2016 Energy Innovation Policy
2016 Energy Innovation Policy
2016 Energy Innovation Policy
By investing in energy
innovation and
infrastructure, the
United States could
wrest back cleanenergy markets,
creating thousands of
jobs in advanced
manufacturing and
improving its
trade balance.
PAGE 1
However, the United States is not doing enough to seize the energy-innovation
opportunity and capitalize on its progress to date. Federal funding for energy research and
development (R&D) lags well behind funding for space, health, and defense R&D. 4 Eleven
other countries around the world spend more on energy R&D as a percentage of GDP
than the United States. China spends three times as much. 5
Private investment in energy innovation has been weak as well. Venture capital and privateequity investment in American renewable-energy companies, for instance, peaked in 2008
at $5.4 billion and slipped to $2.2 billion in 2015. 6 Only a handful of U.S. companies
developing advanced nuclear reactors and carbon-capture technologies have raised enough
private investment to scale up their innovations; meanwhile, China is sponsoring an all-out
push on all of these technology fronts. 7 As a result, researchers, entrepreneurs, and
companies lack sufficient funding to invent new technologies; investors are wary of funding
technology scale-up; and slow-moving incumbents continue to dominate energy markets.
There is a second reason for the next administration to focus on spurring energy
innovation. Climate change is extremely unlikely to go away. As its observable effects, such
as king tides that regularly flood streets in Miami Beach, make the scientific consensus on
climate change more salient to the general public, the pressure on the United States to do
something, both domestically and internationally, will increase. But trying to combat
climate change with only existing energy technologies would be expensive, complicated,
and unpopular. 8 Instead, by investing in affordable and effective low-carbon energy
innovations, America will be able to lead the world in the fight against global warming
without imposing onerous regulations that limit consumer choice or alter our way of life.
President-elect Donald Trump and the 115th Congress should make energy innovation a
high priority and address the obstacles to developing and deploying new technologies. To
do so, they will need to reform a sprawling set of institutions to increase the commercial
impact of federal energy R&D and maximize taxpayer return on investment. These reforms
should draw inspiration from experiences in other sectors, including life sciences,
semiconductors, electronics, and agriculture, where breakthrough technologies have been
successfully commercialized. 9
We distill these lessons into five principles for institutional change that should be applied
to key federal agencies, especially the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE):
These reforms will help focus federal energy-innovation resources on urgent and coherent
needs. We put forward six candidates for these Technology Missions:
Nuclear power;
PAGE 2
Solar energy;
Energy storage;
Carbon capture, utilization, and storage;
Advanced cooling and thermal energy storage; and
Smart energy management and connected vehicles.
Accelerating energy innovation to accomplish these missions will require significant new
funding as well as more effective use of existing resources. Recognizing this fact, 20
countries around the worldrepresenting the vast majority of energy R&D investment
and led by the United Statesrecently committed to a Mission Innovation pledge to
double public-energy R&D funding over a five-year period. 10 Anticipating this increase, a
group of large investors led by Bill Gates has announced a new effort called
Breakthrough Energy Ventures that will invest more than a billion dollars in
innovative energy technologies.
The Trump administration, in partnership with Congress, should seek to meet the United
States Mission Innovation commitment. Dedicated revenue sources for federal energyinnovation investments would provide private investors with confidence that these
investments will be sustained and avoid the stop-and-start pattern that has plagued energyinnovation policy in the past. We close the paper with a set of funding options that merit
more careful exploration.
Billions of USD
2
3
Department of Energy
National Science Foundation
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Department of Agriculture
Department of Commerce
Department of Transportation
Other Agencies
PAGE 3
But U.S. federal investment can produce more bang for the buck. Too much of it is spent
today on a plethora of disconnected projects that lack focus. Reforming the sprawling
federal energy-innovation infrastructure should be an important priority for the Trump
administration and the 115th Congress. In doing so, they can build on initiatives
conceived and piloted under the Bush and Obama administrations that currently represent
only a small fraction of federal investment. The following five principles should guide the
reform effort.
1. Connect basic science with technology priorities
DOE has historically emphasized basic scientific research that is excessively insular,
uninspired by end uses, and disconnected from applied research, development,
demonstration, and commercialization. 13 Explicitly linking basic energy-science funding to
broader technology initiatives can more efficiently guide science without stifling it.
