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Research Topics

The Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) Postdoctoral Research Awards are intended to be an avenue for significant energy efficiency and renewable energy innovation. The EERE Postdoctoral Research Awards are designed to engage early career postdoctoral recipients in research that will provide them opportunities to understand the mission and research needs of EERE and make advances in research topics of importance to EERE Programs. Research Awards will be provided to exceptional applicants interested in pursuing applied research to address topics listed by the EERE Programs sponsoring the Research Awards.

Applicants may select up to three research topics. Research proposal must be specific for the research topics; therefore, a separate research proposal must be submitted for each research topic selected. Proposals must be approved by the research mentor listed in the application for each research topic.

SOLAR ENERGY

S-501 Applying Behavioral Insights to Solar Soft Cost Reduction

Possible Disciplines: Behavioral Economics, Applied Economics, Computer Science, Social Science

In 2013, 64 cents of every dollar spent on residential solar went to soft costs - the aggregated costs for installing panels, commissioning them, and connecting them to the grid. Soft cost reduction is unique from hardware innovation because it deals directly with people and processes - like customer acquisition strategies, diffusion of best practices to local government officials, and relationships between decision makers at energy institutions such as solar installers and electric utilities. Soft cost progress benefits from applying results from social and behavioral science to refine the ways that solar energy systems are bought, sold, designed, and monitored.

SunShot is seeking to support postdoctoral researchers to apply and advance cutting-edge social and behavioral science to drive toward the national solar cost reduction goals.

Areas of interest include:

  • Design, implementation, and evaluation of randomized control trials in partnership with institutions piloting new solar policies and programs (such as electric utilities and municipal governments);
  • Using behavioral economics to understand consumer preferences and the effectiveness of messaging and framing related to solar adoption strategies;
  • Analysis of energy consumption patterns (using Green Button data) and energy efficiency upgrade decisions before and after solar adoption at residential- and commercial-scales; and
  • Human-interface design for solar monitoring devices.

S-502 Applying Data Science to Solar Cost Reduction

Possible Disciplines: Behavioral Economics, Applied Economics, Computer Science, Social Science

The emergence of new big data tools can revolutionize how solar technologies are researched, developed, demonstrated, and deployed. From computational chemistry and inverse material design to adoption, reliability, and insolation forecasting, data scientists have opportunities to dramatically impact the future of solar energy.

SunShot is seeking to support postdoctoral researchers to apply and advance cutting-edge data science to drive toward the national solar cost reduction goals.

Areas of interest include:

  • Computational methods for revealing insights about diffusion of solar technologies at the residential, commercial, and utility scales that ingest large administrative, geospatial, economic, and financial datasets;
  • Novel analysis of Green Button (smart meter) data;
  • Quantification of direct and external cost and benefits of distributed energy generation and storage;
  • Numerical prediction methods for electrical grid operations and planning such as solar insolation forecasting as well as PV system performance;
  • Data tools for advancing photovoltaic and concentrating solar power technologies.

S-503 Solar Systems Integration

Possible Disciplines: Power Systems Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Computer Science

The Systems Integration (SI) program of the SunShot Initiative aims to enable extreme penetration of solar energy onto the electricity grid by addressing the associated technical and regulatory challenges. In order to enable 100’s of GW of solar interconnected on the nation’s electricity grid, we seek postdoctoral research projects that will help us address significant challenges in the following thrust areas:

Grid Performance and Reliability focuses on achieving high penetration at the distribution level (< 69kV) and on the transmission grid in a seamless, safe, reliable and cost effective manner.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

  • Utility modeling, simulation, and analysis tools to address technical issues surrounding grid planning, operations, and reliability
  • Developing advanced grid-friendly PV interconnection technologies;
  • Accelerating cost-effective deployment of PV generation on the distribution and transmission grid
  • Developing validated inverter, solar system planning, operations and feeder models to enhance PV integration analysis techniques
  • Demonstrating the feasibility of high-penetration PV scenarios under a wide range of system conditions through laboratory and field testing
  • Advancing interconnection and performance standards and codes to enable high levels of PV integration for grid reliability.

