The analysis groups spending on energy into the “Everything Else” category, along with spending on education, science, agriculture, and natural resources, etc.  The “Everything Else” share of government spending has declined from 14.8 percent in 1962 to 11.7 percent in 2011.

This program is a collection of 16 projects aimed at reducing the Army’s operational combat vehicle reliance on liquid fuels.  The projects are split between two jointly run programs under similar names – the Combat Vehicle and Automotive Technology Program (for applied research) and the Combat Vehicle and Automotive Advanced Technology Program (for advanced technology development).  While the programs do not solely pursue the development and adoption of clean energy technologies, the proportion of investment devoted to this practice has been rising during recent years, and has expanded from simply developing and demonstrating hybrid electric vehicles to pursuing additional capabilities for its tanks and other combat vehicles by enhancing energy storage capacity, waste heat management and HVAC efficiency, and fuel cell utilization and applicability.

The benefits of this kind of innovation are obvious to both the DOD and Congress, which has allowed the Army to more than double the investment in research and development of clean energy innovation technologies for these two programs, raising spending from $36 million in FY2009 to about $82 million in FY2012.  The additional investment is allowing the Army to further develop its renewable operational energy capabilities, and is encouraging the department to demonstrate these capabilities publicly.  The Army recently announced the development of a new initiative called the ‘Green Warrior Convoy,’ which will be a testing and demonstration project showcasing a fleet of combat vehicles outfitted with the branch’s latest developments in renewable energy technologies.  The fleet will travel from the Tank Automotive Research, Development and Engineering Center (TARDEC) in Warren, Michigan to Washington, DC next spring, stopping in communities along the way to educate the public on the Army’s advanced vehicle technologies and the benefits of reducing fuel consumption and diversifying energy sources for transportation.

Within the last fiscal year, all three military branches committed to adding one gigawatt each of renewable energy to installations – each branch has suggested individual estimates for how long this goal will take to achieve, ranging between five years (for the Air Force) and 15 years (for the Army).  These goals will be met with the help of tangible investments in innovation.  As the military branches’ roles in advanced energy research and development grow in significance, it is important to keep track of the funding allocated to clean technology development, as well as the kind of technology portfolio each branch is maintaining.  We will continue to track these types of investments in the future.

The table below captures the names, descriptions, and funding for the projects within the applied research and advanced technology development combat vehicles programs during the past four fiscal years  – all of these projects have been developed at the TARDEC.

For more data on Department of Defense investments in research and development of clean energy innovation, see our blog posts here, and use the Tracker to search your specific interests – all individual projects include funding and a short description of project details.

Figure 1. Comparison of captured DOD investment from Tracker v11302010 to Tracker v04292012 for years 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2012.

The potential for the DOD to impact energy innovation is substantial.  Not only is the DOD the largest energy consumer in the United States, it also has a long history of being on the forefront of technology innovation and commercialization.  For many decades, the DOD has cultivated an energy ecosystem – incorporating basic science, R&D, and procurement of technologies – which has allowed the agency to take credit for significant advancements in communication, power, and transportation technologies.  This robust innovation ecosystem, combined with the agency’s need for energy security, makes the DOD a potentially key source for clean tech innovation.

Many sources have reached similar conclusions – ITIF’s report Lean, Mean, and Green emphasizes the DOD’s  role in bridging the “valleys of death” – stages of technology development between lab research and deployment that emerging technologies often fail to traverse.  Various sources have reported on applying the theories in the report to current projects in the DOD, considering  the agency’s investment in advanced biofuels by the Navy, or smart grid demonstrations projects by the Army.  In early 2012, the DOD released “Energy for the Warfighter: Operational Energy Strategy,” a guide for the agency’s future progress in adopting clean energy technology to increase operational energy security and decrease the agency’s carbon footprint.

While the previous version of the Tracker captured some DOD energy investment, the scope of the data was limited to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) and the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD), and it only counted investment by the military branches under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).  We noticed, however, that the military branches were increasing taking a larger role in energy innovation.

