Approach to Estimating Private Sector Investment in Research and Development for Active Solar Heating and Cooling Systems

摘要

In support of the US Department of Energy's Office of Solar Heat Technologies, MITRE developed an approach to estimating the amount of funding private industry may be willing to invest in solar R and D. This report presents a review of the characteristics of privately funded R and D in the US and a discussion of R and D project selection techniques in the private sector. Implications for privately funded solar R and D are discussed, and the approach to estimating private sector solar R and D expenditures presented, using R and D on evacuated tube solar collectors as an illustration. The approach developed uses a variant of net present value analysis. This methodology is particularly useful for assessing whether R and D funding of solar energy systems will be profitable from a private sector decision making point of view. (ERA citation 10:046275)