The Inventions & Innovation Program: Inventors and Very Small Businesses Solving Big Energy Problems

Nancy Moore and Steve Weakley, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
Rolf Butters, U.S. Department of Energy

Keywords

Abstract

The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Inventions & Innovation (I&I) Program helps individual inventors and very small businesses transform their technical inventions and innovations into commercially successful technologies. Through DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, I&I selects technologies to receive grants in a competitive process. The I&I Program also provides technical and commercial support that includes market studies, commercialization training, website descriptions of the technology, venture capital coaching, participation in conferences, and other individual assistance.

I&I’s approach has resulted in an outstanding success rate. One in four grantees has sold the I&I-funded technology in the U.S. marketplace. Cumulative energy savings have totaled $4.9B through 2001. The emphasis of this paper is three-fold:

Provide information on how I&I uses every facet of its program to transform the new and emerging buildings technologies it funds.
Present a case history of the technical and market transformation of the D’MAND® system, one of I&I’s most successful projects.
Briefly summarize three emerging technologies that I&I is funding and expects to be in the marketplace within three years.