The purpose of this solicitation is to provide $8 million of Technology Demonstration and Deployment (TD&D) and $6 million of Applied Research and Development (AR&D) funding to support the 2018-2020 EPIC Investment Plan Strategic Initiative S7.2.3 to Integrate Climate Readiness into Electricity System Operations, Tools, and Models. This solicitation will fund projects to advance clean energy mobile backup systems or Mobile Renewable Backup Generation Systems (MORBUGs) that increase the resiliency of the electricity system to climate change and extreme weather events.
With efficiency improvements and cost reductions in renewable generation and the development of more energy-dense storage technologies, primarily for electric vehicles, it is now possible to create a clean energy mobile backup system. Some technologies are currently coming on the market to provide services such as providing power for charging phones or other electronic devices, usually in a public space, such as a campus, or to provide vehicle charging in remote locations. However, they have not been demonstrated in environments requiring greater capacity and reliability, such as during grid outages in emergency response. The lack of data on performance of these systems during critical needs, such as in power outages, is impeding their broader deployment. Demonstrations of system performance in different applications is needed to build confidence for their applications in emergencies.
Due to these reasons, these newer systems can only supplement mobile fossil backup generation but cannot fully replace a mobile fossil backup generator. Applied research is needed to design and pilot systems that can provide sufficient power and duration to fully replace a mobile fossil-fueled system.
The awarded projects in this solicitation will be in three groups: two in TD&D and one in AR&D.
CEC Staff will hold a Pre-Application Workshop on March 12.
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