Experience in health, defense, and other sectors suggests that it is possible to tread a middle
path between focusing on applications and supporting breakthrough science and
technology. The life sciences, for example, have benefited from steady federal support for
basic research, which accounts for over half of the National Institutes of Healths (NIH)
$30 billion research budget. 14 Yet, NIH requires every proposed research project to be
linked to a practical purpose. 15 This approach has helped bring about a broad array of
application-relevant discoveries and the development of powerful enabling technologies,
such as rapid genetic-sequencing methods, which have sped up the pace of
technology commercialization. 16
DOE might draw on NIHs experience by requiring most basic energy-science programs to
identify a Technology Mission or another applied initiative to which they expect to
contribute. However, another lesson from NIH is that steady funding (in contrast to
historically volatile energy investments) nurtures vital communities and institutions, so this
transition should occur gradually. DOE should refrain from abruptly cutting off funding to
current projects. The Trump administration should work with Congress over several years
to increase the proportion of new appropriations for basic energy science that are explicitly
tied to broader initiatives to develop commercially relevant advanced-energy technology.
DOEs Energy Frontier Research Centers (EFRCs), which were designed during the
George W. Bush administration and funded initially in 2009, took a step in the right
direction. These 36 centers address interdisciplinary scientific questions that emerged from
gatherings of academic, government, and industry researchers. 17 More of the federal
governments basic energy-science research should be conducted at EFRCs, which should
be linked institutionally to downstream technology activities, such as Technology Missions.
Similar linkages should be encouraged to drive energy R&D at other federal agencies, such
as the National Science Foundation (NSF), which provides nearly $400 million
in funding. 18
The Obama administration also experimented with new institutions that create greater
connectivity along the energy-innovation chain. The Advanced Research Projects Agency-
PAGE 4
Greater autonomy,
stronger incentives to
collaborate, and better
connections to external
partners, especially
geographically
proximate industrial
clusters, could amplify
the national labs
impact on energy
technology.
At the administrative level, DOE has linked science with technology priorities through the
creation of the Office of the Under Secretary for Science and Energy (S4) and the Office of
Technology Transitions (OTT) within it. These organizational innovations, along with
Tech-to-Market Offices that have been established within some of DOEs major program
offices, advance the reform agenda articulated jointly by the Information Technology and
Innovation Foundation (ITIF), the Center for American Progress, and the Heritage
Foundation in 2010. 21 President Trump, in partnership with Congress, should further
elevate and fund S4 and OTT, and advance budget requests that continue to integrate the
departments narrow technology stovepipes and atomized funding streams.
There will be legislators and interest groups that oppose strengthening the link between
basic energy science and energy-technology priorities. Basic science research can and should
produce unexpected results with unanticipated applications. In fact, DOE and other
federal research agencies can do more to encourage researchers to take risks and pursue
longer-term projects, following the example of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute,
which funds people rather than projects. 22 But the administration has a strong case to make
to its partners in Congress that this middle path is the best one to advance innovation and
meet U.S. economic, security, and environmental objectives.
2. Reorient the national laboratories to pursue commercially relevant RD&D
DOE oversees 17 national laboratories, with a collective annual budget of $12.3 billion. 23
These labs are extraordinary repositories of scientific and technical capabilities that have
made great contributions to the nation since World War II. Many of these contributions
have been in the fields of defense and pure science; surprisingly few have been in energy.
One key reason is that the labs energy activities are too often disconnected from missiondriven, industry-relevant technology development, demonstration, and deployment.
Moreover, DOE delegates the labs limited autonomy to marshal their considerable
resources as coherent technology centers. Greater autonomy, stronger incentives to
collaborate, and better connections to external partners, especially geographically proximate
industrial clusters, could amplify the national labs impact on energy technology.
The president and Congress should empower them to prioritize this objective.
PAGE 5
The most impactful formula for lab-industry relationships centers on well-resourced, longterm RD&D collaborations that tackle commercially relevant problems. Many national
labs already possess a critical mass of relevant capabilities, such as Argonne National
Laboratory for energy storage and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory for solar fuels,
and others could develop comparably focused capabilities. Such locations are natural homes
for collaborations targeted at specific Technology Missions. These labs can also make
important but hard-to-quantify contributions by providing analysis, sharing information,
and convening relevant science and technology communities.
