Frequently Asked Questions

1. A PDF version of the Foundational Program to Advance Cell Efficiency (F-PACE) Funding Opportunity Announcement is now posted under "FOA Documents" on the Exchange website.  Please visit https://eere-exchange.energy.gov/default.aspx.

2. If an organization (such as an FFRDC or a University) intends to submit multiple distinct proposals, it is recommended that  the organization create one account registration in cases where the organization has a central grants contact person (such as a Sponsored Programs Office at a University).  The Exchange system assigns a distinct control number to each proposal, so each proposal submission will be reviewed independently.

If the organization does not have a central grants contact person, it is recommended that each Principal Investigator registers and submits his/her proposal separately.

3. Please refer to Section III.A., Eligible Applicants, in the FOA. Foreign entities, such as your company, may be eligible as the Prime Recipient for an award under this FOA if your company has (1) a place of business in the United States or its Territories AND (2) can demonstrate that your company's use of DOE funds will be in the economic interests of the United States (including, for example; creation of domestic manufacturing capability; use of American products, materials or labor; payment of United States taxes; or United States technological advancements).  There is no pre-determined amount of funds that you must spend in the U.S. if you meet these eligibility criteria.

Entities that do not meet this eligibility criteria are not eligible to apply as the prime applicant.  However, entities not meeting this criteria are allowed as subrecipients to an eligible applicant provided that, in aggregate, not more than 20% of the total estimated federal funding is provided to entities that do not meet the eligibility criteria.

4. Yes.  The cover page for the concept paper should include the following: name and type of organization, the announcement number, the project title, and both the technical and business points of contact for the applicant, denoting the names, titles, addresses, telephone and facsimile numbers, and electronic mail addresses.  The cover page should also identify the names for all other participants (subrecipients).  Finally, the cover page must specify which topic the applicant is applying to.

5. The F-PACE program is not intended to be encompassing of all PV technologies.  It is specifically focused on taking currently mature, recently-commercialized, or near-commercial module technologies, located at the end of this pipeline, and improving them with new cell or sub-cell technology R&D occurring at the beginning of this pipeline.

For all topics, the minimum entrance criteria is a module technology that meets the definition of recently commercialized or near commercial.  For Topic 1, proposed research must be at a initial TRL of 3 or 4.  This topic does not have a minimum efficiency metric for entrance, but applicants must demonstrate that the technology will be advanced at least one TRL by the end of the project.  For Topic 2, it is correct that the minimum entrance criteria is a cell or device functioning at greater than 10% efficiency and an initial TRL of 4.  For Topic 3, the entrance criteria for topics 1 and 2 apply. 

6. No, there is no limit on the number of applications that can be submitted by a PI.

7. Unfortunately, the F-PACE program is competitive and discussions with DOE regarding prospective applications, while the announcement is open, are prohibited. DOE cannot predetermine the suitability or viability of proposed research in advance of the merit review process.  It is up to prospective applicants to review the requirements of the FOA and assess the merits of their proposed project to determine whether or not to apply. 

The F-PACE program is not intended to be encompassing of all PV technologies.  It is specifically focused on taking currently mature, recently-commercialized, or near-commercial module technologies, located at the end of this pipeline, and improving them with new cell or sub-cell technology R&D occurring at the beginning of this pipeline.

8. There are multiple Funding Opportunity Announcements listed on the EERE eXCHANGE website (http://eere.energy.gov/financing/exchange).  Please scroll down to view all funding opportunities available on eXCHANGE. 

9. The Cover Page should be a stand-alone page that includes the same information as described in Section IV.D.3i of the FOA.  The narrative must start on page 2.

10. Page 19 of the FOA requests the SF-424 Application for Federal Assistance, which is a 6 page word document.  The SF-424R&R is a different form, and is not required for the Concept Paper stage.  On the SF-424 Application for Financial Assistance, enter the dollar amounts requested on page 3, question 18 for the complete project period (not just the first year, first phase or other subset of the project period).

11. Please refer to the description of Topic 3: Barrier Focus Teams, which begins on page 11 of the FOA.  International PIs may be a part of a synergistic team of 3-5 PIs.  However, the eligibility requirements in section 3.A of the FOA still apply.  If applying as a consortium, one member of the consortium that is an established legal U.S entity must be designated as the lead applicant.  International organizations must be designated as subrecipients.  In aggregate, not more than 20% of the total estimated DOE and NSF funding can be provided to entities that do not meet the eligibility criteria and those entities must provide at least 20% cost sharing of their portion of the total project cost.  

