Release Date: December 18, 2001

PITTSBURGH, PA - The Department of Energy's longest running student-teacher research grant program - the Office of Fossil Energy's University Coal Research Program - begins its 23rd year today with the release of a solicitation calling on the nation's colleges and universities to propose new projects to enhance the long-term use of coal.

Since the program began in 1979, nearly 1500 students have worked alongside their professors in more than 600 federally funded research projects valued in excess of $100 million. Early concepts investigated in the program have led to commercial innovations ranging from new ways to clean coal to the more efficient use of carbon inks in office copiers.

This year, the department will fund just over $3 million for projects that explore ways to use coal while protecting the environment. Academic institutions can submit proposals in either of three categories:

1. A "Core Program" that will provide up to $2.36 million for 8 to 12 projects that complement ongoing applied research in the department's Fossil Energy program,

2. An "Innovative Concepts Phase I Program" that will offer $0.25 million for approximately 5 grants that encourage "out-of-the-box" ideas that might lead to future breakthroughs; and

3. An "Innovative Concepts Phase II Program" that will provide approximately $0.6 million for as many as 3 awards for promising projects that were supported previously with Phase I funding.

Proposals are due on January 31, 2002, and the department will announce the winning projects next summer.

The Core Program - Focusing on the Energy Plant of the Future
A major focus of this year's "core" program is to carrying out exploratory research that could benefit the Energy Department's Vision 21 program, the development of a futuristic concept for a highly efficient, virtually pollution-free energy plant that could produce a variety of liquid fuels, chemicals and gases in addition to electric power.

Universities could receive up to $200,000 each for individual applications or $400,000 each for teams of universities or industrial partners. Projects are being requested in six focus areas:

• Novel Sensors and Control Systems - novel, high-temperature (1,000^o C or greater), high-pressure (100-1,000 pounds per square inch) systems capable of operating in abrasive gas streams of highly efficient power-generation technologies, as well as robust sensors that monitor fine particulates, characterize fuel and monitor a system's "health" online, including technologies that monitor and predict maintenance of critical equipment;

• Materials and Components of Vision 21 Systems - high-strength structural materials that can withstand the high-temperature, corrosive environments of gas turbines, high-temperature steam systems, reactors, and other key Vision 21 plant components. Also applicable are projects to develop functional materials such as high-temperature filters and gas separation membranes that are essential for Vision 21 co-production;

• Computational Approaches to Advanced Catalyst Design - use of computational chemistry to develop improvements of catalysts for the production of ultra-clean liquid fuels (such as diesel). The computational methods will provide guidance to researchers in identifying the necessary requirements (metals, alloys, particle sizes, etc) for the design of catalyst. This guidance will be derived through understanding the molecular-level kinetics of reactions on catalytic surfaces that address the most critical problems in catalyst performance;

• Materials for Intermediate Temperature Solid Oxide Fuel Cells - chemically stable materials that can be inexpensively manufactured and operate at a temperature range of 500^o to 700^o C in solid oxide fuel cells at Vision 21 coal-based power plants. The efficiency of state-of-the-art solid oxide fuel cells is limited by materials which can only maintain long-term reliability at high temperatures. Current successful materials used for these fuel cells can only operate at temperatures as low as 700^o;

• Novel Concepts for Reducing Water Used in Power Generation - new approaches that reduce or eliminate the need for water for cooling purposes such as efficient heat-transfer media, improved fill materials, improve dry cooling systems, using water as boiler feed water and reducing the amount of water vapor lost from closed systems. Prevailing water usage in power production in the U.S. averages 70 trillion gallons/year. Reducing the impacts that power production has on water quantity and quality is an objective of the Vision 21 program;

• Conversion of Coal-Derived Synthesis Gas to Fischer-Tropsch Liquids - converting coal-based gas to liquids using iron-based catalysts. Fischer-Tropsch liquids can supplement conventional petroleum-based fuels in the nation's transportation sector. To be economically competitive, however, improvements in the performance and economics of the gas-to-liquid processes are needed. To develop these improvements scientist must be able to model the mechanism and kinetics of Fischer-Tropsch catalysts. These liquids are one of the possible products from a Vision 21 facility.

Innovative Concepts Program - Leapfrogging Today's Capabilities
Researchers submitting winning ideas in the "Innovative Concepts Phase I" category could receive up to $50,000 for one-year feasibility studies of concepts that offer dramatic improvements in the way coal is used, rather than incremental improvements over today's systems.

Among the innovative topics the Fossil Energy program is particularly interested in seeing submitted by university research teams are:

• Smart sensing and advanced artificially intelligent control systems;

• Fundamental studies of mechanisms for reacting magnesium silicates with carbonic acid and other solutions (such reactions show promise for sequestering carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas);

• Nitrogen/carbon dioxide separation to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from the flue gases of fossil fuel power plants;

• Heterogeneous reburning of coal and coal-derived chars to reduce nitrogen oxide emissions in boilers.

In addition, researchers who have received "Phase I" innovative concept grants in fiscal years 2000 and 2001 can apply for follow-on "Phase II" funding if their research projects have shown sufficient promise.