Chain Reaction Innovations (CRI) is a two-year fellowship program at Argonne National Laboratory for innovators focused on clean energy and science technologies. Through an annual call, four to six individuals are selected to join CRI. It is part of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lab-Embedded Entrepreneurship Program (LEEP), one of four ‘nodes’. The others are located at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

Sponsored by the Office of Technology Transitions (OTT) at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), the American-Made EnergyTech University Prize (EnergyTech UP) challenges student teams to compete for cash prizes for successfully identifying a promising energy technology, assessing its market potential, and creating a business plan for commercialization. Faculty are challenged to create innovative implementation plans that expand energy technology commercialization.

Students: Develop and present a business plan that leverages National Laboratory-developed or other emerging energy technologies developed by students, faculty, or industry. Throughout the competition, they receive mentorship and materials to help them succeed, all while competing for more than $400,000 in cash prizes.

Faculty: Develop and implement educational activities to engage more students in energy technology commercialization and entrepreneurship topics at their institution. While faculty have always been, and remain, welcome and encouraged to mentor a team competing in EnergyTech UP, this new track is designed to incentivize and support faculty directly, with more than $100,000 in cash prizes available.

Third Derivative and RMI are launching the Industrial Innovation Cohorts. Enabled by a $2M grant from The Lemelson Foundation, we’re launching the Industrial Innovation Cohorts initiative to source, select, and support the most promising innovations in cement and concrete, iron and steel, and chemicals decarbonization.

For startups, this initiative represents an opportunity to get their innovation to market faster through a founder-friendly accelerator program designed with their needs in mind. For our collaborators, it means a front-row seat to the most exciting startups working on industrial decarbonization and access to novel research and analysis on innovation in these sectors.

The Seeding Critical Advances for Leading Energy technologies with Untapped Potential (SCALEUP) Ready program provides a vital mechanism for the support of innovative energy R&D that complements ARPA-E’s primary focus on early-stage transformational energy technologies that require proof of concept. This program focuses only on scaling and pre-pilot projects of promising technologies that ARPA-E has previously funded. A SCALEUP Ready award would substantially build upon innovations achieved under the original ARPA-E award.

The Climate Change Investment Initiative (2c2i) is a 10-year, $20 million, joint commitment between Exelon Corporation and its philanthropic arm, Exelon Foundation, to invest in and cultivate innovative start-ups focused on advancing climate change mitigation, adaptation and resiliency efforts, while also promoting social equality and economic prosperity, in Exelon’s service territories. Through the combined resources of Exelon Foundation ($10 million equity investment commitment) and Exelon Corporation (up to $10 million in-kind service commitment), 2c2i supports innovative start-ups that catalyze solutions to climate change challenges within Exelon’s major market areas, while advancing social equality and economic prosperity. Specifically, we’re looking for startups focused on any aspect of sustainability (e.g. GHG mitigation, climate resiliency, etc.), that are currently doing work, or have the potential to do work, that impacts any of Exelon Corporation’s six major markets—Atlantic City, Baltimore, Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington D.C., and Wilmington, DE.

The purpose of the LCTM Program is to reimburse the incrementally higher costs of using or provide an incentive amount to eligible recipients for the use, in projects, of construction materials and products that have substantially lower levels of embodied GHG emissions, as described by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), associated with all relevant stages of production, use, and disposal as compared to estimated industry averages of similar materials or products, hereafter referred to as low carbon transportation materials.

The program will also serve to help eligible transportation agencies update or develop specification language and conduct identification activities needed to demonstrate materials are appropriate for use on Federal-aid construction projects.

Funds made available for the LCTM Program will be awarded for the use of substantially lower carbon materials and products on construction projects funded under title 23 U.S.C. and necessary work to identify appropriateness for use of these materials on eligible projects.

The NSF Trailblazer Engineering Impact Award (TRAILBLAZER) program supports individual investigators who propose novel research projects with the potential to innovatively and creatively address national needs and/or grand challenges, advance US leadership, and catalyze the convergence of engineering and science domains. TRAILBLAZER will support engineers and scientists who leverage their distinctive track record of innovation and creativity to pursue new research directions that are distinct from their previous or current research areas.

For more than a decade, the BNEF Pioneers program has identified a group of game-changing technologies or innovations annually – each with the potential to accelerate global decarbonization and halt climate change. Applicants are shortlisted by the BNEF Pioneers team, and finalists are judged by a panel of BNEF experts. Winners must prove they offer a novel, substantial, scalable and competitive solution. In 2025, the program will focus on three global climate challenges and will award the Pioneers prize to innovators with scalable, impactful and equitable solutions to these challenges.

NSF-supported science and engineering research increasingly relies on cutting-edge infrastructure. With its Major Research Instrumentation (MRI) program and Major Multi-user Facilities (“Major Facilities”) projects, NSF supports infrastructure projects at the lower and higher range of infrastructure project costs, Foundation-wide, across science and engineering research disciplines. The Foundation-wide Mid-scale Research Infrastructure opportunity is intended to provide NSF with an agile, Foundation-wide process to fund experimental research capabilities in the mid-scale range between MRI and Major Multi-user Facilities.

DOE announced the availability of up to $63 million to enable state and local governments to expand battery recycling and modernize American manufacturing by making cutting edge technologies like advanced sensors and modeling more accessible to small- and medium-sized manufacturers (SMMs). This funding opportunity advances next-generation tools and resources to achieve the Biden-Harris Administration’s ambitious goal of a net-zero economy by 2050 and will help revitalize and strengthen America’s global leadership in manufacturing.

Through the two Areas of Interest (AOIs), the FOA will provide approximately $63 million in support of programs by state or local government entities with the following purposes:

• AOI 1: State Manufacturing Leadership Program (SMLP)
• AOI 2: State and Local Battery Collection, Recycling, and Reprocessing Program

This program provides loan guarantees up to $250 million to assist in the development, construction, and retrofitting of new and emerging technologies. These technologies are: advanced biofuels, renewable chemicals and biobased products. To apply, you must have legal authority, experience, and expertise and demonstrate that you meet the FDIC definition of “Well Capitalized” at the time of application and issuance of the Loan Note Guarantee, including:

• Federal or state-chartered banks.
• Federally-recognized tribes.
• Cooperatives.
• Farm Credit Bank, or other Farm Credit System institution with direct lending authority.
• Credit Unions subject to credit examination and supervision by a state agency or the National Credit Union Administration.
• The National Rural Utilities Cooperative Finance Corporation.

The NSF SBIR/STTR and SBIR/STTR Fast-Track pilot programs support moving scientific excellence and technological innovation from the lab to the market. These NSF SBIR/STTR Fast-Track pilot programs provide fixed amount cooperative agreements for the development of a broad range of technologies based on discoveries in science and engineering with potential for societal and economic impacts. Under a traditional NSF SBIR/STTR Phase I award, a small business can receive non-dilutive funding for research and development (R&D) to demonstrate technical feasibility over 6 to 12 months and then, after completion of a Phase I project, companies may apply for Phase II funding to further develop the proposed technology.