The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Electricity (OE) has released three Notices of Funding Opportunity (NOFOs) worth about $18.4 million for programs to support research and development of electricity grid technologies.
The programs will reduce the cost of HVDC circuit breakers, improve risk assessment and communication for grid operators, and ensure communities respond to unanticipated energy storage system failures.
Upgrading critical systems and controls will extend the life of existing grid components, increase the grid’s ability to receive, transmit, and deliver electricity, as well as improve communications to help predict and prevent failures. Moreover, quantifying and communicating risk and uncertainties to decision-makers and human operators enables accurate and effective prediction, prevention, and mitigation of failures in the grid.
The three funding opportunities are:
- $8 million for the Renewable Integration Management with Innovative High-Voltage Direct Current Power Circuit Breakers (REIMAGINE BREAKERS)
- $6.25 million for the Human-Centric Analytics for Resilient & Modernized Power sYstems (HARMONY)
- $4.125 million for the Blue Sky Training Program
REIMAGINE BREAKERS
OE is providing $7 million and the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy’s (EERE) Wind Energy Technologies Office (WETO) is providing $1 million to this joint funding opportunity for the REIMAGINE BREAKERS program. This NOFO will support research and development related to HVDC power circuit breakers.
This NOFO aims to support grid modernization and the advancement of wind energy by reducing the cost of high-voltage circuit breaker technology, therefore supporting widespread adoption of HVDC transmission systems. The deadline to apply for REIMAGINE BREAKERS is February 28, 2025.
HARMONY
This NOFO from OE intends to improve risk assessment and communication for grid operators. Grid transformation trends, which include the integration of renewable energy and EV charging, are changing assumptions about power system operations. This is causing significant gaps in assessing and resolving systematic uncertainties in power grids.
Better understanding the impacts to power grid operations requires more advanced analytics to help grid operators to predict, prevent, and mitigate cascading failures in power grids. These analytics are also important for enabling renewable integration, increasing infrastructure decentralization, and infrastructure interdependency under a changing climate. Advanced analytics extracting actionable information from data and knowledge should not only consider systems’ physics but also human factors for effectiveness.
While concept papers for HARMONY funding are due on January 27, 2025, full applications are due on March 20, 2025.
Blue Sky Training Program
The Blue Sky Training Program will train first responders, law enforcement agencies, local communities, utilities, authorities having jurisdictions, and others to respond to unanticipated failures of energy storage systems. This NOFO will bring together stakeholders to participate in planning exercises and boots-on-the-ground drills to outline roles and responsibilities and ensure the safety of the hosting community, personnel, as well as infrastructure.
The deadline to apply for Blue Sky funding is February 2, 2025.
