The DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy intends to issue a new $25-million Funding Opportunity Announcement (DE-FOA-0001467) entitled “Next Generation of Electric Machines: Enabling Technologies.”

Goals for next-gen motors include high power density, high revolutions per minute and integrated power electronics. The FOA may include the following topic areas:

• High Performance Thermal and Electrical Conductor Manufacturing. Advances in nanomaterials have shown the potential of improvement in the electrical and thermal properties of metallic conductors, reducing stator and rotor I2R losses.
• Silicon Steel Manufacturing. Electrical steel with 6.5% added silicon can reduce core losses without sacrificing saturation magnetization level.
• Superconducting Wire Manufacturing. Breakthroughs in high-temperature superconductors make it possible to eliminate rotor resistance (I2R) losses and enable higher flux densities.
• Other Enabling Technologies. New motor topologies, low-loss high-speed bearings, high-resolution sensors, improved insulation and varnishing materials, other soft magnetic materials such as amorphous, nanocrystalline and soft magnetic composites, novel cooling mechanisms.

EERE plans to issue the complete FOA on or about March 2016.

Source: DOE via Green Car Congress