Office of Electricity 
    • An Auditable Blockchain for Smart Grid Data Integrity and Immutability
    • Protective Device for LV Underground Grid-type Networks and Network Equipment
  • Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy
    • Advanced Manufacturing of Low-Cost Building Integrated Organic Photovoltaic Modules
    • Innovative Anchoring System for Floating Offshore Wind
  • Office of Fossil Energy
    • CO2 to Methanol Using Plasma Catalysis at Atmospheric Pressure
    • Automated Data Collection and Transmission System for Subsurface CO2 Monitoring
  • Office of Fusion Energy Sciences
    • Design and fabrication of Ultrafast Pixel Array Camera
    • Key Components for the implementation of high repetition rate Petawatt-class lasers
  • Office of High Energy Physics
    • High Gradient Accelerating Structure for Low Energy Protons
    • Optimization of Additive Manufacturing Technique for 3D Superconducting Multi-Qubit Systems
  • Office of Nuclear Energy
    • Video Camera for Harsh Nuclear Environments
    • Ultra-Thin, 3-D Ceramic Matrix Composite Cladding

Small businesses play a major role in spurring innovation and creating jobs in the U.S. economy.  The SBIR and STTR programs were created by Congress to leverage small businesses to advance innovation at federal agencies. Additional information on the DOE SBIR and STTR programs is available at the SBIR/STTR Programs Office:  https://science.osti.gov/sbir.

More information about the projects announced today is available at the following link: https://science.osti.gov/sbir/Awards.

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