In order to build these partnerships, the private sector must have access to clear and
comprehensive information about the assets that each national lab can bring to bear on
technical challenges, such as research results, intellectual property, facilities and equipment,
modeling resources, and technical expertise. DOE has improved its reporting on these
assets in recent years by creating an Innovation Portal and Facilities Database, but there is
much more left to do. Likewise, the labs must work harder to solicit industry input to
better understand market needs and prioritize R&D activities for downstream impact.
PAGE 6
funds that lab directors can allocate toward priorities of their choosingfrom 4 percent to
6 percent or more of total spending on national labs (Figure 2). 28 And more of the
oversight over research projects should reside within the labs rather than in DOE
headquarters, so that the labs can determine the best ways to mobilize their resources
toward commercializing new technologies. 29
Figure 2: DOE Laboratory-Directed Research and Development (LDRD) budgets 30
700
$581m $579m $569m
$541m (4.72%) (4.76%) (4.64%) $527m $542m
$515m
(4.15%)
(4.58%)
$499m $513m
(4.15%)
$476m (5.05%) (4.86%) (4.7%)
(5.21%)
Millions of USD
600
500
400
$384m
(4.29%)
300
200
100
0
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
Year
PAGE 7
Breakthrough Energy Coalition, a 28-member group led by Bill Gates, will put substantial
capital into attractive opportunities. Recently, several of them announced the Breakthrough
Energy Ventureswith an initial capitalization of over $1 billion and plans to growthat
will invest in refining and scaling technologies emerging from federally funded research. To
make it easier to do so, DOE should continue to build out its Clean Energy Investment
Center (CEIC), which seeks to simplify the confusing array of federal resources for
prospective investors, and could focus their attention on the departments technology
priorities. 34 In addition, DOE should expand its Annual Merit Review process, in which all
recipients of applied R&D funds must present their results, to include energy-oriented
investors. Such gatherings could foster matchmaking between researchers and investors and
accelerate initial due diligence.
25
20
15
3
10
1
0
0
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
Year
U.S. Clean Energy Venture Capital Investment (Billions of 2014 USD)
Percentage of Total U.S. VC Investment
Agencies other than DOE should also explore opportunities to support early-stage
advanced-energy companies. For example, SBAs Small Business Investment Company
(SBIC) program should support private funds committed to investing in advanced-energy
technology start-ups. 36 And on the regulatory side, the Treasury Department should issue
additional guidance to institutional investors and charitable foundations, clarifying for
example that program-related investments in innovative energy companies qualify for
favorable tax treatment. 37 DOE should better support the Treasury Department in
developing guidance for energy technologies that qualify for tax incentives, linking those to
Technology Mission goals wherever possible.
4. Support demonstration projects to de-risk private-sector investment
Demonstration is a vital phase in the innovation process for many advanced-energy
technologies. Demonstration projects seek to establish the safety, reliability, and
affordability of technologies under real-world conditions, thereby reducing the risk facing
PAGE 8
later investors. Unfortunately, such projects have been woefully underfunded in recent
years. President Trump and the new Congress should explore new models for judiciously
filling this gap with federal resources to unlock private investment.
One model for financing large-scale energy-technology demonstration projects is an
independent, federally chartered corporation. This corporation would fund projects that
are unattractive to private investors but have the potential to stimulate massive follow-on
investment. Because it would be outside government, it would be able to employ flexible
hiring practices and provide project assistance on a commercial basis. 38
A second approach would organize demonstration projects regionally, taking advantage of
the diversity of natural resources and public attitudes across the country. A set of new
hybrid institutions would have to be created to oversee the selection and management of
such projects. This approach would combine state funding linked to energy use with
federal support. 39
Demonstration
projects have been
woefully underfunded
in recent years.
President Trump and
the new Congress
should explore new
models for judiciously
filling this gap with
federal resources to
unlock private
investment.
PAGE 9
been shown to be vital complements to the supply-push provided by federal RD&D for
many transformative innovations in the past. 44
DOD has long experience pairing supply-push and demand-pull. It virtually created the
computing industry, midwifing the discipline of computer science even as it bought early
computers for uses such as air defense in the 1950s and 1960s. Similar stories can be told
about other major high-tech industries, including aircraft, software, and semiconductors.
