On Monday, July 14, the U.S. Department of Energy announced the Fiscal Year 2015 Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer (SBIR/STTR) Phase I Release 1 technical topics. These topics include non-platinum catalysts for fuel cells and detection of contaminants in hydrogen.

DOE's key hydrogen objectives are to reduce the cost of producing and delivering hydrogen to less than $4 per gallon of gasoline equivalent (gge) to enable fuel cell vehicles to be competitive with gasoline vehicles. Key fuel cell objectives are to reduce fuel cell system cost to $40/kW and improve durability to 5,000 hours (equivalent to 150,000 miles of driving) for automotive fuel cell systems by 2020. In support of these goals, SBIR/STTR topics in the FY15 Phase I Release 1 are focused on both fuel cell systems and hydrogen fuel RD. Topics include the following:

• Non-Platinum Group Metal (PGM) Catalysts for Fuel Cells: Novel transformative research with potential to lead to the development of next generation non-PGM catalysts and bi-functional catalysts for fuel cells.
• Detection of Contaminants in Hydrogen: Improve scientific understanding of material behavior associated with the detection of contaminants in hydrogen at parts per billion (ppb) accuracy to enable technology for real time fuel quality monitoring.

The full SBIR/STTR Funding Opportunity Announcement will be issued on August 11, 2014, and applications will be due October 14, 2014.

There will be a webinar on the above topics on Tuesday, July 22, 2014, from 1:00 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. EDT to provide additional information and an opportunity to ask questions. Questions must be provided on the webinar registration form in advance of the webinar.