The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced 43 million dollars in funding for projects that will advance research, development, demonstration, and deployment (RDD&D) in several areas critical to the future of advanced batteries.
The funding will drive innovations in low-cost electric vehicle (EV) battery electrode, cell, or pack manufacturing; improve battery safety and reduce cascading failures; and strengthen the domestic supply chain of inexpensive and abundant battery materials.
This funding is aligned with strategies detailed in the U.S. National Blueprint for Transportation Decarbonization, which is a landmark interagency framework of strategies and actions to remove all emissions from the transportation sector by 2050, by advancing battery technologies that can power safe and efficient zero-emission EVs.
DOE’s Vehicle Technologies Office (VTO) will supply the funding and build on the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy’s leadership in RDD&D of new technologies leading to efficient, clean, and affordable mobility options.
Topic areas in VTO’s Fiscal Year 2024 Batteries funding opportunity include:
- Improving 12V lead-acid battery service life and performance requirements to meet critical safety features while reducing cost.Â
- Developing cell, module, pack, vehicle, or structural strategies that reduce cascading effects of thermal issues that could lead to EV fires.Â
- Conducting research and development that would reduce the manufacturing cost at the electrode, cell, or pack level by at least 30% compared to the state of the art, and increasing throughput by at least 50% compared to the state of the art.
- Researching, fabricating, and testing silicon-based lithium battery cells that meet EV battery performance requirements.
- Developing high energy density cathodes containing metal chalcogenide, oxide, or halide materials that surpass the energy density of state-of-the art nickel cathodes.Â
As part of this approach, VTO encourages the participation of underserved communities and underrepresented groups.
Applicants are highly encouraged to include individuals from groups historically underrepresented in STEM on their project teams.
Topic areas
This FOA has five topic areas:
Topic 1 Improved 12 Volt Lead Acid Batteries for Safety-Critical Electric Vehicle Applications, focused on improving the service life and performance requirements to meet critical safety features while reducing cost (ten million dollars).
Topic 2 Develop Vehicle or Structural Level Strategies to Reduce the Likelihood of the Cascading Effects of Electric Vehicle Fires, focused on university-led teams conducting research at the cell, pack, and vehicle level (3.9 million dollars).
Topic 3 Battery Electrode, Cell, and Pack Manufacturing Cost Reduction, focused on developing improved manufacturing technologies for EV battery electrodes, cells, and packs (12.5 million dollars).
Topic 4 Silicon-Based Anodes for Lithium-Ion Batteries, focused on researching, fabricating, and testing lithium battery cells implementing silicon electrodes with a commercially available cathode technology to achieve cell and cost performance targets (more than 350 Wh/kg of usable energy with a cell cost target of less than 70 dollars/kWh) (12.5 million dollars).
Topic 5 High Energy Density Conversion Cathodes, focused on developing high energy density battery cells containing metal chalcogenide, oxide, or halide cathodes by solving key challenges for the cathode, electrolyte, electrode integrity, or safety (4.05 million dollars).