Once the markets for these products took off, federal procurement fell to a small fraction of
total sales. 45
DOD has already begun to play a similar role for energy innovations that meet its
operational needs and provide the military with reliable and secure energy services. 46 The
General Services Administration, which serves as the acquisition agent for federal civilian
agencies, has also provided demand-pull for energy innovations in areas such as green
buildings and alternative-fuel vehicles. Such efforts sometimes bump up against legal and
regulatory barriers that should be dismantled. However, it is also essential that
policymakers are vigilant about preventing such procurement preferences from being
captured by non-innovative incumbents.
DOE is not in the business of procuring energy on a large scale, so the demand-pull that
complements its RD&D investments will have to arise from other sources. Tax incentives
are one such source. They can help drive innovation by encouraging early adoption by end
users. Like procurement, however, such incentives must be regularly reviewed, so that they
dont become subsidies for mature technologies. Environmental and energy-efficiency
regulations may also drive demand for energy innovation. At its best, the regulatory process
engages technically savvy regulatory staff with industrial experts in order to set aggressive
but feasible targets on a time frame that allows industry to plan ahead to meet them.
Although DOEs own regulatory role is relatively small, it should play a larger role in
providing technical support to other agencies that regulate energy production and use. For
example, DOE could increase funding for technical experts at national labs to provide
impartial technical input to rulemaking processes conducted by the Federal Energy
Regulatory Commission, the Department of the Interior, state utility and transportation
regulators, and others.
State, local, and private-sector initiatives may well be more important in providing
demand-pull for energy innovation than federal policies. State renewable portfolio
standards, for instance, have helped to drive down costs for wind and solar power in recent
years. Many large corporations have added momentum to this trend by voluntarily
committing to purchase renewable energy.
In fact, in large part because of the growth of renewables, the electric power market is in
the midst of an historic transition from a centralized, one-way system to an interactive,
dynamic one. State regulators, and regional planning organizations under the purview of
the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), are on the front lines of this complex
PAGE 10
process. DOE, drawing on the national labs, should be engaged to provide technical advice
and support to these bodies as they navigate this uncharted territory. A combination of
bottom-up experimentation and federal information-sharing and coordination is more
likely to yield a 21st-century grid that enables innovation than either level acting alone.
PAGE 11
Nuclear Power
Nuclear power plants are by far the largest sources of zero-carbon energy in the United
States, supplying about 20% of the nations electricity. That is about three times as much
power as hydroelectric sources provide.
But the U.S. nuclear-power industry faces significant challenges. Although new plants are
under construction for the first time in decades, several older plants have shut down or are
scheduled to do so in the near future. These aging plants are expensive to maintain and run
compared with natural-gas plants in a period of very low gas prices and to wind and solar
plants that have received capital subsidies and have no fuel costs at all. A significant
number of nuclear operators argue that they can no longer cover their costs in current
wholesale electricity markets. Moreover, the costs of new plants have not fallen over time
and may have even increased, rendering them less competitive. 50
Generation IV nuclear
reactors would have
safety, cost, and fuel
cycle advantages over
the dominant currentgeneration technology,
light-water reactors.
PAGE 12
subsidies, allowing the United States to meet its stated goal of reducing greenhouse gas
emissions by 80 percent by mid-century, the fully installed average cost will need to fall to
25 cents per watt (12 cents per kilowatt-hour). 55 This low target is a result of the falling
value that solar can deliver to the power grid as its penetration increases. Currentgeneration silicon PV technology is very unlikely to hit this cost target, even assuming
aggressive cost declines as greater production yields learning benefits for manufacturing
and deployment.
Innovative new solar technologies have the potential to surpass the performance and
functionality of todays PV technology. They may cost less than the 25 cents per watt
target well before mid-century and open up new applications, such as building-integrated
systems, solar-coated windows, and portable generators. In particular, over the past five
years, researchers around the world have discovered that perovskite PV coatings have the
potential to be lightweight, flexible, colorful, and more efficient than silicon PV
technology, while using earth-abundant materials and cheap printing processes. 56 Other
approaches, such as organic and quantum-dot devices, are also promising.
Researchers around
the world have
discovered that
perovskite PV coatings
have the potential to
be lightweight,
flexible, colorful, and
more efficient than
silicon PV technology,
while using earthabundant materials
and cheap printing
processes.