After a thorough review of the DOD R&D budget, we calculate a total of $1.2 billion in investments for FY2012.  The graph below shows the difference between the current and previous Tracker database versions for energy innovation spending in FY2011.

Figure 2. Comparison of Tracker v11302010 and Tracker v04292012 composition of agency investment in total energy innovation spending for FY2011.

The next graph shows a breakdown of the offices and military branches contributing to the DOD’s energy innovation total for FY2011.  Of the seven ‘offices,’ the Air Force, Navy, and Army contribute nearly 77 percent of the Department’s investment – DARPA, OSD, DLA, and the US Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) make up the remaining 23 percent of spending.

Figure 3. Breakdown of proportional contribution from DOD offices and military branches for FY2011.

On a basic level, the additional data included in this Tracker database update indicates that energy innovation comes from many other sources besides the Department of Energy, and these sources should not go unrecognized or uninvestigated.  In fact, DOD investments represent 20% of government spending on energy innovation in FY2012.  The newly-mined data on the DOD emphasizes the potential impacts the agency may have on advancing the energy innovation ecosystem in the US, but more importantly it defines past and current projects and activities by technology, innovation stage, funding, and location within DOD’s labyrinth of offices, providing a resource for additional analysis.

In the past, DOE budget justifications captured office- and program-level data.  For instance, the Tracker identifies that the Vehicles Technology program within DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) invested $223.6 million in 2009, $274.0 million in 2010, and $278.9 million in 2011.  Within the Vehicle Technologies program, spending is distributed to projects focusing on batteries and electric drive technology, vehicle simulations, engine research and development, fuels technology and materials research.  Within each project are activity-level investments that further delineate even more specific research efforts – i.e. the Battery and Electric Drive Technology project within EERE’s Vehicle Technology program funded power electronics and electric motors R&D, as well as batteries and energy storage technologies.  This breakdown is demonstrated in the table below.

Unfortunately, the recently released FY2013 budget justification from EERE deviates from this traditional format, instead emphasizing project ‘innovation stage’ over the hierarchical program-project-activity structure.  On one hand, it is a positive change to see DOE pursuing a more explicit view of its clean technology investments through a prism of innovation – at a quick glance, this change appears almost like a Tracker analysis.  On the other hand, this action effectively removes activity-level figures from public view, restricts detailed analysis of clean tech investments in EERE for FY2013, and limits possible trends-over-time comparisons .  The new budget structure is shown in the table below.

Consequently, the reclassification of the budget structure inevitably trades informative funding details for redundant information, and less of it at that – arguably taking a significant step backward in demonstrating accountability and openness of federal budget activity.  And policy-makers are taking notice.  The recently released report from the Senate Appropriations Committee for Energy and Water similarly addresses the issue stating:

“Although the format is more condensed, parts of the justification – particularly the Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy [EERE] section – are nearly devoid of usable information and make meaningful analysis of the budget impossible…While the Committee supports displaying how funding is distributed among technology readiness levels, the narrative should pertain to a comparable structure to previously enacted acts to enable comparison of activities, and funding information should be displayed in comparable account structures showing at least the program, project, or activity level.” 

Under pressure, EERE produced a ‘crosscut’ analysis of its programs for FY2013, which includes total activity level data, as well as activity level data by innovation stage.  While useful for analyzing the FY2013 Request, this solution still fails to provide activity-level details for FY2012, which continues to make trending analysis a challenge with no remedy.  As a result, the figures in the newest version of the Tracker for EERE reflect the FY2012 budget request values, rather than actual investment figures.

The Committee’s report directs that the budget justification for the next fiscal year reflect the previous designs, with modifications if necessary to include ‘innovation stage’ information.  Even better, EERE should take a look at the Tracker database and analysis to get a sense of more useful ‘innovation stage’ breakdowns.  With any luck, EERE will release a supplement to the FY2013 justification, and stick to the Committee’s advice next year.

The old version of the database covered actualized spending for FY2009 and FY2010, with FY2011 spending estimates.  This new version updates those FY2011 values to reflect actualized spending and includes spending estimates for FY2012.  These additions allow for more indicative trending analysis, and some initial analysis of this new input is provided below.