12. Third-party certification of performance for the entrance baseline is not required at the time of application to this FOA.  However, if third-party measurement of the entrance cell is not available, then supporting data should be included in the application that supports the assertion that the entrance cell performance is >10% cell; additionally, the project management plan should include third-party certification of the entrance cell as the first milestone.

13. There is no limit on how many pre-applications are allowed per Principal Investigator (PI) or Co-Principal (Co-PI). Please see Section I FOA Description, Special Requirements on pages 12-13, which states:

• Entities that apply for multiple awards must demonstrate that all work for each application can be completed as a standalone effort. There must be a single prime recipient identified in each application.

• Applicants must indicate the Topic to which they are applying in their full application narrative. Applicants may submit applications to multiple Topics; however, separate applications must be submitted for each Topic. If your organization is submitting more than one Application to different topic areas, you must identify an application number and the Topic Area Number at the end of each file name (e.g., Company-1-Topic1).

• Topic 3 only: The Barrier Focus Team must consist of at least 3-5 PIs from at least 2 institutions, and at least one of the PIs must have PV cell expertise. “Institutions” can be separate universities, companies, or national labs. Different departments or divisions within a university, company, or national lab are not considered different institutions.

14. For all topics, the minimum entrance criteria is a module technology that meets the definition of recently commercialized or near commercial.  For Topic 1, proposed research must be at a initial TRL of 3 or 4.  This topic does not have a minimum efficiency metric for entrance, but applicants must demonstrate that the technology will be advanced at least one TRL by the end of the project.  Any technology, organic or inorganic, that meets this criteria is eligible.

15. No, the FFRDC authorization letter is only required as a component of the Project Narrative in the Final Full Application.  Please refer to section IV.D.3.vi of the FOA for further information.

16. For the Concept Paper documents, please follow a similar naming convention as to what is outlined in section IV.D of the FOA:

• SF-424: Control#_Institution_App424.pdf

• Concept Paper: Control#_Institution_ConceptPaper.pdf

17. CFDA Number: 81.087

CFDA Title: Renewable Energy Research and Development

Federal Entity Identifier: Enter the control number listed on the "General" tab of your application in Exchange

Competition Identification Number: Leave this field blank

20. As noted in Section IV.C.2 of the FOA, the Concept Paper should provide a clear, concise statement of the specific objectives, primary approaches, and expected outcomes and impacts of the proposed project.  It should address each of the Merit Review Criteria for Concept Papers listed in Section V.A.2 for the Topic under which the applicant is proposing a project.  It must provide sufficient information that reviewers will be able to evaluate the technical merits of the preliminary application in accordance with these merit review criteria.  The justification for the proposed project should include a clear statement of the importance of the project in terms of the utility of the outcomes and the target community of beneficiaries.  For multi-organizational or multi-investigator projects, briefly describe the roles and the work to be performed by each participant/investigator.

21. The organization's registered user will be the primary user for the organization who will apply to funding opportunities by completing an initial information sheet for each submission and click the create Concept Paper button.  The system will then generate a control number for the submissions and move it to the primary applicant's My Submissions section.  From there the primary applicant will click on My Submissions, then click on the control number for the submission.  The primary applicant will then click on the share button at the bottom of the screen.  To share permissions the primary applicant will insert the email address of a registered EERE Exchange user.  Once permissions are granted the other EERE users will be able to begin updating the submission data in EERE Exchange.

22. As stated in section III.B of the FOA, the cost share waiver is only available for Topic 1 applications from Non-profit organizations (as defined in 10 CFR 600.3), Institutions of Higher Education, U.S. National Laboratories, or U.S. Federally Funded Research and Development Centers (FFRDC).  The cost share waiver is automatic, based on the type of organization applying under Topic 1. 

Cost sharing above the minimum required and the likelihood of technology to be commercialized as evidenced by industry participation and/or industry cost share may be considered during selection (see Section V.A.3).

23. If the federal agency has its own statutory authority to apply for other federal awards, it would be eligible.  To establish such eligibility to apply for funding under this announcement, a cognizant Contracting Officer from the agency should provide a written verification letter along with its application materials. 

The following wording is acceptable for the verification letter:

“In consultation with legal counsel for the _____________ [federal agency], I have verified that this agency does have the statutory authority to apply for funding under this DOE funding opportunity announcement [insert FOA #] and to participate in the performance of the proposed project.  The work proposed for this agency is consistent with or complementary to the missions of the agency, authorized by the following statute ________________.”

