WPTO Announces Upcoming $10 Million Funding Opportunity to Advance Marine Energy Innovation

DOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy sent this bulletin at 08/24/2022 12:00 PM EDT

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Water Power Technologies Office

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Aug. 24, 2022

Banner announcing the newsletter name "The Water Column" with an image of the ocean at sunset behind it.

Welcome to the Water Column, a monthly snapshot of marine energy news and happenings. This month’s newsletter will take approximately nine minutes to read. 

Reach out to us at WaterPowerTechnologiesOffice@ee.doe.gov with any inquiries or suggestions.
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Did You Know?

The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Water Power Technologies Office (WPTO) prioritizes environmental protections and improvements across all its marine energy research and development projects. Learn more about how WPTO is supporting new technologies to advance monitoring equipment to protect the ocean and its inhabitants. 

Upcoming Deadlines

Announcements & Opportunities

Buoy floating in the ocean

WPTO Announces Upcoming Funding Opportunity to Advance Marine Energy Innovation: WPTO published a notice of intent to issue a $10 million funding opportunity to support wave energy technology innovation for seawater desalination, research and development for powering blue economy markets, and a feasibility assessment for a potential ocean current test facility. WPTO expects to release this funding opportunity in September 2022. The full notice of intent is available on DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) Exchange.

DOE and NOAA Announce Winners of Ocean Observing Prize BUILD Contest Designed to Advance Hurricane-Monitoring Systems: DOE and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) recently announced the winners of $500,000 in the BUILD Contest, the second contest in the Ocean Observing Prize’s DEVELOP Competition. The prize challenges competitors to develop solutions that use marine energy to power hurricane-monitoring systems. The teams tested their early-stage prototypes in the state-of-the-art Maneuvering and Seakeeping Basin—also known as the U.S. Navy’s indoor ocean—at the Naval Surface Warfare Center’s facility in Carderock, Maryland.

Twelve Small Businesses Receive Funding to Further Water Power Research and Development: DOE announced $12 million for 12 hydropower and marine energy projects as part of the Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer programs. These small business-led projects, selected by WPTO, will drive innovation in water power technologies and contribute to the Biden administration’s goals of a carbon-free power sector by 2035 and a net-zero-emissions economy by 2050. 

Applications Open for Next Round of TEAMER Technical Support: The TEAMER program is accepting applications for its next RFTS through Oct. 14, 2022. The access period for teams to utilize facilities for RFTS 8 is February 2023–November 2023. Sponsored by WPTO and directed by the Pacific Ocean Energy Trust (POET), TEAMER offers marine energy stakeholders and developers access to the nation’s best facilities and expertise to support marine renewable energy testing and development projects. Apply for the next round today.

Upcoming Events

New Functionality and WPTO Wave Hindcast Data in the Marine Energy Atlas

Aug. 30, 2022, 1–2 p.m., Online

Join the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) for a webinar highlighting updates to the Marine Energy Atlas. New features include expansion of the WPTO Wave Hindcast Dataset to 42 years and increased functionality to let users select data to capture only variables of interest and save queries. 

Register for the event.

Sandia Wave Energy Power Take-off Lab Virtual Launch Party

Aug. 30, 2022, 3–3:45 p.m. ET, Online

Join the Sandia National Laboratories (Sandia) as it hosts the Sandia Wave Energy Power Take-off Lab Virtual Launch Party. Take a virtual tour of Sandia’s newest wave energy laboratory and listen as marine energy researchers explain Sandia’s wave energy testing and research capabilities.

Register for the event.

2022 Ocean Renewable Energy Conference and UMERC + METS 

Sept. 13–15, 2022, Portland, Oregon

The University Marine Energy Research Community (UMERC) and Marine Energy Technology Symposium (METS) are jointly sponsoring a marine energy research conference in Portland, Oregon, Sept. 13–14, 2022. This event will provide a venue where technical experts can present marine energy research that helps accelerate sustainable technology development. The conference will be held in conjunction with the Ocean Renewable Energy Conference, which is taking place Sept. 14–15, 2022, and organized by POET. UMERC is a WPTO-sponsored program coordinated by POET.

Register for the event.

STEMtember Series: Careers in EERE: Renewable Power

Sept. 15, 2022, 12–2 p.m. ET, Online

Whether you’re a seasoned professional or a new graduate, this is the webinar for you! The event will feature leaders and employees from EERE, who will speak briefly about the importance of EERE’s mission, why now is the most exciting time to be part of the clean energy revolution, and the many types of career opportunities available within renewable power, including solar, wind, geothermal, and water power.

Register for the event.

PRIMRE Webinar: Release of the New Marine Energy Projects Database

Sept. 20, 2022, 11 a.m.–12 p.m. ET, Online

The Portal and Repository for Information on Marine Renewable Energy (PRIMRE) team now hosts a recently developed a new Marine Energy Projects Database that provides a catalog of devices, projects, and test sites around the world. The database provides a history of past efforts so the industry may learn from past successes and failures, provides additional outreach for developers, and displays a broad overview of progress in the sector. This webinar is open to the public.

Register for the event.

From Science to Consenting: OES-Environmental 2022 Highlights

Sept. 22, 2022, 11 a.m.–12 p.m. ET, Online 

Ocean Energy Systems’ (OES) annual public webinar will focus on risk retirement and the guidance documents as a whole, providing an update since the 2021 public webinar. The event will also cover current focus areas and new research topics such as tropical/subtropical environmental effects, displacement, and collision risk.

