DOE announces funding for energy technology partnerships

The U.S. Department of Energy Tuesday announced nearly $16 million in funding to help national laboratories and industrial partners move promising energy technologies to the marketplace.

This first round of funding through DOE's Technology Commercialization Fund will support 54 projects at 12 national labs involving 52 private-sector partners. Nine projects totaling more than $1.04 million involve Idaho National Laboratory.

“Moving research and development from the laboratory to market increases INL's impact,” said Amy Lientz, the lab’s director of Partnerships, Engagement and Technology Deployment. "Over the past decade, INL has signed 697 new technology license agreements, executed 145 competitive research and development agreements and completed 417 agreements with federal agencies and private-sector entities worth nearly $250 million. The nine INL projects awarded federal funds today will advance Idaho's role as an international clean energy and national security innovation hub.”

Projects include:

1. Advanced Outage Control Center Dashboard with Predictive Tools, $60,500
2. Commercialization Research and Development of Change Detection Systems for Nuclear Applications, $62,500
3. Computer-Based Procedure System for Field Workers, $130,000
4. Enhancing Lithium-Ion Battery Safety for Vehicle Technologies and Energy Storage, $119,005
5. 
Vibro-Acoustic Testing for Microstructure Characterization and Metrology, $150,000

6. Additive Manufacturing as an Alternative Fabrication Technique for the Fabrication of Uranium Silicide Fuel, $150,000: Westinghouse Electric Corporation, Pittsburgh, Pa.
7. 
Development of In-Core Three-Omega Thermal Conductivity Probe, $74,911: Radiation Detection Technologies, Inc. (RDT), Manhattan, Kan.
8. 
Enhanced and Miniaturized Wireless Valve Position Indicator Prototype, $149,600: Analysis and Measurement Services Corporation (AMS), Rolls Royce, Reston, Va. (US HQ’s), Westinghouse Electrical Corporation (WEC), Pittsburgh, Pa., Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), Palo Alto, Calif.

9. Vehicle Controller Area Network (CAN) Bus Network Safety and Security System, $150,000: Mercedes-Benz Research and Development North America, Inc., Sunnyvale, Calif.


A snapshot of Bonneville County home sales for early 2016

Going by the numbers for the first four months of this year, it looks like the real estate market in Bonneville County is off to a ripping start in 2016. If you want to drill down a little deeper, visit this link: http://www.snakerivermls.com/ and click the Marketing Statistics box.

Vietnamese restaurant, Cyclo, opening on Hitt Road

Cyclos -- three wheeled bikes -- are popular with tourists in Vietnam.

I'm as excited as anyone about the prospect of a Vietnamese restaurant in Idaho Falls. We've had Thai food covered for a while, and Indian food got a foothold two years ago with Tandoori Oven.

Now I notice that Cyclo will be setting up where Togo's used to be, at 2994 S. 25th East. I haven't had any luck tracking down the principals in this project, but my digging has gotten me this much information so far.

Cyclo Vietnamese Cuisine LLC is an Idaho limited-liability company filed on March 9, 2016. The registered agent on file for this company is Cody Do, and is located at 3260 N Lake Grove #101, Boise, ID 83713.

I will be keeping tabs on this. If you know anything, post here or on Facebook. This is social media, after all. Cheers!

FYI, Cyclo seems to be a pretty common name for Vietnamese restaurants in the States. The cyclo is a three-wheel bicycle taxi that appeared in Vietnam during the French colonial period after a failed attempt to introduce rickshaws. A double-seat cyclo is supported by the two front wheels, with the driver sitting behind.

INL to send six teams to entrepreneurial program this year

Idaho National Laboratory has gotten off to a fast start with the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lab-Corps program, designed to guide innovation at national laboratories into the world of commerce and industry. Four INL teams participated in earlier rounds, and six INL teams will participate in the program’s third and fourth rounds this summer and fall.

DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) created the Lab-Corps program in fall 2014 to help research scientists and engineers explore new ideas for meeting the needs of industrial users.

“DOE’s Lab-Corps program offers a new pathway to advance greater collaboration between industry and national laboratories,” said Steven Aumeier, an INL associate laboratory director and director of the Center for Advanced Energy Studies (CAES), a consortium that involves INL, the state of Idaho, Idaho State University, Boise State University, the University of Idaho and University of Wyoming.

Lab-Corps teams participate in a seven-week entrepreneurial boot camp, or “cohort,” facilitated by the DOE's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in Golden, Colo. This involves in-person sessions and weekly webinars to help teams learn how to evaluate the market potential of their technologies and bring a new level of entrepreneurial awareness back to their research and colleagues.

One team has been chosen to participate in the summer 2016 cohort. It is led by Jake Gentle, an INL power systems engineer who also led development of GLASS (General Line Ampacity State Solver), a software package developed to calculate the effects of weather on power lines so operators can manage transmission for maximum efficiency and savings.

