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President Obama released his long-awaited FY2014 budget request and while it’s unlikely the budget will be taken up by Congress in its entirety, it remains an important document. Namely, the proposal is significant because it steadfastly argues that America can continue to support next-generation industries like clean energy. In fact, the President’s proposal budgets for a number of high-profile, high-impact programs, including those aimed at growing the domestic clean energy manufacturing sector, reduce transportation fuel use, and calls on Congress to fund a new Energy Innovation Hub to transform the electricity grid. Across the board, the FY2014 request boosts key… Continue Reading

DOD’s role in energy innovation and the development of clean energy technologies from basic science through procurement and commercialization has come to the front of policy discussion. This conversation is particularly centered around DOD’s interests in using drop-in biofuels to reduce the department’s significant, costly, and sometimes dangerous reliance on petroleum-based fuels. According to the Energy Innovation Tracker, DOD investment in basic science, R&D, and procurement of advanced biofuels peaked in FY2010 at $155 million (including ARRA investment) and has fallen to $37 million in FY2012. Ninety-two percent of FY2012 biofuel investment was for research and development. A November 2012… Continue Reading

In March 2011, ITIF released Lean, Mean and Clean: Energy Innovation and the Department of Defense, a report detailing the ways in which DOD’s accredited and successful innovation ecosystem could be applied to the development of breakthroughs in clean energy technology. To expound further on these conclusions, ITIF – in conjunction with the Energy Innovation Tracker (EIT), a free and publicly accessible data source for federal investments in energy innovation – released a supplementary report: Lean, Mean and Clean II: Assessing DOD Investments in Clean Energy Innovation, which explores in detail the character of DOD’s investments in energy innovation by… Continue Reading

Congress has yet to come up with a plan for handling the threatening consequences of sequestration, or the blunt, automatic across-the-board budget cuts enacted by law by the Budget Control Act of 2011, a consequence of Congress’s failure to agree on a bipartisan deficit reduction plan.  As a result, the first installment of cuts goes into effect January 1st of 2013 and according to the Energy Innovation Tracker will have significant impacts on clean energy innovation that will severely handicap America’s already underfunded clean energy innovation ecosystem. Under the Budget Control Act of 2011, the sequester calls for the reduction… Continue Reading

Last month, Boeing launched its 2012 ecoDemonstrator Program, a flying test bed for new aviation innovations that increase fuel efficiency, reduce noise, and incorporate advanced materials to reduce flight travel’s environmental footprint. The project is a collaboration between Boeing, American Airlines, and the FAA’s Continuous Lower Energy, Emissions and Noise (CLEEN) program, and represents a forward-thinking public investment aimed at accelerating the development of low-carbon airline technologies. The ecoDemonstrator recently completed its first round of flight tests in Montana, during which the plane was flown using a ten percent biofuels mixture. The ecoDemonstrator showcases five main technologies for the future of… Continue Reading

The U.S. House of Representatives will vote on the FY2013 Energy and Water Appropriations Bill (H.R. 5325) this afternoon, which includes the budget of critical clean energy innovation programs within the Department of Energy (DOE).  The bill, which was passed by the House Appropriations Committee on April 25, cuts clean energy innovation investment deeply compared to the FY2012 Omnibus and the FY2013 Presidential Request.  Specifically, compared to FY2012 levels, the bill cuts funding for DOE’s Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA-E) by 27 percent; the Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) programs by 24 percent; and the Office of… Continue Reading

The use of power electronics is extensively involved in the clean tech industry.  Power electronics control and transform electric energy from the large-scale transmission level to the conventional consumer electronics level.  While this conversion process does not receive as much attention as solar panels or wind turbines when referring to clean energy innovation, power electronics technologies are central to everything from transferring energy from intermittent renewable sources, to energy storage, to re-charging electrical vehicles quickly and safely.  Significant innovations in these technologies are largely necessary for future development of next-generation electrified transportation systems and smart energy distribution. To address this… Continue Reading