From Figure 1 it is evident that energy innovation spending increased from FY2011 to FY2012.  This figure does not include the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009 funds, which were largely distributed in 2009 and 2010.  ARRA spending is included in the tracker, but it is difficult to determine which programs were funded during which years.  If ARRA spending is distributed evenly between FY2009 and FY2010, total energy innovation spending in those years would still be greater than spending in either FY2011 or FY2012.

Figure 1. Total energy research and development spending by innovation stage.

Figure 2 demonstrates total energy innovation spending by technology.  From the graph it is clear that technology portfolio has remained proportionally consistent during the past four years, with slight increases to investments in buildings and industry projects.

Figure 2. Total energy research and development spending by technology.

Figure 3 captures a comparison of the technology portfolio in FY2011 and FY2012.  Reflecting slight progression towards President Obama’s “all of the above” strategy for energy, the FY2012 technology portfolio invests slightly more evenly in the various technologies – slight decreases in electricity and fuel investments, and increases in transportation, building, and industry investment.

Figure 3. Energy research and development spending by technology component - comparison between FY2011 and FY2012.

Figure 4 shows the distribution of total energy innovation investment by government agency for FY2011.  The Department of Energy, the Department of Defense, and the Department of the Interior are the largest agency contributors to energy innovation spending.  Spending at the DOE and DOD span all innovation stages, while DOI spending comes from the department’s New Energy Frontier program, which encourages the development and deployment of both renewable and conventional energy on public lands.

Figure 4. Total energy research and development spending by government agency for FY2011.

The new version of the database also captures additional energy research and development spending by the Department of Defense.  While the previous version simply captured spending by various offices like DARPA, the Defense Logistics Agency, and the Office of the Secretary – what is known as “Defense-Wide” spending – the improved version expands the capacity of the Tracker to monitor Army, Navy, and Air Force energy innovation spending.  This inclusion was prompted by a growing conversation about DoD investments in energy innovation.  Although voices were offering top-line estimates of DoD energy spending, we wanted to increase the transparency of these suggestions with an activity-level approach to shed some light on which branches of the Military these investments were coming from and what technologies they were supporting.  We intend to explore these findings further in future analyses.

Emphasis in both of these bills was placed on protecting the nuclear security of the United States while modernizing the country’s stockpile of nuclear weapons, which is counted in the budget as defense spending.  Also, both committees addressed the issue of high and rising gas prices in the US by appropriating increased funds to fossil fuel energy research and development.  The House also suggested the creation of a $25 million shale oil program. 

The Senate appropriations bill is divided into defense and non-defense spending.  And like the House appropriations proposal, this bill also increases defense program funds at the expense of non-defense programs.  Under the bill, the National Nuclear Security Administration receives $11.5 billion in appropriations for securing and modernizing the nation’s nuclear weapons stockpile.  This is offset by moderate decreases in key energy innovation offices at the DOE.  Specifically, appropriations in the Senate bill for the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy are 15 percent lower than the Presidential Request announced two months ago.  The bill also makes cuts to the Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA-E) and the Office of Science, reducing appropriations by ten percent and two percent, respectively, relative to the President’s Request.While these cuts certainly propose hits to clean energy innovation programs at the DOE, the Senate’s proposal does try to strike something of a balance between fiscal responsibility and commitment to the advancement of clean energy technology.  Under the Senate proposal, all key energy innovation offices appropriations are increased relative to FY2012 levels.  Most significantly, EERE numbers increase by nearly nine percent, and ARPA-E’s by over 13 percent. Compared with the House appropriations for Energy and Water for FY2013, the Senate’s estimates provide generously for these two agencies, which are arguably the more vulnerable pieces of the DOE’s clean energy innovation budget.  The House proposal for the next fiscal year reduces appropriations by about 40 percent from FY2013 Presidential Request levels for each of these offices.