Dispatchability aims to ensure that solar power plants based on PV and concentrating solar power (CSP) technologies at utility and distributed scales are capable of being dispatched in a fashion that is comparable to or better than conventional power plants.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

  • Extensive analyses to understand the impact of high penetration of solar power plants on the bulk power system and distribution system operations
  • Understanding and enhancing the dispatch capability of PV solar power plants, and investigating the value of varying energy storage capabilities for CSP plants
  • Development of standardized methods for testing grid performance of PV solar power plants, and exploring and demonstrating the value of energy storage.

Power Electronics seeks to develop intelligent devices with advanced functionalities that maximize the power output from the PV arrays on the one side and serve as the interfaces to the electric grid (or end use circuits) on the other, while ensuring overall system performance, safety, reliability, and controllability at minimum cost.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

  • Innovative circuit design that maximizes power output from the PV arrays
  • Development of advanced components and optimal control
  • Development of power electronics technologies to improve energy yield while reducing balance of system (BOS) hardware costs, process costs and installation time; development and field demonstration of smart inverter functionalities
  • Development of accelerated life testing methods for full PV systems
  • Physics of failure models to predict faults and improve reliability of PV systems

Communications help inform grid operations effectively with high-level integration of solar, requiring visibility across multiple spatial scales (from the end-user load through the distribution substation and beyond) and at multiple time scales (from microseconds to hours and days).

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

  • Advances in information, communication, and sensor technologies to adequately monitor the behavior and manage the impact of the solar technologies integrating into the grid
  • Enterprise level integration of PV management systems with grid management systems
  • Development of open and interoperable communication and control architectures
  • Development of communication requirements such as network latency, scalability, and availability
  • Implementation of standard communication protocols in inverter hardware and enterprise software
  • Demonstration of end-to-end system integration and interoperability on actual distribution feeders with utilities.

For the description of these thrust areas, please refer to http://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2014/08/f18/2014SunShotPortfolio_Syst...

S-504 Concentrating Solar Power Materials and Systems

Possible Disciplines: Mechanical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Materials Science

Concentrating solar power (CSP) technologies use light collecting elements to concentrate and direct sunlight onto receivers, which convert the solar flux to heat. This thermal energy is then used to produce electricity, typically via a turbine or heat engine. By utilizing heat as the energy input, CSP is complementary to other forms of renewable power generation that rely on intermittent energy sources (e.g. photovoltaics and wind) due to the relative ease in storing thermal energy. Thermal energy storage (TES) can easily be integrated into a CSP plant, and CSP is unique among renewable technologies in that the integration of energy storage actually reduces the Levelized Cost of Electricity (LCOE) of a CSP plant, up to a capacity factor of approximately 70%.  The increased cost effectiveness results from better utilization of the power block for more hours of the year and the ability to harness excess energy from the solar field. The higher levels of power production and the ability to shift power production to better coincide with peak loads correspond to increases in revenues. Thus, the relatively small costs associated with a well-designed TES system can be significantly offset by the improved performance of the CSP plant.
 
A well-designed CSP TES system is one that has a high energetic efficiency, η (Eq. 1), as well as a high exergetic efficiency, ζ (Eq. 2), as defined,

   η=  Qout/Qin     (Eq. 1)

    ζ=  Qout/Qin ×Wout/Win   ≈  (Qout (1-T∞/TPB ))/(Qin (1-T∞/TRO ) )    (Eq. 2)

where Qin is the total energy transferred from the heat transfer fluid (HTF) to the storage system during charging, Qout is the total energy transferred from the storage system to the HTF during discharging, TPB is the temperature of the working fluid at the inlet of the turbine in Kelvin, TRO is the temperature of the HTF at the outlet of the receiver in Kelvin, and T∞  is the ambient temperature nominally taken to be 298K.  SunShot targets a cost-effective TES system as having ≥ 99% energetics efficiency and ≥ 95% exergetic efficiency.

