BACKGROUND: Department of the Air Force (DAF) installations largely rely on off-site electricity to conduct its globe-spanning, national security missions on land and in air, sea, space, and cyberspace. Dependence on off-site electricity, however, creates mission risks, because electrical grids are susceptible to outages from extreme weather and cybersecurity attacks by determined adversaries. See problem Attachment 1 – Problem Statement (detailed below) for more details. WARNING: DO NOT SUBMIT VIA THIS PAGE: This Special Topic Opportunity Page provides the content requirements and instructions for your submission. The actual submission, however, will be made through the Tradewinds Solutions Marketplace Opportunity Page located here. INSTRUCTIONS FOR SUBMITTING A SOLUTION AGAINST THIS SPECIAL TOPIC:  Submissions for this Special Topic will only be accepted via the Tradewinds Solutions Marketplace Opportunity Page located here. After navigating to the Tradewinds Solutions Marketplace Opportunity Page, click on the “Start My Response” button on the left-hand bottom of the page to begin the correct submission workflow. If you select the "Start My Response" button from any page other than the Tradewinds Solutions Marketplace Opportunity Page, the submission workflow will be missing required fields such as: (1) Strategic Focus Area; (2) Technology Readiness Level; (3) Related Keywords; and (4) Video Upload Link. If you find that the submission workflow is missing these fields, please exit the workflow and navigate to the correct submission workflow located on the Tradewinds Solutions Marketplace Opportunity Page. SUBMISSION INSTRUCTIONS: The submission process for this Special Topic consists of four steps: ·       Step I – Video pitch submission through the Tradewinds Solutions Marketplace Opportunity page. ·       Step II – Video submissions are assessed in accordance with the Tradewinds Solutions Marketplace (TSM) assessment process and rubric. o   Submissions will only be accepted via the Tradewinds Solutions Marketplace Opportunity Page located here. After navigating to the Tradewinds Solutions Marketplace Opportunity Page, click on the “Start My Response” button on the left-hand bottom of the page to begin the submission workflow. o   Under the field for Strategic Focus Area within the submission workflow, select “Special Topics". o   To identify that your video submission is being submitted against the “Geothermal for Electricity and Green Hydrogen Production” TSM Special Topic, the Title of your submission should start with “DAF Geothermal” and then continue with your specific title (e.g., DAF Geothermal: Quix13 Software Solution). o   For the content of the video submission, all submissions must adhere to the Tradewinds Solutions Marketplace guidelines and submission instructions (detailed within Section 7 of the TSM Announcement available here). As identified within the TSM Announcement, there are five required content elements that each video submission must address. The Five elements are:   (1) Identification of the Problem(s) Addressed ·       The problem statement has already been defined, it is recommended that minimal time be spent on problem identification within the video submission.   (2) Description of the technology or service solution and its application to the problem(s) identified. The below should be covered as part of element 2: Technical: Approach to conducting any geoscientific exploration, remote sensing, mapping, drilling, etc., and integrating the data into a robust resource conceptual model. Identify any teaming that may be necessary to complete this approach. Environmental: Details on plans for conducting all environmental analysis (e.g. National Environmental Policy Act). Identify any teaming that may be necessary to complete this approach.    (3) Potential impact of the solution if adopted by DoD Examples: Provide case studies or examples on how to design a utility-scale facility (at least 5 megawatts) to meet and perhaps exceed the energy customer’s electricity or hydrogen needs cost-effectively.   (4) Differentiation from other technology and service solutions which address the same or similar problem(s)   (5) Pricing Model Financing: Details on plans for fully financing (100%) the prototype with DAF providing land, site control, and access to an installation’s facilities for the prototype project. ·       Step III – Solutions are assessed as awardable / non-awardable in accordance with the TSM assessment process and scoring rubric; and ·       Step IV - The Government may elect to conduct negotiations with, one, some, all or none of the entities whose video submissions are determined awardable. NOTE ON POTENTIAL FUTURE ACTIVITIES: If electricity production is technically and economically feasible, the prototype project may be considered further for future construction of a utility-scale facility for the production of electricity and hydrogen. DAF would not execute a long-term contract under the prototype to purchase the electricity and hydrogen commodities. Rather, DAF would execute a sole-source, follow-on contract only after the prototype has been successfully completed. Once the follow-on contract has been executed, construction of the facilities could proceed. DAF would not own the facilities, rather it is expected that a third party would own, operate, and maintain them. The government may also consider scaling a successful prototype to other DAF installations in the United States. PROBLEM STATEMENT: Department of the Air Force (DAF) installations largely rely on off-site electricity to conduct its globe-spanning, national security missions on land and in air, sea, space, and cyberspace. Dependence on off-site electricity, however, creates mission risks, because electrical grids are susceptible to outages from extreme weather and cybersecurity attacks by determined adversaries. To maintain mission continuity and comply with congressional mandates to maintain energy resilience for all critical missions at each installation, DAF is seeking novel approaches to generate electricity at its installations using geothermal energy, because it can provide, continuous, resilient, carbon-free electricity regardless of weather conditions. While current renewable energy solutions such as wind and solar can supply on-site energy, such solutions provide intermittent power and require battery energy storage or other solutions to maintain energy resilience, unlike geothermal energy. Despite its advantages, there are numerous technological and geological barriers to geothermal energy that have hindered the U.S. government’s ability to construct a utility-scale geothermal facility on federal land to directly supply electricity to its missions. While newer geothermal technologies such as advanced geothermal (i.e., closed-loop) and enhanced geothermal technologies hold the promise of producing power without having to rely on naturally occurring, hot, underground, water resources, such technologies do not currently exist at utility-scale. Given the recent introduction of these new technologies, DAF is seeking to conduct a business process prototype to determine whether these technologies are technically and economically feasible at DAF installations in the United States. Under the prototype, the selected vendor(s) would (a) gather data through geoscientific exploration, (b) map out the resource, (c) develop an engineering design for a utility-scale facility to produce electricity and green hydrogen through electrolysis to power fuel cells, and (d) propose a deal structure for the sale of the electricity and hydrogen to DAF and others. If electricity production is technically and economically feasible, the prototype project may be considered further for future construction of a utility-scale facility for the production of electricity and hydrogen. DAF would not execute a long-term contract under the prototype to purchase the electricity and hydrogen commodities. Rather, DAF would execute a sole-source, follow-on contract only after the prototype has been successfully completed. Once the follow-on contract has been executed, construction of the facilities could proceed. DAF would not own the facilities, rather it is expected that a third party would own, operate, and maintain them. The government may also consider scaling a successful prototype to other DAF installations in the United States.

The Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office (CDAO) in conjunction with its marketplace manager, the Applied Research Institute (ARI), is initiating a Monthly Collection Period for solutions providers to upload videos into the Tradewinds Solutions Marketplace.