Today, the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Clean Energy Smart Manufacturing Innovation Institute (CESMII) announced selections totaling up to $1 million for five projects to identify ways to use smart-manufacturing technologies to improve productivity, precision, performance and energy efficiency.

Bolstering domestic manufacturing is a top priority for the Trump Administration. In a report titled, “Strategy for American Leadership in Advanced Manufacturing,” the White House calls for new, smart-manufacturing technologies to “facilitate a digital transformation in the manufacturing sector by enabling the application of big data analytics and advanced sensing and control technologies to a host of manufacturing activities.”

This request for proposals (RFP) falls under a new category of CESMII projects called “smart-manufacturing innovation projects.” Selected project teams will create “smart-manufacturing profiles”—a library of reusable information, including models of manufacturing processes and related equipment—that will help achieve CESMII’s energy objectives.

  • ECM Performance Materials Corp and Flexware Innovation will create smart-manufacturing profiles to improve throughput, quality and energy efficiency across ECM’s chemical mixing and packing production lines. The project will provide a framework that small-to-medium-sized manufacturers can use to reduce collection, parsing and real-time data storage costs.

 

CESMII is part of Manufacturing USA, a network of federally funded institutes working to increase U.S. manufacturing competitiveness and promote a robust and sustainable national manufacturing research and development (R&D) infrastructure. CESMII works with American companies to spur innovations in new, integrated, systematic, “smart” manufacturing processes, including advanced sensors, controls, platforms, and models. CESMII also promotes a highly skilled manufacturing workforce and a strong domestic supply chain.

Founded in 2016, in partnership with DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), CESMII is the third institute funded by EERE’s Advanced Manufacturing Office. CESMII accelerates smart manufacturing adoption through the integration of advanced sensors, data analytics, platforms and controls to improve productivity, precision, performance, and energy consumption in manufacturing.