Grants / Department of Energy / Golden Field Office

DE-FOA-0003460: Fiscal Year 2025 Solar Module and Solar Hardware (SMASH) Incubator

Closed Closed May 30, 2025 Opportunity DE-FOA-0003460 ☆ Save

This grant is closed. A newer notice from the same program is open now: Accelerating Scale-up and Pre-piloting of Emerging Chemical Technologies (ASPECT) (DE-FOA-0003647). Status: Closes December 1, 2026 (24 days left). It is in our archive of Golden Field Office notices from 2025.

• Award ceiling$4.0 million
• Award floor$1.0 million
• Total funding$20.0 million
• Expected awards10
• Cost sharingRequired
• Funding typeCooperative Agreement

Key dates

Who can apply

This opportunity was open to small businesses and businesses.

• For profit organizations other than small businesses
• Small businesses

More grants for small businesses, businesses.

Is this a realistic fit?

• Past Renewable Energy Research and Development awards averaged $2.8 million; this notice allows up to $4.0 million per award.
• Most of the program's money (30% over five years) went to colleges and universities.
• The notice requires cost sharing or matching funds, so you must contribute part of the project cost.

What the grant funds

SMASH Incubator seeks to address the lack of sufficient private investment that is available to successfully commercialize the output of research, development, and demonstration activities and bring innovative solar photovoltaic (PV) technology to market. Specifically, projects funded through this NOFO will encourage innovations in solar photovoltaic (PV) manufacturing across the supply chain, with the aim of reducing U.S. reliance on imported materials and technologies. This NOFO also encourages the development of new solar hardware and technology for domestic use and potential export. These activities are expected to deliver jobs and economic growth in the clean energy sector, while increasing national energy security. Topic Area 1 seeks to conduct early-stage pilot-scale testing and demonstration of innovative processes or products that can substantively increase domestic manufacturing in all segments of the crystalline silicon solar module supply chain. Each segment also includes the manufacturing equipment used in that segment, input materials for that segment, process control and characterization tools, and consumables used in that segment, which today are predominantly made outside the United States. Topic Area 2 aims to support the cadmium telluride (CdTe) PV industry, an increasingly valuable part of the U.S. economy and leading domestic renewable energy technology. All segments of the CdTe PV module supply chain are of interest, including improvements in materials, processes, manufacturing, components, metrology, demonstration, recycling, and reclamation. Topic Area 3 is focused on R&D and demonstration activities with the goal of de-risking new non-module PV components and manufacturing processes, while developing and validating a realistic pathway to commercial success. This includes structural and electrical components and tools that can be made domestically and improve performance, functionality, reliability, or ease of installation for PV systems.

Category: Energy.

Applying now

This notice no longer takes applications. Apply under the newer notice, DE-FOA-0003647, which is open now.

The notice on Grants.gov keeps its full text and attachments, which is useful for planning a resubmission.