The Water Power Technologies Office (WPTO), within the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), invites input from the public regarding challenges and opportunities associated with hydropower development in undeveloped stream-reaches. Additionally, WPTO is seeking input on the focus and structure of a potential funding opportunity to support research and development of advanced and/or nontraditional transformative hydropower technologies and project designs capable of avoiding or minimizing environmental and social effects for new cost-competitive hydropower development in undeveloped stream-reaches of the United States.
Through its HydroNEXT initiative, WPTO’s Hydropower Program (the Program) invests in the development of innovative technologies that lower cost, improve performance, and promote environmental stewardship of hydropower development across three resource classes:
- Existing non-powered dams
- Pumped storage hydropower
- New stream-reach development
Under a Fiscal Year 2016 Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) DE-FOA-0001455 titled, “Innovative Technologies to Advance Non-Powered Dam and Pumped Storage Hydropower Development,” the program made federal funding available to research and develop innovative solutions for non-powered dams and pumped storage hydropower development. In fiscal year 2017, the program seeks to overcome challenges associated with furthering the development of hydropower in new stream-reaches.