Another round of funding has arrived to the doorsteps of five United States Department of Energy Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy companies to the tune of $100 million from private sector financing, according to Vice President Joe Biden.
The financing covers five companies that received sums between $1.5 million and $6 million totaling $15.5 million from the Energy department under the Recovery and Reinvestment Act in 2009 and 2010 to develop advancements in clean energy technologies namely, North Carolina-based Phononic Devices, California-based Primus Power and Transphorm, Colorado-based OPX Biotechnologies, and research center Stanford University.
These institutions were tasked to develop advanced grid scale batteries, innovate new approaches to biofuels or waste heat recovery, among others.
«America is at its best when we innovate – and ARPA-E supports the very best of American innovation. These five companies are swinging for the fences, pioneering new technologies that could help answer the energy challenge and create jobs,» said Mr. Biden.
Phononic Devices and Primus Power will be given $11 million to design devices to capture waste heat from power plants and vehicles and turn it into electricity, and to develop a battery that can store renewable energy which it can release through the grid during peak load times, respectively.
Transphorm will be provided with $25 million to develop compact semiconductors that can quickly switch electrical currents; OPX Biotechnologies with $36.5 million to develop bacteria that will produce liquid biofuels using electricity and carbon dioxide; and Stanford University with $25 million to develop a high-tech energy storage device that can withstand thousands of charges without a drop in performance.
The ARPA-E, whose objective is to research on energy challenges and create innovations to address those challenges, was put in place in 2007 and given an initial funding of $400 million from the economic stimulus bill of February 2009.
The Obama administration forecasts a rise in renewable energy technology investments by as much as $2 trillion over the next decade.
