Energy center hopes to shine

TROY, NEW YORK - There is a million-dollar opportunity for researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's Center for Future Energy Systems.

A $20 million opportunity, really.

RPI is hosting the first of what is expected to become an annual open house for the center, which is a collaboration of RPI, Cornell University, Clarkson University and Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island, and is funded with $10 million from New York state.

The New York State Office of Science, Technology and Academic Research has pledged an additional $10 million over 10 years to the center. That's being offered as matching funding to encourage businesses and the federal government to spend another $10 million sponsoring energy research at the center's member institutions. As a result, the total funding generated by the center could top $20 million.

The center was created in 2004 and named a Center for Advanced Technology by NYSTAR, one of just 15 in the state. Over its first 12 months ended in June, it pulled in $1.4 million from company- sponsored research and matching funds from NYSTAR. That is a sizable amount considering that total research funding at RPI totaled $90 million in 2004.

The open house is designed to help companies in New York state learn more about the energy technology research being done by the researchers affiliated with the center, such as those at RPI's Lighting Research Center and its Center for Fuel Cell and Hydrogen Research. About 50 researchers and students are expected to bring information about their cutting edge efforts on renewable energy, energy efficiency and fuel cell technology. Representatives from more than 40 companies are expected to attend.

Hopefully, some of those companies will be impressed enough to reach into their pockets, said Rick Robertson, the center's associate director.

"In an ideal world, it could lead to new sponsored research on campus or at our partner institutions," he said.

Some of the research being done for the center is taking place at RPI's Lighting Research Center, which has labs in downtown Troy and in Watervliet. Corporate clients conducting funded research include General Electric Co. and other major lighting firms, and Evident Technologies Inc. of Troy and RPC Photonics Inc. of Rochester.

Nadarajah Narendran, director of research at the Lighting Research Center, says advances in lighting are crucial to efforts by the U.S. Department of Energy to reduce the country's electricity consumption for lighting by half within the next 15 years. Currently, lighting accounts for 22 percent of the electricity consumed in the United States.

Research at the Lighting Research Center can help with that goal - the center in April announced a significant advance in developing more efficient LED, or light-emitting diodes, for instance - but it needs industry to commercialize the product so people will buy it and use it.

And the Center for Future Energy Systems, and events like its open house, are so important, Narendran says, because funded research can lead to commercialization. But it can't happen if the academic world and industry don't meet and collaborate.

"Universities tend to keep things as good secrets," he said. "We want industry to take a look at our capabilities so we can work with them and take advantage of technology transfer."

Jim Denn, deputy executive director for NYSTAR, says the state is pleased with the progress made by the Center for Future Energy Systems. He says the open house will help the center grow even more.

"A very important element of this is that industry be made aware of the resources that exist at these research centers," he said. "It breaks down the barriers."