Today, the Department’s Loan Programs Office (LPO) is kicking off a long weekend of celebrating American independence by announcing a major investment in American energy. The $4 billion Renewable Energy and Efficient Energy Projects Loan Guarantee solicitation is intended to support the first commercial-scale deployments of the next wave of innovative clean energy technologies.
Investing in American energy and reducing the emissions that lead to climate change are important parts of President Obama’s Climate Action Plan. The Department’s loan guarantees are already helping to achieve those goals.
Our previous loan guarantees for renewable projects helped to finance the world’s largest completed photovoltaic (PV) solar project, the world’s largest concentrating solar power (CSP) plant, the first solar thermal energy storage in the U.S., one of the world’s largest onshore wind farms, and one of the nation’s first cellulosic ethanol projects.
We want to replicate that success with this new solicitation. The LPO has initially identified technology areas that are poised for commercial-scale development, can catalyze industries, and be most easily replicated. While we can issue a loan guarantee to any project that meets the solicitation’s requirements, we’ve identified five target areas:
- Advanced Grid Integration & Storage: This area focuses on renewable energy systems that mitigate issues related to variability, dispatchability, congestion, and control by incorporating technologies such as demand response or local storage. These advanced system designs will demonstrate greater grid compatibility of generation from renewable resources and open up an even larger role for renewable power generation.
- Drop-In Biofuels: This area focuses on biofuels that are more compatible with today’s engines, delivery infrastructure and refueling station equipment. These projects take advantage of existing infrastructure by providing nearly identical bio-based substitutes for crude oil, gasoline, diesel fuel, and jet fuel, or produce intermediate fuel feedstocks that can be delivered to and integrated into existing oil petroleum refineries.
- Waste-to-Energy: This area focuses on projects harnessing waste products such as landfill methane and segregated waste as a source of energy. These types of projects will enable commercial scale utilization of waste materials which are otherwise discarded and produce significant clean, renewable energy.
- Enhancement of Existing Facilities: This area focuses on projects incorporating renewable generation technology into existing renewable energy and efficient energy facilities to significantly enhance performance or extend the lifetime of the generating asset.
- Efficiency Improvements: This area focuses on projects that incorporate new or improved technologies to further improve on energy efficiency that would substantially reduce greenhouse gases.
As we move forward with this solicitation, we’re excited about the prospect of catalyzing a new spectrum of innovative clean energy technologies and generating more American energy.
Peter W. Davidson
Peter W. Davidson served as Executive Director of the Loan Programs Office (LPO) at the U.S. Department of Energy from May 2013 to June 2015. Mr. Davidson oversaw the program’s more than $30 billion portfolio of clean energy and advanced vehicle loans and loan guarantees, making it the largest project finance organization in the U.S. government. Mr. Davidson was responsible for ensuring that the LPO carries out its mission to accelerate the deployment of innovative clean energy projects and domestic advanced vehicle manufacturing. By providing debt capital to a broad range of renewable energy, advanced fossil energy, and nuclear energy projects, as well as advanced vehicle manufacturing facilities, the LPO is supporting economic development across the U.S., promoting an “all-of-the-above” energy strategy, and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
Prior to leading the LPO, Mr. Davidson was Senior Advisor for Energy and Economic Development at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and was the Executive Director of New York State’s economic development agency, the Empire State Development Corporation. Prior to his government service, Mr. Davidson was an entrepreneur who founded and managed six companies in Spanish language and other niche markets, broadcasting, publishing, marketing and digital preferred services. Early in his career he was an executive in the investment banking division of Morgan Stanley & Co.
Since 2001, Mr. Davidson has also been Chairman of the JM Kaplan Fund, a New York City based philanthropic organization. Under his leadership, grant making has focused on reducing New York City’s carbon footprint; supporting immigrant integration in the U.S. and archeological conservation world-wide.
Mr. Davidson has a BA from Stanford University and an MBA from the Harvard Business School.