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U.S. Secretary of Energy Steven Chu announced last week an award of $92 million through the Department of Energy's (DoE) Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) to fund 43 research projects aimed at improving how the U.S. uses and produces energy. The selections focus on "accelerating innovation in green technology while increasing America's competitiveness in grid scale energy storage, power electronics and building efficiency."

Charlie Sullivan

Chris Levey

Dartmouth engineering professors Charlie Sullivan and Chris Levey will serve as PI and Co-PI, respectively, on a key part of a larger project led by MIT and also involving researchers from Georgia Tech and U. Penn. The overall project is titled Advanced Technologies for Integrated Power Electronics, and the public summary states, "This research program seeks improvements in power electronics that enable major advances in many systems, and provide substantial reductions in energy usage and greenhouse gas emissions. Important applications of this research include drivers for solid state lighting, microconverters for photovoltaic energy systems, and miniaturized power supplies among many others. Moreover, the new technology developed will help set the stage for resurgence of U.S. leadership in electrical energy conversion. This research thus supports improved energy efficiency, reduced emissions, and future American jobs."

The new integrated power converter technology and contributing elements

"Chris Levey and I are also PIs on a smaller project with GE funded by the same DoE award," added Sullivan. "We'll be doing pilot studies of advanced magnetic materials that will be scaled up with a process at GE. The PI at GE is a Thayer PhD alum from my group, Satish Prabhakaran."