24. As stated in section IV.C of the FOA, there are two documents required to be uploaded to in the Concept Paper application:

1. SF-424 Application for Federal Assistance
2. Concept Paper Narrative

25. As stated in section IV.C of the FOA, the application process includes two phases: a concept paper application phase and a full application phase. Following completion of the concept paper phase, applicants will be notified as to whether or not they are encouraged to submit a full application. If you are encouraged to submit a full application, please follow the Exchange instructions regarding the abstract. Applicants may use a brief (one or two sentence) description of the proposed project in the abstract field required by the EERE Exchange online form.

26. As stated in section IV.C.2 of the FOA, the Concept Paper must not exceed 4 pages, including cover page, charts, graphs, maps, and photographs.  It must provide sufficient information that reviewers will be able to evaluate the technical merits of the preliminary application in accordance with the Merit Review Criteria for Concept Papers listed in Section V.A.2 of the FOA.  See section IV.C.2 for full details on the Concept Paper requirements.

It is not necessary to include a budget in the Concept Paper, unless it significantly contributes to the reviewers' ability to evaluate the technical merits of the proposed project.  The budget estimate is entered on the "Funds and Costs" tab of your application in Exchange.  On this tab, you are asked to enter both the Federal share and the non-Federal share of project costs.  The full budget should be provided in the Full Application (see section IV.D.5-8 of the FOA). 

As stated in section IV.C.2 of the FOA, projects with multiple organizations or multiple investigators must briefly describe in the Concept Paper the roles and the work to be performed by each participant/investigator.  The full bio and resume should be provided in the Full Application (see section IV.D.3 of the FOA). 

27. DOE has no preference with regard to a single PI or multiple PIs.  For a discussion of international collaboration, please see the Eligibility Requirements in section III of the FOA.  The applicant, whether a single organization or team/partnership/consortium, must indicate if the project will include multiple PIs.  The decision to use multiple PIs for a project is the sole responsibility of the applicant.  If multiple PIs will be designated, the application must identify the Contact PI/Project Coordinator and provide a “Coordination and Management Plan” that describes the organization structure of the project as it pertains to the designation of multiple PIs.  This plan should, at a minimum, include:

• Process for making decisions on scientific/technical direction; 
• Publications;
• Intellectual property issues;
• Communication plans;
• Procedures for resolving conflicts; and
• PIs’ roles and administrative, technical and scientific responsibilities for the project

An amendment to the FOA to incorporate this language will be posted on May 10, 2011, after the Concept Paper closing date.

For FOA DE-FOA-0000492, the two possible responses were "Encouraged" or "Discouraged".  In this case, there was not a down-select, and therefore there is no restriction against "Discouraged" concept paper applicants submitting full applications.

39.   Except under Topic 1 of this FOA, the applicant’s cost share requirement will be based on the total cost of the project, including the applicant’s and the FFRDC contractor’s portions of the effort.  The applicant, if successful, will be the responsible authority regarding the settlement and satisfaction of all contractual and administrative issues, including but not limited to, disputes and claims arising out of any agreement between the applicant and the FFRDC contractor. 

FFRDC funding should be included in the budget submitted in response to this FOA.  In the event an applicant is selected for negotiation of an award, the value of, and funding for, the FFRDC contractor portion of the work will not normally be included in the award to a successful applicant.  Usually, DOE will fund a DOE FFRDC contractor through the DOE field work proposal system and other FFRDC contractors through an interagency agreement with the sponsoring agency. 

Click on "My Submissions"

Click on the Control Number of your application

Scroll down to "Concept Paper Response" to view comments.

Please review the Applicant User Guide at https://eere-exchange.energy.gov/Manuals.aspx for additional information.

Please visit www.grants.gov to search for additional grant opportunities.

Without delving into the specifics of your particular indirect rate agreement, DOE cannot comment on whether it is acceptable for the lead to apply its normal G&A indirect rate on the FFRDC's funded costs.  If your proposal is selected for award, individual rate questions will be resolved during the negotiation process.

"Please be advised that those entities that form teams with National Laboratories in which the Laboratory is a Prime Recipient (i.e., lead participant) will be required to enter into subcontracts with the Laboratory.  As such, the terms and conditions of the Management and Operating contract between the Laboratory and the Department of Energy will be in effect for any subcontracts, and not the traditional provisions associated with a financial assistance award.  National Laboratories acting as Prime Recipients must make all applicable terms and conditions available to their subcontractors prior to submission of their applications.  Any entities considering such teaming arrangements should request the Laboratory to provide the applicable terms and conditions prior to the Prime Recipient submitting a response to this FOA."

