The US Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Fossil Energy (FE) plans to make $8 million in Federal funding available for cost-shared research, development, and testing of technologies that can utilize carbon dioxide from power systems or other industrial sources for bio-mediated uptake by algal systems to create valuable products and services.

Funding opportunity announcement (FOA) DE-FOA-0002403, Engineering-Scale Testing and Validation of Algae-Based Technologies and Bioproducts, will support the goals of DOE’s Carbon Utilization Program. The primary objective of carbon utilization technology development is to lower the near-term cost of carbon capture through the creation of value-added products from the conversion of carbon dioxide.

The intent of the FOA is to seek applications that aim to perform engineering-scale testing and validation of algae-based technologies and bioproducts.

Technologies that convert CO₂ must show a net decrease in CO₂ emissions through life cycle analysis, display a potential to generate a marketable product and show that the product displays beneficial aspects when compared to commercially available products produced with existing state-of-the-art technology.

The FOA has one Area of Interest:

• Engineering-Scale Testing and Validation of Algae-Based Technologies and Bioproducts. The Carbon Utilization Program is interested in technologies for carbon dioxide absorption integrated with algae systems for capturing and reusing carbon dioxide to produce useful products such as fuels and chemicals. This area of interest addresses the development and field-testing of algae-based, bio-mediated uptake pathways to transform carbon dioxide into targeted, advanced products.

  Applications are solicited for projects that include three major activities: 1) optimization of carbon uptake and conversion efficiency; 2) characterization of target products and validation of their economic and environmental benefits; and 3) field testing of the proposed uptake and conversion technologies.

This FOA seeks to build upon previous advancements in the use of algae-based processes developed under FE’s Carbon Utilization Program and by the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy’s (EERE) Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO).

Applications may be sought and accepted under a second closing date contingent upon the availability of appropriated funds and need.