The Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO) is offering the Regional Resource Hubs for Purpose-Grown Energy Crops Grant

If issued, this FOA will support the Bioenergy Technologies Office’s research and development (R&D) priorities in the area of Renewable Carbon Resources (RCR). The RCR subprogram develops science and engineering-based strategies and technologies to cost-effectively transform renewable carbon resources into high-quality, environmentally sustainable, conversion-ready feedstocks for biofuels and bioproducts. These strategies and technologies are designed to improve the efficiency, sustainability, and reliability of feedstock production, harvesting or collection, storage, preprocessing, and transportation, and identify the key feedstock quality and operational variables for conversion performance.

Developing a domestic supply chain of purpose-grown energy crops is critical to decarbonizing the U.S. transportation and industrial sectors and can contribute to decarbonization of adjacent sectors of the economy, such as the agricultural and power sector. The Regional Resource Hubs for Purpose-Grown Energy Crops FOA will address the U.S. National Blueprint for Transportation Decarbonization by funding high-impact R&D focused on mobilizing low carbon intensity, purpose-grown energy crops. These crops will support the Clean Fuels and Products Shot™ and contribute to the 2050 sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) production targets of the SAF Grand Challenge. In order to verify greenhouse gas benefits and encourage grower adoption and deployment, long-term yield and sustainability of production crop varieties need to be demonstrated along with the agricultural and silvicultural practices that can provide low carbon intensity feedstocks for the production of renewable fuels and products.

It is anticipated that the FOA may include the following Area of Interest:

Area of Interest (AOI) 1: Purpose-Grown Energy Crops

The goal of this AOI will be to demonstrate the long-term yield and sustainability of purpose-grown energy crops across varied agronomic and geographic landscapes that will accelerate feedstock supply chain development through the generation of data for use by analysts, policy makers, and industry. Verification and validation of the effectiveness of improved agronomic practices on reducing the carbon intensity of biomass resources across multiple regions, feedstock types, and growing seasons will also be essential to meet the 85% GHG emission reduction goal of the Clean Fuels and Products Shot™ compared to fossil-based sources by 2035. Feedstocks of interest include, but are not limited to, algae (microalgae, macroalgae, and cyanobacteria), herbaceous crops (switchgrass, miscanthus, energy cane, sweet sorghum, and high-biomass sorghum), short-rotation woody crops (hybrid poplars and shrub willows), and intermediate crops (carinata, pennycress, and camelina). Each application selected from this FOA will become a member of the Regional Biomass Resource Hub Initiative that will work together with DOE’s established Regional Biomass Resource Hub Initiative Coordinator, Idaho National Laboratory (INL), to coordinate experimental plans, report data, and collectively achieve the FOA objectives. Selected projects will be mapped to a Regional Biomass Resource Hub (RBRH) based on the proposed feedstock(s) and region(s) included in their application.

Please note: Due to INL’s role as Initiative Coordinator and involvement in FOA strategy discussions, INL is not eligible to apply for funding as a Prime Recipient under the FOA and may not be proposed as a Subrecipient on another entity’s application. Any application that includes INL as a Prime Recipient or Subrecipient will be deemed ineligible, non-responsive, and will not be further considered.

This Notice is issued so that interested parties are aware of the EERE’s intention to issue this FOA in the near term. All of the information contained in this Notice is subject to change. EERE will not respond to questions concerning this Notice. Once the FOA has been released, EERE will provide an avenue for potential Applicants to submit questions.

EERE plans to issue the FOA in or around January 2024 via the EERE eXCHANGE website https://eere-eXCHANGE.energy.gov/. If Applicants wish to receive official notifications and information from EERE regarding this FOA, they should register in EERE eXCHANGE. When the FOA is released, applications will be accepted only through EERE eXCHANGE.