The FOA 492 due date has been moved to June 30th, 2011 at 11:59 pm Eastern Time.

55.  Unless there was an error in the initial Topic designation, the full application must be submitted under same Topic to which the Concept Paper was submitted.

Criterion 1 places a key scoring criterion on the achievement of the specific SunShot goal of $0.50/modules by 2020. Since this is a three year award we recognize that $0.50/W may not be achieved by the completion of an award, however, a clear and definitive pathway to achieving $0.50/W modules must be included in the full application. A successful applicant is expected to be able to clearly articulate and quantify the expected benefit of the work they are proposing. We expect an analysis detailing where the applicant believes costs to be today, how they believe cost will be reduced, where cost will be at the completion of this work, and the technical pathway the proposed technology will take to achieve $0.50/W modules by 2020. An application which does not clearly define a technical pathway to achieving $0.50/W modules by 2020 will not score well on Criterion 1.

63.  It is acceptable to charge a percentage of total direct personnel compensation as cost share.  Cost sharing must meet the criteria outlined in Title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) Part 600 (applicable subpart depends on type of entity). In general, all cost sharing and matching contributions, including cash and third party in-kind, must meet the following the criteria:

-- Are verifiable from the recipient's records;

-- Are not included as contributions for any other federally-assisted project or program;

-- Are necessary and reasonable for proper and efficient accomplishment of project or program objectives;

-- Are allowable under the applicable cost principles;

-- Are not paid by the Federal Government under another award, except where authorized by Federal statue to be used as cost sharing or matching;

-- Are provided for in the approved budget; and

-- Conform to other provisions outlined in the regulations, as applicable.

Cost sharing must be "verifiable from the recipient's records," which means that the recipient must be able to capture in their accounting system records that cost sharing was spent for the project. 

Second, applicants are not bound to the tasks and timelines described in the concept paper and may modify these, as appropriate, in the full application.

1.     Click on “Review” in the Excel menu bar

2.     Click on “Unprotect Sheet” (there is no password).

3.     Paste the following into cell AL97: “=SUM(AL19,AL28,AL37,AL46,AL66,AL75,AL84,AL93,AL95)”

Once you unprotect the worksheet, you will be able to correct any additional formula errors.

77.  The Topic 1 cost share waiver does not apply to entities that do not meet the eligibility criteria in Section III.A of the FOA.  If the foreign collaborator on your project does not have a place of business in the United States or its Territories, the foreign collaborator must provide at least 20% cost sharing of their portion of the total project cost.   

The second option is that the subcontractors can submit this information directly to the question mailbox for each FOA, if necessary.  However, we will need a letter from the Prime Applicant to give the Subcontractor permission to submit the information separately and give the Department of Energy permission to speak to the subcontractor directly should we have any questions.

Please note that CCR registration is not required to submit an application, however, Applicants that do not have this requirement in place prior to September 1, 2011 may not receive an award under the announcement. 

80. (2) Instructions for the budget justification can be found on page 2 of the SF-424R&R Instructions document, also available for download on the Exchange website.

80. (3) We have tested the Summary Slide download, and have not found it to be corrupted.  If you still encounter problems, you may use the Summary Slide template from one of the other SunShot FOAs.

Applicants selected for award under the F-PACE FOA are anticipated to be announced in early September.

18.  Please scroll up and review Question & Answer #2 on this website.

19.  The Business Point of Contact should be the person best equipped to provide documentation regarding the applicant organization's administrative / financial matters, such as: Cognizant Federal Agency, indirect rates, recent audits, accounting system compliance, preferred payment method / information (ASAP routing number), etc.  It is recommended that this person have access to FedConnect, so as to be able to retrieve and sign official award documents.  At a university, a representative from the Sponsored Programs Office is generally the best choice for this role.

1.      Eighteen proposals were selected for negotiation leading to award.   

2.      Unfortunately, as in Question # 40, which referred to concept paper applications, we will not be releasing information regarding number of full proposals received for this FOA.

3.     The successful applications will not be made publicly viewable through any DOE controlled website. The only way to access award proposals is through a Freedom of Information Act Request (FOIA). To learn more about and submit a FOIA request, please visit http://energy.gov/management/office-management/operational-management/freedom-information-act.