The Solar Energy Technology Mission should also encompass approaches that can address
the roughly 40 percent of primary energy usage that cannot easily be electrified with
todays technological options. 57 These uses include aviation, heavy shipping, and heavy
trucking, which primarily rely on liquid fuels derived from petroleum. Decarbonizing these
uses will likely require clean drop-in replacement fuels. Researchers have made substantial
progress harnessing sunlight to split water and generate hydrogen, which can then be
combusted to produce heat, power a fuel cell to generate electricity, or serve as an input for
synthetic fuels. 58 Like more conventional forms of energy storage, which are discussed
below, solar fuels avoid the intermittency of solar PV, even as they provide flexibility in
end use.
A Solar Energy Technology Mission should aim to commercialize (a) highly efficient,
versatile, and cost-effective solar PV technologies such as perovskite, organic, or
quantum-dot devices; and (b) a robust, efficient, safe, and cost-effective solar-fuel generator
that uses earth-abundant materials for electrodes to harness sunlight and catalysts to
produce hydrogen.
Energy Storage
Energy storage is an increasingly vital function for electricity systems in the 21st century.
Variable renewable generation and increasingly flexible demand are already raising the
value of storage, and it may rise further as baseload-power generation declines and
transportation end uses expand.
Pumped hydroelectric systems dominate large-scale energy storage in the United States at
the moment, but no new capacity has been added to the system in the past decade, and
there are relatively few suitable sites for future additions. Most new storage capacity has
used lithium-ion batteries. 59 This technology is an extraordinary success story, powering
the mobile electronics that we have come to rely on as well as todays electric vehicles.
PAGE 13
But it also has important limits. Lithium-ion batteries are not optimal for long duration
grid-scale services, for instance. They are also heavier than one would like for powering
vehicles. Moreover, this family of battery chemistries appears to be approaching its
theoretical limits on performance metrics such as energy density. 60
New materials for battery components, coupled with careful system integration and
attention to manufacturability, could yield superior batteries for grid and vehicle
applications. Combinations of innovative components such as sulfur cathodes, lithiummetal anodes, solid electrolytes, and ceramic separators could exhibit higher energy density,
better safety, longer lifetimes, and faster power discharge. 61 For electric vehicles, such
technologies could yield performance and functionality superior to those of existing
internal combustion engines. For long-duration grid-scale applications that are currently
served by pumped hydro, an alternative architecture, the flow battery, could be ideal if
researchers can successfully manufacture it with earth-abundant materials. 62
Ultimately, there will not be one silver bullet for energy storage. Rather, a range of different
batteries should be devised that offer a menu of different attributes from which to select the
appropriate solution for energy-storage services in the electricity and transportation sectors.
Moreover, batteries are only a subset of energy-storage technologies; alternative approaches
such as fast-charging supercapacitors made of advanced materials such as graphene could
complement batteries and further broaden the menu.
Transformative advances in energy storage would make it considerably easier to
decarbonize both the electricity and transportation sectors. An Energy Storage Technology
Mission should produce next-generation storage technologies that improve on various
aspects of lithium-ion battery performance as well as drive costs down even further.
Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Storage (CCUS)
Fossil fuels are cheap and abundant. Even if the costs of their health and environmental
externalities are fully factored in, it will be important to continue to make use of them. The
cost of mitigating climate change could more than double this century if carbon-dioxide
emissions from fossil-fuel use are not captured, utilized, and stored. 63 And turning fossil
fuels into stranded assets on a monumental scale, as the keep it in the ground movement
calls for, would surely provoke massive resistance from the countries and communities
where they are found.
Current-generation technology for capturing and storing emissions from fossil-fuel power
plants is expensive. Researchers have been exploring several methods for capturing carbon
dioxide from advanced coal plants, including pre-combustion, post-combustion, and oxycombustion. To date, none of these technological pathways has emerged as optimal. In
fact, the cost of capture may actually have increased over the last decade. 64 DOE forecasts
only modest cost decreases of 20 to 30 percent in the near future. 65
Utilization has the potential to dramatically change these economics if the carbon that is
captured can be monetized. Enhanced oil recovery is the only viable use at the moment,
PAGE 14
but new technologies are emerging that would provide additional options. Near-term
opportunities include cement curing and building-material manufacturing. In the longer
term, manufacturing of industrial chemicals, plastics, biofuels, and carbon fiber could all
use captured carbon dioxide. 66 Although these uses may not account for a very large
fraction of carbon emissions, they could provide a vital economic incentive for increased
private investment and early adoption of carbon-capture technology.
Carbon storage on a large scale presents a variety of technological and societal challenges.
