Alternative Energy/AE Essay on EFRC Survey
Introduction
PAPER UNDER OFFLINE DEVELOPMENT
Under the assertion that history has demonstrated that radically new technologies arise from disruptive advances at the science frontiers, the Office of Basic Energy Sciences [(http://www.er.doe.gov/bes/BES.html BES)] in the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science has established a $100 million Energy Frontier Research Centers (EFRCs) initiative as one of the outputs of more than 8 years of work and 11 workshops, which resulted in the BESCA report Directing Matter and Energy: Five Challenges for Science and the Imagination. The research programs developed by the EFRC will address of the energy challenges described in the ten BES workshop reports - The 10 Basic Research Needs Workshop Reports.
The EFRC initiative is part of a broader vision of government support throughout the innovation value chain of alternative energy. While the EFRCs are placed in the upstream of the value chain, the Advanced Research Projects Agency [ (http://arpa-e.energy.gov ARPA-E)] addresses translational issues and the Energy Innovation Hubs are focused on building cross-disciplinary and public-private partnerships to bring to market Alternative Energy innovations. This structure was the answer from the Obama Administration to two challenges: assuring clean, secure, and sustainable energy to power the the world, and establishing a new foundation for enduring economic and jobs growth. As Secretary Chu declared, when announcing the selection of the new EFRC centers in August 2009:
“Meeting the challenge to reduce our dependence on imported oil and curtail greenhouse gas emissions will require significant scientific advances. These centers will mobilize the enormous talents and skills of our nation’s scientific workforce in pursuit of the breakthroughs that are essential to expand the use of clean and renewable energy.”
In contrast to traditional fossil fuel-based technologies, clean energy technologies are considered to be in their infancy, operating far below their potential, with many scientific and technological challenges to overcome, specifically in regard to near-term industry needs. [www.er.doe.gov/bes/reports/files/SET_rpt.pdf (BESAC-DOE, 2010)] In this context, the Energy Frontier Research Centers (EFRCs) are designed to address energy and science “grand challenges.” The 46 EFRCs are funded at $2 - $5 million a year for 5 years, and were chosen from over 260 applicant institutions. In total the program represents $777 million in DOE funding over five years.
The EFRC represents an increased emphasis on the importance of university based research, and expands the R&D funding for this research – from the 46 EFRCs, 31 are led by Universities, 1 by General Electrics in partnerships with Universities and others by National Labs. Each institution received funding for a particular center doing research on a particular type of clean technology, and in some cases more than one center at a particular institution was awarded funding.
As part of the Industrial Cooperation Project (ICP), under the Alternative Energy Sector analysis, we decided to investigate further the structure of knowledge governance [1] of the EFRCs publicly funded knowledge outputs. Some general questions were in the background of our mind - “How are components of the industrial structure of information production systems changing in different industries, different business models, and different sets of actors? How are they incorporating commons-based strategy?” - and guided a [http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/commonsbasedresearch/sites/commonsbasedresearch/images/LimeService_Questions4EFRC.pdf broader survey which was sent to the 46 EFRCs.
Footnotes
- ↑ The “knowledge governance approach” is characterized as a distinctive, emerging approach that cuts across the fields of knowledge management, organization studies, strategy, and human resource management. Knowledge governance is taken up with how the deployment of governance mechanisms influences knowledge processes, such as sharing, retaining and creating knowledge. It insists on clear micro (behavioral) foundations, adopts an economizing perspective, and examines the links between knowledge-based units of analysis with diverse characteristics and governance mechanisms with diverse capabilities of handling these transactions. Research issues that the knowledge governance approach illuminates are sketched. (Foss, 2007)
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