Scientists and engineers across the world are in pursuit of creating ‘the sun in a bottle’ – a fusion power plant – with the goal of creating the ultimate clean and sustainable energy source on earth. The United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) and Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS) are two leading organizations in the field of fusion developing such devices, and they want to work with YOU! Apply by April 21 with an innovative new joining/bonding technology for dissimilar materials or cutting-edge, non-destructive testing equipment to verify and inspect those bonds.

The Accelerate Smart Cities Innovation Challenge brings together industry experts with innovators and startups to support smart region solutions. Over 6 weeks, teams create innovative, high-impact solutions while hearing from and collaborating with sector experts and mentors. In addition, the Challenge creates connections among key elements of the startup community and provides a novel way for municipalities to pilot cutting-edge technology solutions in priority policy or program areas. Companies are invited to pitch their solutions to a panel of judges on an innovative topic, including the following: broadband, housing, transportation, health, water, food systems, education, infrastructure, energy, and public safety.

After launching a successful Inaugural Pitch Showcase last fall, our partners at Cleantech Leaders Roundtable (CTLR) have announced a spring CTLR Angels call for pitches. CTLR is now collecting pitches from startups focused on decarbonization, advancing the energy transition, and innovative climate adaptation solutions. Startups seeking early-stage Angel funding at or below $3m will be considered. Three finalists will be invited to CTLR’s Spring 2023 Pitch Showcase to present their pitch to CTLR Angels (location/date TBA).

The $15 million Energizing Rural Communities Prize challenges individuals and organizations to develop partnership plans or innovative financing strategies to help rural or remote communities improve their energy systems and advance clean energy demonstration projects. The Energizing Rural Communities Prize has two tracks, both following a two-phase timeline:

• The Partner track—with a $10 million cash prize pool—will support plans to connect rural or remote communities to government funding, technical assistance, or a network of partners that can help implement clean energy demonstration projects.
• The Finance track—with a $5 million cash prize pool—will support plans to access capital or to develop community ownership models to help finance clean energy demonstration projects in rural or remote areas.

The goal of the Office of Science Graduate Student Research (SCGSR) program is to prepare graduate students for science, technology, engineering, or mathematics  careers critically important to the DOE Office of Science mission, by providing graduate thesis research opportunities at DOE laboratories.  The SCGSR program provides supplemental awards to outstanding U.S. graduate students (US citizens or lawful permanent residents) to pursue part of their graduate thesis research at a DOE laboratory/facility in areas that address scientific challenges central to the Office of Science mission. The research opportunity is expected to advance the graduate students’ overall doctoral thesis while providing access to the expertise, resources, and capabilities available at the DOE laboratories/facilities.

REpowering Schools (REpS) is partnering with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory to offer seed-funding up to $6,000 for universities, colleges and community colleges related to wind energy.  Project expenses could include:

• Research materials and expenses
• Travel to support research and engagement
• Supplies or parts for research platforms for courses (such as simple wind tunnels or bench dynamometers for capstone classes)
• Curricula development
• Expenses related to the publication of research

Join the world’s largest multi-sector commercialization program for emerging deep technologies. Showcase, pitch and connect your innovations for licensing and investment opportunities with leading corporate, investment and federal prospectors.

The American-Made Net Load Forecasting Prize is open to forecasting industry organizations that cater to utilities, system operators, and power plant owners, as well as academic teams with machine learning capabilities that are interested in forecasting. Competitors are required to submit daily day-ahead probabilistic net load forecasts, with an hourly resolution, over the course of four weeks and across multiple distinct climatic locations in the United States. The Solar Forecast Arbiter will be used to evaluate how well each competitor’s forecasts performed compared to a benchmark forecast. By using the Arbiter for comparing forecast performance, the Prize helps demonstrate the feasibility of fair, transparent, and high-quality evaluations of probabilistic net load forecasts using a publicly available open-source platform.

This prize offers up to $600,000 in cash prizes, with three anticipated winners and three anticipated runners-up.

The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management (FECM) and the DOE’s National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) announced more than $18 million in available funding for research and development projects that focus on the characterization, treatment, and management of produced water—or wastewater associated with oil and natural gas development and production—as well as management of legacy wastewater associated with coal-based thermal electric power generation facilities, primarily coal combustion residuals waste streams. Apply by April 12, 2023.

SPARK Virginia works to build an innovation cluster creating solutions for the entire value chain – making it safer and easier to build, generate, transmit, and consume nuclear and hydrogen energy in Virginia and beyond. SPARK Virginia kicks off in February 2023 with a set of two public innovation challenges hosted in the Richmond and Hampton Roads areas that will award early commercialization grants to inventors and engineers in select hard-tech areas to develop preliminary business models exploring the commercial viability of their technology.

TechConnect World enables you to connect with the largest science and technology funding in the world. Connect with top scientists, corporate, federal and VC prospectors and interact with research, investments, licensing, and partnering opportunities.

There are two opportunities for startups to be featured at the TechConnect World: Submit a poster by March 31 or submit your innovation by February 24.

1. Climate Change – We are looking for disruptive innovations that can decarbonise energy generation and industries, as well as capture and utilise carbon to create scalable products for global markets. We also want solutions that address ocean challenges including  innovative models that restore and regenerate coastal and marine ecosystems in Southeast Asia.

2. Food & Nutrition – We are looking for disruptive innovations that can establish a circular urban agriculture or aquaculture system, or alternative protein system.  We are seeking innovative and breakthrough technological solutions to maximise production efficiency and minimise resource requirements.