Notice of Intent to Issue Funding Opportunity Announcement DE FOA 0001027 Building Energy Efficiency Frontiers Incubator Technologies (BENEFIT) 2014 | Apply Online

Opportunity Summary:

This notice is a heads-up from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), specifically the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) on behalf of the Building Technologies Office (BTO), that DOE intended to release a formal Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) called Building Energy Efficiency Frontiers - Incubator Technologies (BENEFIT) 2014 (planned FOA number DE-FOA-0001027). The notice itself was not a solicitation and was posted only to give prospective applicants time to prepare. DOE explicitly stated that no applications would be accepted under the notice, and it also requested that people not submit questions or responses to the notice. The practical message to applicants was to use the advance time to build partnerships, refine technical ideas, and gather supporting data ahead of the actual FOA release, which DOE expected to issue around the first quarter of calendar year 2014.

The opportunity was positioned as discretionary federal funding for energy-related conservation research and development (CFDA 81.086), and it indicated that cost sharing would be required. Eligibility was described as unrestricted (open to any entity type), with the caveat that the final FOA could clarify or limit eligibility in its detailed text. The funding mechanism was expected to include cooperative agreements, grants, and potentially other agreement types, which usually signals that some projects might involve substantial DOE involvement (common under cooperative agreements) depending on the topic and project maturity. Although the record fields list estimated total funding and award ceiling/floor as $0, that appears to reflect that this was only a notice of intent rather than the actual funding announcement where dollar amounts would normally be defined.

DOE directed applicants to use the EERE eXCHANGE portal for participation. Prospective applicants would need to register and create an account in that system, and DOE provided a user guide location within the eXCHANGE site. The notice also included a technical support contact for issues accessing the announcement materials electronically, emphasizing that eXCHANGE was the official platform for the upcoming submission process.

Technically, the notice previewed the kinds of projects DOE anticipated supporting under BENEFIT 2014, organized into two broad groupings: "Incubators (Off Roadmap)" and "Frontiers (Roadmap Driven)." The Incubators areas were framed to attract earlier-stage or unconventional approaches that were not already being supported or targeted by BTO, as long as they clearly applied to residential and/or commercial buildings and could plausibly deliver significant primary energy savings. This structure signaled an intent to bring new ideas into the buildings R&D pipeline, not just incremental improvements to technologies already on BTO's roadmap.

Under Incubators, Area of Interest 1 was an open topic category for energy efficiency solutions in residential and commercial buildings. The key requirement was novelty relative to existing BTO support: applicants needed to propose innovative technologies, approaches, or design tools that were not already targeted by BTO, while still demonstrating a credible pathway to meaningful building-sector energy savings. In practice, this kind of open topic area typically encourages cross-cutting concepts such as new building materials or components, novel HVAC or lighting concepts, innovative controls and operational strategies, design and modeling tools, or other approaches that can reduce energy use at the building or system level, as long as the applicant can make a strong case for impact and relevance to buildings.

Incubators Area of Interest 2 focused on innovative sensors and sensor systems, with a clear emphasis on open architecture and data sharing. DOE described the aim as developing sensors and sensor systems that can easily share data so building owners and operators can cost-effectively capture energy and cost savings through both new and existing control system applications. The notice highlighted three major goals: low cost, data sharing/interoperability, and ease of deployment, including plug-and-play methodologies. This points toward solutions that reduce the friction and expense of installing and integrating sensors in real buildings, and that avoid locked, proprietary ecosystems that prevent data from being used across different platforms and control applications.

The Frontiers category was described as "roadmap driven," meaning it aligned more directly with BTO-defined priority technology pathways and performance targets. Area of Interest 3 addressed advanced, energy-efficient clothes dryers, specifically advanced electric dryers in both vented and ventless configurations. DOE indicated that there were defined economic and technical goals for this topic, and it encouraged concepts that provide measurable non-energy benefits as well, recognizing that market adoption often depends on more than efficiency alone. Non-energy benefits in appliance contexts often include improvements such as better fabric care, faster or more reliable drying, reduced heat release into the home, improved indoor air quality, lower noise, reduced maintenance, or easier installation, all of which can be decisive for consumer acceptance.

Area of Interest 4 targeted highly insulating building envelope components and split into two subtopics: visibly transparent components and opaque components. For visibly transparent envelope components (such as advanced window or glazing technologies), DOE previewed performance metrics that implied major improvements over common products, listing targets of R-7 for residential applications and R-5 for commercial applications. Those R-value targets signal a push for high-performance windows or transparent assemblies that meaningfully cut heat loss and gain while still providing daylight and visibility, which is traditionally challenging because transparency and high insulation are often at odds.

For opaque envelope components (such as wall insulation materials or retrofit systems), DOE indicated a target of R-8 per inch for insulation material that could be added to either exterior or interior walls in existing buildings, while holding the installed cost premium (labor and material) to $0.30 per square foot. That combination of aggressive thermal performance and very low incremental installed cost suggests a strong interest in practical retrofit-ready insulation solutions that can scale across existing building stock. The emphasis on both interior and exterior applicability also reflects real-world constraints, since many retrofits must work around architectural, structural, historic preservation, property line, and occupant disruption issues.

Administratively, the notice associated the opportunity with the DOE Golden Field Office and provided eXCHANGE support contact information for technical access issues. Key dates listed in the record include a posted and creation date of January 17, 2014, and an "original/current closing date" of April 19, 2014, with an archive date of July 19, 2014; however, because the document is a notice of intent rather than the actual FOA, those dates mainly reflect the lifecycle of the notice posting rather than an application deadline for awards under BENEFIT itself. The central takeaway is that DOE was signaling an upcoming, cost-shared buildings energy efficiency funding opportunity with both open innovation space (incubators) and targeted roadmap topics (frontiers), and that serious applicants were expected to prepare early by assembling teams, evidence, and a credible path to impact before the formal FOA was released through EERE eXCHANGE.

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