Washington, D.C. — The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management (FECM) has announced up to $6 million available for research and development (R&D) projects that will repurpose domestic coal resources for products that can be employed in clean energy technologies such as batteries and advanced manufacturing. Expanding innovative uses for coal and coal wastes has the potential to create local job opportunities for power plant communities as our country transitions to a net-zero greenhouse gas economy.

Potential projects selected under this funding opportunity announcement (FOA) will support FECM’s Carbon Ore Processing Program, which focuses on converting coal and coal wastes into products such as graphite and carbon metal composites and alloys. Coal’s unique structure and composition also make it well suited as a raw material for producing various high-value carbon products like carbon nano-materials, activated carbons, and graphite, which may be used for computer memory devices, LED lighting, solar photovoltaic cells, batteries, capacitors, sorbents, catalysts, membranes, and medical imaging. Carbon ore-derived products can possess unique electrical and mechanical properties through processing, making these materials well suited to electrochemical, electromechanical, sorbent, catalyst, separation, and mechanical applications.

Eligible applicants include companies, academic institutions, and research coalitions with expertise in the following areas of interest:

• R&D of high-value graphitic products such as graphene, quantum dots, graphitizable foams, and more.
• R&D of carbon metal composites that offer the potential for superior technical and economic performance, particularly in electromechanical applications.

All applicants must register and submit application materials through FedConnect. The application deadline is October 6, 2022, at 11:59 a.m. ET. All questions about this FOA must be submitted through Fedconnect; register here for an account. Read the full FOA for more information.

FECM funds research, development, demonstration, and deployment projects to decarbonize power generation and industrial production, to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and to mitigate the environmental impacts of fossil fuel production and use. Priority areas of technology work include carbon capture, carbon conversion, carbon dioxide removal, carbon dioxide transport and storage, hydrogen production with carbon management, methane emissions reduction, and critical minerals production. To learn more, visit the FECM website, sign up for FECM news announcements and visit the NETL website.