US DOE Issues USD 48.6 Million Call for Offshore Wind R&D

July 26, 2024, by Adnan Memija

The US Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Wind Energy Technologies Office (WETO) has launched the Offshore Wind National and Regional Research and Development Funding Opportunity, allocating USD 48.6 million to projects designed to address several key needs in offshore wind development.

The areas include accelerating research and development of floating offshore wind platforms; exploring innovations for fixed-bottom foundations; improving offshore wildlife protection through new monitoring technologies; expanding the reach of the domestic supply chain; advancing the US academic leadership in floating offshore wind; and investigating solutions to protect future infrastructure from lightning.

The deadline for filing concept papers is 3 September, and the deadline for full applications is 7 November 2024.

The expected timeframe for award negotiations is August 2025.

According to the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), this funding opportunity represents one of DOE’s single largest investments in offshore wind, comprising USD 48 million in funding from WETO with USD 600,000 in funding support from the US Department of the Interior’s (DOI) Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE).

The funding includes six topic areas. The first is related to the floating offshore wind platform research and development, with designated USD 20 million in funds.

The subtopics for this topic are Refinement and Innovation in Floating Platform Design, Manufacturing, and Deployment, and Next-Generation Integrated Turbine/Platform Research.

The second topic area covers innovation for fixed-bottom offshore wind foundation types and supporting infrastructure, with up to USD 7.5 million in funds.

The third topic area is technology advancement to inform risk to birds and bats from offshore wind energy. Here, up to USD 8 million of designated funding will be available, which aims to advance technologies to monitor bird and bat presence and behavior better to understand the risk to species from offshore wind deployment.

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The fourth area refers to the development of a manufacturing and supply chain offshore wind consortium in the Great Lakes region, with up to USD 5 million in funds.

The fifth area is the floating offshore wind center of excellence. As DOE and BSEE co-found this topic area, up to USD 3.8 million of designated funding will be available.

The last topic area is protecting the future offshore wind fleet against lightning, also co-funded by DOE and BSEE, with up to USD 4.3 million in funds.

At the beginning of this year, DOE released a USD 14.5 million funding opportunity to address challenges in marine and ocean renewable energy industries and to encourage innovation.