Register for the event. 

Wave Hindcast Webinar: High-Resolution Regional Hindcast Data Sets for Wave Energy Resource Characterization in U.S. Coastal Waters

Sept. 27, 2022, 11 a.m.–12 p.m. ET, Online 

To support nearshore wave climate research and wave energy development in the U.S., long-term, high-resolution, regional wave hindcast data sets were generated using unstructured-grid Simulating WAves Nearshore (SWAN) models for the U.S. coastal waters, including those bordering U.S. territory islands. The regional SWAN models were driven by global model outputs and run for a 42-year period from 1979 to 2020. Extensive model validation and error characterization were performed using buoy data collected and maintained by the National Data Buoy Center’s Coastal Data Information Program. During this webinar, Zhaoqing Yang and Gabriel García-Medina (Pacific Northwest National Laboratory), on behalf of the Marine Energy Resource Characterization Team (Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Sandia and NREL), will discuss the overall effort and highlight some technical details and challenges.

Register for the event.

WPTO R&D Deep Dive: Lessons Learned From Instrumenting and Deploying Composite Tidal Turbine Blades Webinar Registration

Sept. 27, 2022, 3–4 p.m. ET, Online

A research team from NREL will share best practices from their experience instrumenting structures that operate in harsh underwater environments and their experience trying to obtain structural loads data on a deployed marine energy device. Additionally, the webinar will address the following topics:

  • Why data acquisition for marine energy is difficult.
  • Options for strain measurements on operational tidal turbines.
  • Learning from wind energy: how to model, specify, install, calibrate, and analyze strain gauge data on deployed tidal turbines.
  • Lessons learned from the deployment of a data acquisition system on an operation tidal turbine.

Register for the event.

Products & Publications

WPTO Article: Ocean Observing Prize Supporters Help Build an Ecosystem to Support Marine Energy Pioneers: Through the Ocean Observing Prize, WPTO and the NOAA’s U.S. Integrated Ocean Observing System are challenging innovators, dreamers, and tinkers to develop needed technologies to better understand, map, and monitor the planet’s oceans. Read how prize sponsors are working with participants to help turn their designs into reality.   

WPTO Article: Exploring New Materials and Manufacturing Processes to Help Marine Energy Achieve Commercial Success: To explore what new materials—and manufacturing processes needed to make those materials—could do for the marine energy industry, WPTO convened researchers and industry experts to share what they might need to build more affordable, longer-lasting, and more efficient marine energy machines. More than 100 participants shared their perspectives on what research gaps persist and efforts WPTO should consider funding in the future. Learn more about the key takeaways from these discussions.

Inflation Reduction Act Boosts Family Owned Sea Life Monitoring Business: With the recent passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, nearly $375 billion in funding will go toward incentives and tax credits to increase renewable energy production and reduce climate pollution. For BIosonics, a sonar based sea life monitoring equipment company used to help facilitate site selection and permitting, the funding could give them the opportunity to continue their work in ensuring all marine energy is environmentally friendly. 

NREL’s Marine Energy Program Is Making Waves: The NREL marine energy program is working to harness the power surging through U.S. oceans and rivers to help build a 100% renewable energy future. From power generation to software simulations, NREL researchers are working with WPTO and other industry partners from concept to implementation.

Tour NREL’s Water Power Facilities and Capabilities in This 360-Degree Virtual Tour: At the NREL Flatirons Campus, the wave tank is emulating ocean-like conditions and dynamometers to evaluate power take-off systems for water power devices. Step inside NREL’s facilities in this 360-degree virtual tour. Explore NREL’s unique research capabilities and specialized state-of-the-art equipment, both of which are setting the stage for the next generation of clean energy.

OES Brochure Shares How Marine Energy Is Used Around the World: A recent OES brochure presents six interviews that offer insight into how different projects around the world are using the temperature of the ocean for heating, cooling, and power production. The interviews focus on ocean thermal energy conversion demonstration plants, seawater air conditioning systems, and seawater heat pump systems.

In Case You Missed It

Marine Energy Collegiate Competition Alumni: Where Are They Now?: The Marine Energy Collegiate Competition offers participants the opportunity to develop solutions to complex energy challenges and build real-world experience and professional connections, paving the way for students to start their clean energy careers. Learn more about two past competitors and how they turned their competition experiences into careers advancing marine energy.

  • Murphy Gay: As a child, Gay knew with absolute certainty he would be a paleontologist. As he grew up, his dreams and goals changed, but his love for and desire to protect ecology and animals helped shape his career.
  • Nicholas May-Varas: May-Varas does not have a typical scientist origin story. Instead of building mini rockets in his parents’ backyard, he volunteered at local food banks and animal shelters and tutored fellow students. Through his love for giving back, May-Varas found his home: humanitarian engineering.

Social Spotlight

EERE on Facebook — Aug. 18, 2022

Ocean waves

Water-scarce, remote, or island communities that are already vulnerable to the effects of climate change face worsening natural disasters with the potential to disrupt their clean water supply. That’s where the Waves to Water Prize comes in. The prize challenged teams to create ocean-powered desalination machines to turn ocean water into drinking water.

Celebrate Water Quality Month by learning more about the prize and its winners.

Follow along on the Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy (EERE) Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook channels for more #WaterWednesday content each week.

WPTO in the News

Marine Mentions