TES may be grouped into three classes: Sensible (utilizing a material’s inherent heat capacity), Latent (applying the latent heat involved in a particular phase transition), and Thermochemical (based on the heat of reaction for a highly reversible chemical reaction). While each class has its unique challenges, all classes benefit from realizing high values for volumetric energy density. To achieve the SunShot Initiative’s cost targets, modeling, designing, and testing of TES systems must validate an installed cost of ≤$15 per kilowatt-hour-thermal (kWhth). Further, applicants must demonstrate that the proposed TES design is compatible with high-efficiency power cycles (> 50% thermal-to-electric) that have been identified as necessary to meeting SunShot CSP targets. For example, for novel supercritical CO2-based cycles, the TES system must provide heat to the turbine working fluid at ~750 °C.

1Stekli, J.; Irwin, L.; Pitchumani, R.  “Technical Challenges and Opportunities for Concentrating Solar Power With Thermal Energy Storage,” ASME Journal of Thermal Science Engineering and Applications; Vol. 5, No. 2; Article 021011; 2013; http://dx.doi.org/10.1115/1.4024143.

 
Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:
 
  • Novel concepts for the solar thermochemical sulfur cycle – i.e. solar thermal activation of sulfuric acid, or another oxidized sulfur compound, to generate easily-stored elemental sulfur. Of particular interest would be innovative catalysts, materials, and reactor designs to enhance the reaction rate of the desired SO3  SO2 conversion process. Novel designs may take advantage of external forces (including but not limited to pressure, electromagnetism, centrifugation, and others) so as to shift thermodynamic equilibria in favor of desired products while concurrently disfavoring the generation of sulfate (SO42-) and other thermodynamic sinks in the high temperature SO3/SO2 disproportionation reactor.
  • Novel thermochemical materials or cycles for high volumetric energy density storage systems (> 3000 MJ/m3), including self-healing systems, or other design strategies capable of cost effective, simple, periodic regeneration.
  • The development of Pickering emulsions to increase the stability and volumetric energy density of sensible and latent TES material systems, including the use of such materials to reduce the corrosive nature of molten chloride heat transfer fluids.
  • High-temperature (≥ 650°C), low-cost (≤ $15/kWhth) thermal or thermochemical storage materials compatible with advanced fluids and cycles
S-505 Photovoltaic Materials, Devices, and Modules

Possible Disciplines: Materials Science and Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Applied Physics, Physics, Chemistry

In photovoltaic system hardware, serious materials challenges remain in many commercial and near commercial technologies. Research projects are sought in applied science to improve performance and drive down costs of photovoltaic materials, devices, and modules. Below are some questions and areas of interest:

  • Fundamental understanding of mechanisms of degradation in PV devices. Development of models based on fundamental physics and material properties to predict PV device degradation able to predict device lifetime with material based input parameters and stress conditions, and to enable shorter testing time and high confidence data.
  • Methods that can be used to recycle modules and related components when PV modules reach end of life.
  • Approaches to reduce the gap between module and cell efficiencies aiming to reach single junction module efficiencies of 25% or multi-junction module efficiencies of 40%.
  • New multi-junction solar cell architectures and designs that would result in higher efficiency cells.
  • Earth abundant PV materials (absorber, TCO, etc.) to enable TW level of deployment.
  • Novel ways of charge separation and extraction, light trapping, or device design that could outperform a p-n junction architecture.
  • New module architectures and innovative non-cell, module components that enable higher module efficiency, lower cost and/or improved reliability.
  • Development of new probing techniques to overcome material limitations to get to higher PV device efficiency. Scalable low-cost measurement and characterization methods for cell and modules during fabrication that could later become one of the standard in-line metrology tools on the production line.
  • Fundamental understanding of mechanisms of degradation in PV devices and modules. Development of models based on fundamental physics and material properties to predict PV 
    device or module degradation and lifetime with material based input parameters and stress conditions, and to enable shorter testing time and high confidence data.
  • Novel ways of charge separation and extraction, light trapping, or device design that could outperform traditional p-n junction architectures.
    Methods that can be used to recycle modules and related components when PV modules reach end of life.
  • New multi-junction solar cell architectures and designs that would result in higher efficiency cells
  • Earth abundant PV materials (absorber, TCO, etc.) to enable TW level deployment.