Fiscal Year 2023 Vehicle Technologies Office Program Wide Funding Opportunity Announcement | DE FOA 0002893

Opportunity Information: Apply for DE FOA 0002893

The Fiscal Year 2023 Vehicle Technologies Office Program Wide Funding Opportunity Announcement (DE-FOA-0002893) is a discretionary funding opportunity from the U.S. Department of Energy, administered through the National Energy Technology Laboratory, that uses cooperative agreements to support projects in transportation energy research and deployment. The overall purpose is to push forward research, development, demonstration, and deployment efforts that help the United States reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. In practical terms, the FOA is aimed at accelerating technology progress that makes vehicles, fuels, and supporting infrastructure cleaner, cheaper, and easier to adopt at scale, while also helping broaden participation and benefits across diverse communities.

The technical focus areas span several major bottlenecks in the clean transportation transition. A central theme is improving batteries by cutting both weight and cost, which directly affects electric vehicle affordability, driving range, and efficiency. Another emphasis is on advanced lightweight materials, specifically reducing their life-cycle emissions, which points to looking beyond tailpipe emissions and addressing the carbon footprint associated with material production, processing, and end-of-life considerations. The FOA also targets charging and infrastructure for both on-road and off-road applications, with an emphasis on reducing costs and advancing technology, recognizing that charging needs and operating conditions vary widely between passenger vehicles, commercial fleets, industrial equipment, and other off-road uses.

Beyond components and infrastructure, the opportunity includes innovative public transit solutions, signaling interest in approaches that can reduce emissions per passenger-mile and improve system performance, reliability, and user experience. The FOA also highlights training and workforce-related efforts designed to increase the deployment of these technologies, particularly among diverse communities. That training component suggests the program is not only funding hardware and technical R and D, but also practical capacity-building that helps ensure new technologies actually get adopted, operated, and maintained, and that the benefits are not limited to a narrow set of regions or populations.

From an applicant and award standpoint, eligibility is listed as unrestricted, meaning a wide range of entities can apply (for example, companies, universities, national labs, nonprofits, and others), subject to any additional eligibility details that may appear in the full announcement text. Awards are expected to be made as cooperative agreements, which typically means DOE anticipates substantial involvement during the project period compared with a standard grant, such as active project management, milestone reviews, and collaboration around technical direction. The anticipated maximum award amount (award ceiling) is $7,000,000 per award, and DOE projected roughly 63 awards, indicating the program is structured to fund a sizable portfolio across multiple topic areas rather than only a few large projects.

Key administrative details in the public listing include a creation date of May 19, 2023, and an original application closing date of August 11, 2023. The program aligns with CFDA number 81.086 and falls under activity categories that include energy, environment, science and technology, research and development, and transportation. Overall, the FOA is best understood as a broad, portfolio-style DOE vehicle technology funding call meant to move multiple pieces of the clean transportation ecosystem forward at once: better batteries, lower-carbon materials, cheaper and more capable charging infrastructure (including for off-road needs), improved transit concepts, and training that helps expand real-world deployment and adoption.

• The Department of Energy, National Energy Technology Laboratory in the energy, environment, science and technology and other research and development, transportation sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Fiscal Year 2023 Vehicle Technologies Office Program Wide Funding Opportunity Announcement" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 81.086.
• This funding opportunity was created on May 19, 2023.
• Applicants must submit their applications by Aug 11, 2023. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $7,000,000.00 in funding.
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 63 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: Unrestricted (i.e., open to any type of entity above), subject to any clarification in text field entitled Additional Information on Eligibility.

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