ARPA-E’s current FY2012 appropriations of $275 million is actually 50 percent lower than the Presidential Request for FY2012 – the agency, which develops advanced and “out of the box” transformational energy technologies, is known for its practice of taking on high-risk, high return projects, in order to eventually reduce the price of energy in the US, while reducing the impact of energy consumption on the environment.  ARPA-E’s enthusiastic director Dr. Arun Majumdar addressed the House Appropriations Committee as his “board of directors,” and justified the high-risk investments of ARPA-E as a rejuvenation of the American story of innovation. The agency’s appropriations for FY2013 will provide funding for projects on stationary power and transportation systems.

Spending on coal, natural gas, and other fossil energy technologies, also included in the DOE’s alternative energy portfolio, was not specified in the bill summary – these details should be released when the accompanying bill report becomes available.  Appropriations for fossil energy research and development in FY2012 amounted to $534 million; the Presidential Request suggested a 20 percent reduction of this number, while the House Appropriations suggested a four percent increase from FY2012 levels. This middle-of-the-road appropriations strategy taken by the Senate is strikingly similar to the legislative body’s appropriation suggestions for FY2012, shown in Figure 3.  While suggested appropriations under this bill are still below those in the Presidential Request for the next fiscal year, the impact on DOE’s clean energy innovation programs is less troubling under this scenario than others, offering a more positive outlook for the future of clean energy in the US.  However, the process of passing a complete budget for FY2013 is long and currently still in its early stages, so stayed tuned for further updates.

Since the DOD’s carbon footprint involves the use of 2.5 billion gallons of fuel every year by the Air Force alone, initiatives advancing renewable energy technologies propose interesting potential results.  More information from the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation on the policy implications of spurring DOD investments in energy innovation is available here.  Further analysis on the DOD’s role in energy innovation spending proposed in the FY13 budget request will be presented in the coming weeks!

The program within the DOI undertaking these initiatives is called the New Energy Frontier.  The program was started by Secretary Ken Salazar in 2009 with a mission to advance domestic exploration and production of both renewable and conventional energy on the “one-fifth of the nation’s landmass and 1.7 billion acres off its shores” managed by the DOI.  Secretary Salazar has commented a number of times on the importance of committing to the development of renewable energy on public lands as one of the Department’s highest priorities – and the program has begun to gather momentum with the approval of 29 commercial-scale renewable energy projects, including 16 solar, five wind, and eight geothermal projects on federal lands since 2009.

Although the “New Energy Frontier” moniker has been used occasionally during the past year, project specifics continue to remain publicly vague, especially details of specific projects; part of the reason for this ambiguity is the program’s budget structure.  Funding for the New Energy Frontier program comes from contributions from six different bureaus within the DOI – specifically the Bureau of Land Management, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, the U.S. Geological Survey, the Fish and Wildlife Service, the Office of Natural Resources Revenue, and the Bureau of Indian Affairs.  Each bureau contributes resources towards the domestic advancement of both renewable and conventional energy.

Upon quick analysis of the FY2013 New Energy Frontier budget proposal a few details are unavoidably noticeable:

• Although renewable energy investment is referred to as a “major component” of the program’s strategy, renewable energy development has continuously received only 11 percent of the total New Energy Frontier funds during the last three years.

• Correspondingly, pursuit of conventional energy development – specifically offshore oil and gas exploration and drilling – is the crux of the New Energy Frontier program, with proposed appropriations for FY2013 of $662 million, an additional 10 percent increase from FY2012 estimated spending.

In support of the New Energy Frontier program in FY2010 the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) contributed $16.7 million to the “identification of prime renewable resource areas” and corridors for transmission, and $135.8 million towards oil and gas development on public lands.  Likewise, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) provided $31.7 million in FY2010 for offshore wind deployments, and $217.5 million for offshore drilling.  The budget requests for the New Energy Frontier program continue to increase each year, but the proportion of spending on renewable compared to conventional energy remains constant and consistently imbalanced.

While the New Energy Frontier program cites its initiatives to encourage greater development and deployment of renewable energy technologies on public land, further analysis reveals that the majority of funding for the program is devoted to pursuing America’s “old” energy frontier.  The Department of Interior has significant potential to be a major source of support for the deployment of clean energy technologies, but currently these efforts are outweighed by the New Energy Frontier’s pursuit of conventional energy development.