The long-term security of sequestration in specific geological formations must be
demonstrated, for example. Once that has been done, an equally secure pipeline system for
transporting captured carbon dioxide from power plants and industrial facilities to
appropriate formations must be constructed.
A CCUS Technology
Mission should not
only focus on
upstream capture
technologies but also
on downstream
industrial process
technologies that
could use carbon
dioxide and systems
for transporting and
storing it securely.
Thus, a CCUS Technology Mission should not only focus on upstream capture
technologies but also on downstream industrial process technologies that could use carbon
dioxide and on systems for transporting and storing it securely. Additionally, the mission
should encompass investigation of power-plant designs that promise dramatically lower
CCUS costs, such as integrated gasification fuel-cell plants and generators that use
supercritical carbon dioxide as a working fluid. 67 As a long-term goal, this mission might
extend to processes to harness sunlight to convert carbon dioxide into clean fuels (in
partnership with the Solar Energy Technology Mission described above). 68
Advanced Cooling and Thermal Energy Storage
Energy efficiency complements low-carbon electricity generation and fuel production,
reducing emissions and providing economic savings. Even though energy-efficiency
opportunities may be more cost-effective than fuel-switching, they are often overlooked in
technology assessments. 69 Cooling is a particularly promising end use on which to focus,
since more than 90 percent of the worlds primary energy generation is either consumed
or wasted thermally, and enormous latent demand for this service exists in
emerging markets. 70
Cooling applications consume energy directly through air-conditioning and refrigeration
and indirectly through the need to provide heat rejection in power plants, engines, and
industrial processes. Rapid growth in global demand for these end uses, particularly airconditioning and refrigeration in industrializing countries, is adding to the problem. A
further complication is that HFCs, the primary refrigerant in use today, have a global
warming potential that is thousands of times greater than carbon dioxide.
Although treaty negotiations to phase out HFCs globally were concluded successfully this
year, next-generation technological alternatives are needed to execute this agreement. 71
Possible options include HFOs (a related family of chemicals), ammonia, carbon dioxide,
hydrocarbons, and non-vapor-compression-based systems, such as magnetic,
thermo-elastic and membrane-based technologies, and passive radiant cooling from
nanostructured surfaces. 72
PAGE 15
Thermal energy storage allows the heat energy rejected from cooling to be used for valuable
purposes such as desalination and water heating. The current lack of robust systems for this
function means that an enormous amount of energy is simply lost. 73 Advanced materials
and systems that could be used for thermal storage could also improve the efficiency of
nuclear, fossil, solar thermal, and geothermal power generation and extend the range of
electric vehicles by reducing cooling and heating demand on traction batteries.
An Advanced Cooling and Thermal Energy Storage Technology Mission should focus on
developing drop-in alternatives to HFCs, new cooling and refrigeration technologies that
do not rely on working fluids, and thermal energy-storage materials.
Cooling is a
particularly promising
end use on which to
focus, since more
than 90 percent of the
worlds primary energy
generation is either
consumed or wasted
thermally, and
enormous latent
demand exists for
this service in
emerging markets.
PAGE 16
A Technology Mission for Smart Energy Management and Connected Vehicles should
embrace innovations in hardware, software, institutions, and behavior. It should facilitate
large-scale demonstration and experimentation to create smarter and smarter grids at the
district, metropolitan, and regional levels.
The Trump
administration should
work with Congress to
increase
appropriations for
energy RD&D to
roughly $13 billion,
consistent with the
U.S. Mission
Innovation pledge.
$Billions
%Total
Technology Missions
4.0
30%
1.5
11%
1.5
11%
Mission-Related Demonstrations
5.0
37%
Advanced Nuclear
CCUS
Other
Other Enabling Technology
Total
2.0
2.0
1.0
1.5
11%
13.5
[1] Including geo geothermal, building technologies, offshore wind, power electronics, fuel
[2] "Off-road map" here refers to technologies and tech development pathways beyond DOE's
Although expanded federal funding for energy innovation, especially in tandem with
institutional reforms that improve the return on public investment, should be a bipartisan
PAGE 17
Innovation is best
supported with steady
public investments
that provide
confidence to
entrepreneurs,
researchers, and
established firms that
their own investments
will yield results.
A source of federal
revenue that is
dedicated to energyinnovation funding
would provide
this much-needed
stability.
