Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 27 / Wednesday, February 10, 2016 / Notices 7087 

laws’’ and ‘‘provide information on 

emerging practices in the consumer 

financial products or services industry, 

including regional trends, concerns, and 

other relevant information.’’ (b) To carry 

out the Board’s purpose, the scope of its 

activities shall include providing 

information, analysis, and 

recommendations to the Bureau. The 

Board will generally serve as a vehicle 

for market intelligence and expertise for 

the Bureau. Its objectives will include 

identifying and assessing the impact on 

consumers and other market 

participants of new, emerging, and 

changing products, practices, or 

services. (c) The Board will also be 

available to advise and consult with the 

Director and the Bureau on other 

matters related to the Bureau’s functions 

under the Dodd-Frank Act. 

II. Agenda 

The Consumer Advisory Board will 

discuss the Bureau’s strategic outlook 

2016–2017 and Financial Well-Being. 

Persons who need a reasonable 

accommodation to participate should 

contact CFPB_504Request@cfpb.gov, 

202–435–9EEO, 1–855–233–0362, or 

202–435–9742 (TTY) at least ten 

business days prior to the meeting or 

event to request assistance. The request 

must identify the date, time, location, 

and title of the meeting or event, the 

nature of the assistance requested, and 

contact information for the requester. 

CFPB will strive to provide, but cannot 

guarantee that accommodation will be 

provided for late requests. 

Individuals who wish to attend the 

Consumer Advisory Board meeting must 

RSVP to cfpb_cabandcouncilsevents@

cfpb.gov by noon, February 25, 2016. 

Members of the public must RSVP by 

the due date and must include ‘‘CAB’’ 

in the subject line of the RSVP. 

III. Availability 

The Board’s agenda will be made 

available to the public on February 10, 

2016, via consumerfinance.gov. 

Individuals should express in their 

RSVP if they require a paper copy of the 

agenda. 

A recording and transcript of this 

meeting will be available after the 

meeting on the CFPB’s Web site 

consumerfinance.gov. 

Dated: February 5, 2016. 

Christopher D’Angelo, 

Chief of Staff, Bureau of Consumer Financial 

Protection. 

[FR Doc. 2016–02717 Filed 2–9–16; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 4810–AM–P 

DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY 

Request for Information (RFI) for 

Updated Critical Materials Strategy 

AGENCY: Office of Energy Policy and 

Systems Analysis, Department of 

Energy. 

ACTION: Notice of Request for 

Information (RFI). 

SUMMARY: In 2010, the U.S. Department 

of Energy (DOE) developed and issued 

a Critical Materials Strategy report 

addressing the role of rare earth and 

other materials in energy technologies 

and processes. An update and 

additional analyses were completed the 

following year. In order to update the 

2010 and 2011 analyses, DOE is seeking 

information from stakeholders on rare 

earth elements and other materials used 

in an array of energy technologies, as 

well as key materials used in the 

manufacturing of energy technologies 

that do not necessarily appear in the 

final product. 

DATES: Written comments and 

information are requested no later than 

5:00 p.m. ET, on April 11, 2016. 

ADDRESSES: Interested persons are 

encouraged to submit comments, which 

must be submitted electronically to 

materialstrategy@hq.doe.gov. 

Instructions: Electronic responses 

must be provided as attachments to an 

email. It is recommended that 

attachments with file sizes exceeding 

25MB be compressed (i.e., zipped) to 

ensure message delivery. Respondents 

are requested to provide the following 

information at the start of their response 

to this RFI: Company/Institution name; 

Company/Institution contact; Contact’s 

address, phone number, and email 

address. 

Please identify your answers by 

responding to a specific question or 

topic if possible. Any information 

obtained as a result of this RFI is 

intended to be used by the Government 

on a non-attribution basis for planning 

and strategy development. DOE will not 

respond to individual submissions or 

publish publicly a compendium of 

responses, except as required by 

applicable law. A response to this RFI 

will not be viewed as a binding 

commitment to develop or pursue the 

project or ideas discussed. DOE will not 

pay for information provided under this 

RFI. This RFI is not accepting 

applications for financial assistance or 

financial incentives. DOE has no 

obligation to respond to those who 

submit comments, and/or give any 

feedback on any decision made based 

on the responses received. 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: 

Requests for additional information may 

be sent to materialstrategy@hq.doe.gov. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 

I. Purpose 

The purpose of this RFI is to solicit 

feedback from industry, academia, 

research laboratories, government 

agencies, and other stakeholders on 

issues related to the demand, supply, 

use, and costs of rare earth metals and 

other materials used in the energy 

sector. DOE is specifically interested in 

information on the materials and 

technologies in the following table, as 

well as other materials of interest 

identified by the respondents to this 

request that are used in energy 

technologies: 

Materials of Interest 

• Rare earth elements (e.g., cerium, 

dysprosium, europium, gadolinium, 

lanthanum, neodymium, praseodymium, 

samarium, scandium, terbium, ytterbium, 

and yttrium) 

• Platinum group metals (e.g., iridium, 

palladium, platinum, rhodium, and 

ruthenium) 

• Antimony, bismuth, cadmium, cobalt, 

gallium, germanium, hafnium, helium, 

indium, lithium, magnesium, manganese, 

molybdenum, nickel, rhenium, selenium, 

silicon, tantalum, tellurium, tungsten, 

vanadium, and zirconium 

Technologies and Components of Interest 

Technologies Types Components 

Solar photovoltaics ........................................................... .......................................................................................... Thin film. 