The teams selected for the fall cohort include:

• Bioenergy Conversion Process (principal investigator Allison Ray), which allows researchers to produce high-quality feedstock from grass, wood and agricultural residues.
• CellSage (principal investigator Kevin Gering), which involves deploying software to support battery performance and life-cycle determinations in diverse applications.
• Electromechanical Recovery of Metals from Electronic Waste (principal investigator Tedd Lister), which retrieves critical and rare earth materials from such devices as cellphones and computers.
• Change Detection Systems for Nuclear Applications (principal investigator Troy Unruh), a computer software program that aligns digital images for nuclear facility and national security applications.
• Online Condition Monitoring of Spent Nuclear Fuel Dry Cask Storage Systems (principal investigator Ahmad Al Rashdan), which enables the non-invasive determination of the status and integrity of vented dry casks.

With competition from as many as 17 national laboratories, the first hurdle for participation in Lab-Corps is being selected. Each lab proposes one or more three-person entrepreneurial teams consisting of a principal investigator, an entrepreneurial lead and an industry mentor. In the first two cohorts, 14 teams from seven national labs were selected.

During the training, DOE assesses the viability of each team. This is done by an impartial panel of clean energy commercialization experts comprised of three representatives from private industry or venture capital and one from NREL. Scores to inspire continued improvement are given based on weekly presentations and rigorous questioning. The other basis for performance evaluation is the number of interviews each team manages to conduct with prospective customers or collaborators.

While the program’s aim is to teach researchers how to take their work to customers outside the national laboratory complex, Lab-Corps is also aimed at making national labs more accessible to businesses, said Tammie Borders, industry outreach coordinator for CAES and INL’s Energy and Environment Science and Technology Directorate.

For more information about the Lab-Corps program, visit http://energy.gov/eere/technology-to-market/lab-corps.

Energy Department announces more than $82 million in nuclear research funding

U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, left, and Idaho National Laboratory Director Mark Peters, during Moniz's INL visit on Tuesday. (Instagram photo by INL)

U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz used his visit to Idaho Falls Tuesday to announce more than $82 million is being awarded to nuclear energy research, development and infrastructure projects in 28 states. Overall, 93 projects have been selected to receive funding for nuclear energy-related research through the Nuclear Energy University Program, Nuclear Science User Facilities, and Nuclear Energy Enabling Technology programs. A number of recipients will also receive technical and regulatory assistance through the Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear (GAIN) initiative.

“Nuclear power is our nation’s largest source of low-carbon electricity and is a vital component in our efforts to both provide affordable and reliable electricity and to combat climate change,” Moniz said, visiting INL facilities with lab director Mark Peters and giving opening remarks at the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board meeting at the Energy Innovation Laboratory building on University Boulevard. “These awards will help scientists and engineers as they continue to innovate with advanced nuclear technologies.”

DOE is awarding nearly $36 million through its Nuclear Energy University Program (NEUP) to support 49 university-led nuclear energy research and development projects in 24 states. NEUP seeks to maintain U.S. leadership in nuclear research across the country by providing top science and engineering students and faculty members opportunities to develop innovative technologies and solutions for non-military nuclear capabilities.

Additionally, 15 universities will receive nearly $6 million for research reactor and infrastructure improvements – providing important safety- performance- and student education-related upgrades to a portion of the nation’s 25 university research reactors as well as enhancing university research and training infrastructure.

The awards are part of the first steps to implement the GAIN initiative that was announced November 2015, which provides the nuclear energy community with access to the technical, regulatory, and financial support necessary to move new or advanced nuclear reactor designs toward commercialization while ensuring the continued safe, reliable, and economic operation of existing nuclear facilities.

These awards complement the Office of Nuclear Energy’s Small Business Voucher Program, which will provide up to $2 million this year to help small businesses overcome critical nuclear technology and commercialization challenges. Of the eight vouchers announced, one involves INL, a partnership with Creare LLC of Hanover, N.H., investigating materials for continuous casting of metallic nuclear fuel.

The Department is also awarding $21 million for six Integrated Research Projects (IRPs), which include a jointly-funded project between the Office of Nuclear Energy and the Office of Environmental Management for enhanced glass forms for nuclear waste immobilization. The Office of Environmental Management will also fund two IRP projects for advanced nuclearized robotics capabilities. Collaboration between the Offices of Environmental Management and Nuclear Energy is part of Moniz’s effort to integrate the department’s research for advanced nuclear R&D and remediation efforts.

Since 2009, the Energy Department’s Office of Nuclear Energy has awarded approximately $464 million to 113 U.S. colleges and universities to continue American leadership in clean energy innovation and to train the next generation of nuclear engineers and scientists through its university programs. Visit neup.gov for more information on today’s awards and Energy.gov for information on all of the Energy Department’s efforts to continue American leadership in low-carbon nuclear energy innovation.