1. Carbon tax
A carbon tax has been widely recognized on both sides of the aisle and by key energyindustry players such as ExxonMobil as a prudent and efficient mechanism to account for
the externalities of greenhouse gases. 81 A small carbon tax would be sufficient to fully fund
expanded energy-innovation efforts. For example, a $5.00 per ton of carbon-dioxide tax on
the U.S. electric power sector would raise approximately $9.4 billion annually. A tax of
$7.00 per ton would raise $13.0 billion annually, enough to fully fund a doubled federal
energy RD&D budget.
2. Electricity wires fee
Congress could enact a small, nationwide surcharge on U.S. electricity sales that pass
through the electrical power grid, known as a wires fee. A wires fee of just $0.001 (one
tenth of a cent) per kilowatt-hour on U.S. electricity generation available to the grid would
generate approximately $4 billion annually.
3. Proceeds from sale of petroleum reserves
The U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) holds a vast store of value that could be
unlocked through the creation of a public-private partnership to operate the SPR, which
would generate a one-time windfall to fund energy innovation. Congress could require oil
companies to purchase the oil in the SPR and hold it in reserve, as other countries do, for
use in emergencies to counteract a shock to the oil market. Given oil prices of
approximately $50 per barrel, this strategy could raise over three-quarters of the additional
funding required to meet the U.S. Mission Innovation commitment over the next
five years. 82
4. Oil and gas extraction royalties
By harmonizing the rate at which the federal government charges onshore and offshore oil
and gas production, the Trump administration could raise substantial funding to support
energy innovation. According to the Department of the Interior, total federal revenue from
oil and gas extraction on federal lands in 2013 was $10.9 billion (onshore and offshore),
dominated by the roughly $7.5 billion coming from production in the Gulf of Mexico,
where the royalty rate is 18.75 percent. 83 By contrast, the federal government charges a
royalty of just 12.5 percent for oil and gas extraction from onshore public lands, a rate that
has not been updated since 1920. 84 Over $1 billion could be raised annually for federal
energy-innovation investments by harmonizing these rates. Raising the federal royalty rate
PAGE 18
is an executive action that does not require congressional approval. Current law states that
the rate should be not less than 12.5 percent, but it does not set an upper limit.
5. Fossil-fuel export fee
Congress could levy a small fee on U.S. fossil fuels that would apply only to exports. This
fee would neither raise prices for American consumers nor materially impact the viability of
U.S. exports. 85 An export fee of $1 per short ton of coal, $1 per barrel of crude oil, and
$0.10 per thousand cubic feet of liquefied natural gas (LNG) would have raised
approximately $250 million in 2015. With the projected growth in LNG exports, the
LNG fee alone could raise $250 million by 2020.
CONCLUSION
President-elect Trump has an opportunity to make good on his campaign promises to
create well-paid advanced-manufacturing jobs, protect the environment, embrace a diverse
energy mix that includes fossil fuels, and boost the flagging U.S. trade balance. Seizing that
opportunity, in cooperation with the 115th Congress, will require investing in energy
innovation, a priority that both sides of the aisle can get behind. But the obstacles to
bringing advanced-energy technologies to market are formidable. Institutional reforms are
sorely needed that focus federal energy-innovation institutions such as DOE on technology
commercialization and on supporting innovation through all stages of the extended
innovation pipeline. By organizing the energy-innovation effort around overarching
Technology Missions, the administration and Congress will be able to demonstrate to
taxpayers a superior rate of return on the publics investment. Dedicated and expanded
federal funding will help to induce private investment, so that the United States not only
has clean, affordable, reliable, and safe energy for its own needs, but also becomes a much
more effective player in the burgeoning global advanced-energy market. To be sure, this
agenda is a substantial undertaking, but the prize is easily worth the effort.
PAGE 19
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PAGE 25
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The authors thank David Victor, Joshua Freed, Sagatom Saha, and Quinn
Marschik for providing input to this report, as well as the Sloan Foundation for
its generous support. The recommendations herein, as well as any errors or
omissions, are the authors alone.
ABOUT ITIF
The Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) is a nonprofit,
nonpartisan research and educational institute focusing on the intersection of
technological innovation and public policy. Recognized as one of the worlds
leading science and technology think tanks, ITIFs mission is to formulate and
promote policy solutions that accelerate innovation and boost productivity to
spur growth, opportunity, and progress.
FOR MORE INFORMATION, VISIT US AT WWW.ITIF.ORG.
PAGE 26