The U.S. DOE plans to provide $117.6 million US in Recovery Act funding to accelerate widespread commercialization of solar energy technologies as follows:
PV Technology Development - $51.5 million to expand investment in advanced PV concepts and high impact technologies, with the aim of making solar energy cost-competitive with conventional sources of electricity and to strengthen the competitiveness and capabilities of domestic manufacturers.
Solar Energy Deployment - $40.5 million for projects that will focus on non-technical barriers to solar energy deployment, including grid connection, market barriers to solar energy adoption in cities, and the shortage of trained solar energy installers.
Concentrating Solar Power Research and Development - $25.6 million to improve the reliability of concentrating solar power technologies and enhancing DOE National Laboratories capabilities to provide test and evaluation support to the solar industry.
Of the total funding, $17 million will be available only to DOE National Laboratories, under solicitation DE-FOA-0000087 with a deadline for proposals of July 15, 2009. July 30, 2009 is the deadline for submissions for both High Penetration Solar Deployment projects - solicitation DE-FOA-0000085 and for Solar Market Transformation - solicitation DE-FOA-0000078. (Source: EERE News, June 3, 2009)