$130 Million for ARPA-E Fourth Round of Funding: Concept Papers Due May 19

On April 20, U.S. Department of Energy Secretary Steven Chu announced that up to $130 million from the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) will be made available to develop five new program areas. ARPA-E’s fourth round of funding focuses on rare earth alternatives and breakthroughs in biofuels, thermal storage, grid controls, and solar power electronics.

Concept papers for all five programs are due May 19, 2011. The deadline for submission of full applications is to be determined.

The five new funding opportunity announcements are:

• Rare Earth Alternatives in Critical Technologies for Energy (REACT),
• Plants Engineered To Replace Oil (PETRO),
• High Energy Advanced Storage (HEATS),
• Green Electricity Network Integration (GENI), and
• Solar Agile Delivery of Electrical Power Technology (Solar ADEPT).