Introduction

In November 2010, during President Obama's visit to New Delhi, India and the United States signed an agreement to establish the Joint Clean Energy Research and Development Center (JCERDC or Center) under the bilateral Partnership to Advance Clean Energy (PACE). The Center will facilitate joint research and development on clean energy by teams of scientists, technical experts from academic institutions, national laboratories, private corporations and non-governemntal organizations from India and the United States, and related joint activities needed to deploy clean energy technologies rapidly with the greatest impact. To begin implementation of the agreement, the U.S. DOE and the Government of India are launching cooperation in three initial priority areas: energy efficiency of buildings, solar energy, and second-generation biofuels.

The Center will provide funding for collaborative research and development projects, led by joint teams (consortia) from India and the United States. The Indo-U.S. Science and Technology Forum (IUSSTF) in New Delhi and the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) in Washington will be the secretariats for the Center. The Funding Opportunity Announcement was released on May 16, 2011 and the final application due date is August 16, 2011.

Please find all materials regarding the funding and application process in the official Funding Opprtunity Announcement (FOA) at (DOE) and (IUSSTF).

One of the objectives of the Center is to fund cutting-edge collaborative research at a scale that has never been done before at the bilateral level. Administrative Staff College of India (ASCI) in partnership with Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW) is supporting the initiative by creating awareness amongst the best and brightest talent in both countries for this opportunity and drawing in those entities who have extremely high potential to contribute to transformation, breakthrough clean energy research.

Our efforts aim to reach out concerned stakeholders to raise the visibility of center and to encourage their involvement in the venture. We are organizing two workshops to facilitate interaction amongst interested applicants, one in Hyderabad and other one in New Delhi.

ASCI, NRDC and CEEW invite all of you who are interested for these workshops. Please find information about the workshops on this website, through the appropriate links. Please also keep abreast of further developments and additional resources that we will be sharing on this website. We encourage you to visit this site frequently, and also share it with others you may know who could be prospective applicants for the funding opportunity.