Concentrated solar power ................................................ Trough system .................................................................

Power tower system ........................................................

Mirrors. 

Molten salts. 

Dish engine system. 

Wind turbines ................................................................... Direct drive ....................................................................... Permanent magnets. 

Natural gas generators ..................................................... .......................................................................................... Superalloys. 

Coatings. 

Magnetic materials. 

Hydropower ...................................................................... .......................................................................................... Permanent magnets. 


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7088 Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 27 / Wednesday, February 10, 2016 / Notices 

Technologies Types Components 

Nuclear ............................................................................. .......................................................................................... Control rods. 

Cooling fluids. 

Control absorbers or neutron shielding materials. 

Fuel rod cladding. 

Fuel assembly grid plates. 

Alloys. 

Vehicles (in all vehicle classes) ....................................... Battery electric .................................................................

Plug-in hybrid electric ......................................................

Permanent magnets. 

Batteries. 

Hybrid ............................................................................... Catalytic converters. 

Fuel cells .......................................................................... Lightweighting (platform, 

frame, engine cradle, 

etc.). 

Lighting ............................................................................. LEDs ................................................................................ Phosphors. 

Fluorescents (CFLs, LFLs).

Other solid-state lighting.

Grid storage ...................................................................... .......................................................................................... Batteries. 

Stationary fuel cells & hydrogen electrolysis ................... Solid oxide .......................................................................

Solid acid .........................................................................

Catalysts. 

Cathode. 

Phosphoric acid molten carbonate .................................. Anode. 

Polymer electrolyte membrane ........................................ Electrolytes. 

DOE is interested in receiving information 

on the following issues: 

Category 1: Technology and Component 

Material Intensity 

For the following questions, please express 

material intensity in terms of quantity per 

unit, such as weight percentage per magnet 

of a given size, content per unit of generation 

or storage capacity, weight content per lamp, 

content per vehicle type, weight requirement 

per industrial process output, or other 

appropriate metric or industry standard. 

• For the energy technologies and 

components of interest listed above, what is 

the current and anticipated materials 

requirement over the next 15 years? 

• What is the level of purity required? 

• How much material is lost during use 

(i.e., dissipative losses)? 

• What are the quantities of material loss 

in manufacturing currently and how might 

that change over the next 15 years as the 

technology develops? 

• For the energy technologies and 

components of interest listed above, what are 

the quantities of material used in 

manufacturing them that do not appear in the 

final product (e.g., materials used in 

sputtering targets, as manufacturing 

equipment, as catalysts, etc.)? 

Category 2: Market Projections 

• For the energy technologies and 

components of interest listed above, what is 

the current and projected global market 

demand over the next 15 years and how does 

it vary by region? What are the key 

uncertainties that may significantly affect 

these projections? 

• What is the anticipated average lifespan 

for the energy technologies of interest and 

how frequently do the components need to 

be replaced? How might these lifespans and 

replacement frequencies evolve as the 

technology develops? 

• For the energy technologies of interest 

listed above, are the materials and/or 

components easily substitutable or do they 

require product and/or manufacturing 

process re-designs? 

• If known, what are the most appropriate 

currently viable substitutes for these 

technologies or components? Are additional 

substitutes anticipated within the next 15 

years? 

• What are the leading concerns regarding 

using the identified substitute material(s) 

(e.g., lower performance, higher costs, 

product or process redesigns, capital 

requirements, inadequate supply, difficulty 

of use, etc.)? 

• Do you use or expect to use significantly 

increasing quantities of the materials listed 

above for non-energy technologies? Please 

explain. 

• Do prices, price volatility and/or basic 

availability affect your decision to use the 

materials of interest? 

Category 3: Energy Technology Transitions 

and Emerging Technologies 

• How do you anticipate technology 

transitions (e.g., fluorescent lights to LEDs) 

will affect material availability over the next 

15 years? Please share any insight or 

recommendations with respect to technology 

transitions. 

• How do you expect the emergence of 

new energy or energy efficiency technologies 

(e.g., fuel cells) to affect material demand 

over the next 15 years? 

• What timescales or delays in production 

and utilization can affect the ability to plan 

for deployment of new energy technologies? 

Category 4: Primary Production and Material 

Processing 

• Do you anticipate additional production 

of the materials of interest coming online in 

the next 5 years? 

• What technical, economic, or regulatory 

factors lead to barriers or delays in bringing 

on new production or increasing current 

production? 

• What are the emerging processes or 

approaches (physical, chemical, or 

biological) to separation and processing these 

materials? Can they be scaled? What are the 

barriers to deploying these emerging 

processes? 

• Do prices, price volatility and/or basic 

availability affect your decision to produce 

the materials of interest? 

Category 5: Supply Chains 

• For the technologies and components of 

interest listed, what are the process stages 

within the supply chain, and where 

geographically does each occur? What are the 

factors that affect where a component is 

manufactured? 

• How vertically integrated are the supply 

chains in different countries? Does this 

matter? Why? 

• How concentrated or diversified are the 

suppliers and consumers of the materials, 

components, or technologies? 

• How much material inventory is 

typically stockpiled across the stages of the 

supply chain? How long is it stockpiled for? 

Given a supply disruption, how long would 

the inventory last? 

• For the technologies and components of 

interest listed, what are the lead times at each 

stage of their supply chain? 

Category 6: Recycling Opportunities 

• What quantities of critical materials are 

currently being recycled from industrial and 

post-consumer sources and what quantities 

could potentially be recycled on what 

timeframe? 

• What are the technological barriers to 

recycling materials? 

• What recycling process innovations 

would increase recycling technical and 

economic viability? 

• How could design for recyclability 

improve the level of recycling? 

• How are current technological trends of 

the specific material, component, or 

technology of interest (e.g., miniaturization, 

increased complexity) likely to affect its 

recyclability? 

• What types of policies would impact 

recycling? 

• Are there synergies between industries 

(e.g., using cadmium telluride from 

semiconductor recycling for solar cells)? 


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Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 27 / Wednesday, February 10, 2016 / Notices 7089 

Category 7: Impacts of Wide-Scale 

Electrification 

We are also interested in the potential 

material implications of wide-scale 

electrification (industry, transportation, etc.). 

• What components are needed and for 

what purpose to accomplish wide-scale 

electrification (both in the electricity 

infrastructure and end use applications) and 

what quantities will be required in what 

timeframe? 

• What materials of interest are required 

for these components? 

Category 8: Additional Information 

• Are there other materials that DOE 

should analyze (beyond the materials of 

interest) that may be of concern due to 

increasing demand for energy technologies 

and/or supply risk? Please explain and 

provide material content by component and 

energy technology. 

• Are there other technologies or 

components that DOE should analyze 

(beyond the technologies of interest)? Please 

explain. 

• Is there additional information, not 

requested above, that you believe DOE 

should consider in updating the Critical 

Materials Strategy? If so, please provide here. 

II. Confidential Business Information 

Pursuant to 10 CFR 1004.11, any 

person submitting information that he 

or she believes to be confidential and 

exempt by law from public disclosure 

should submit via email two well 

marked copies: one copy of the 

document marked ‘‘confidential’’ 

including all the information believed to 

be confidential, and one copy of the 

document marked ‘‘non-confidential’’ 

with the information believed to be 

confidential deleted. DOE will make its 

own determination about the 

confidential status of the information 

and treat it according to its 

determination. 

Factors of interest to DOE when 

evaluating requests to treat submitted 

information as confidential include: (1) 

A description of the items; (2) whether 

and why such items are customarily 

treated as confidential within the 

industry; (3) whether the information is 

generally known by or available from 

other sources; (4) whether the 

information has previously been made 

available to others without obligation 

concerning its confidentiality; (5) an 

explanation of the competitive injury to 

the submitting person that would result 

from public disclosure; (6) when such 

information might lose its confidential 

character due to the passage of time; and 

(7) why disclosure of the information 

would be contrary to the public interest. 

Jonathan Pershing, 

Principal Deputy Director for Energy Policy 

and Systems Analysis. 

[FR Doc. 2016–02676 Filed 2–9–16; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 6450–01–P 

DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY 

Federal Energy Regulatory 

Commission 

Combined Notice of Filings #1 

Take notice that the Commission 

received the following electric rate 

filings: 

Docket Numbers: ER14–2875–003. 

Applicants: UNS Electric, Inc. 

Description: Compliance filing: 

Amended Formula Rate Protocols 

Compliance Filing to be effective 11/14/ 

2014. 

Filed Date: 2/4/16. 

Accession Number: 20160204–5072. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 2/25/16. 

Docket Numbers: ER15–2331–001. 

Applicants: PJM Interconnection, 

L.L.C., Baltimore Gas and Electric 

Company. 

Description: Compliance filing: BGE 

submits revisions to Attach. H–2A re: 

Sept 30 Order citation & formatting to be 

effective 10/1/2015. 

Filed Date: 2/3/16. 

Accession Number: 20160203–5146. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 2/24/16. 

Docket Numbers: ER16–56–001. 

Applicants: Midcontinent 

Independent System Operator, Inc. 

Description: Compliance filing: 2016– 

02–03_Hurdle Rate Removal 

Compliance Filing to be effective 2/1/

2016. 

Filed Date: 2/3/16. 

Accession Number: 20160203–5197. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 2/24/16. 

Docket Numbers: ER16–270–002. 

Applicants: Midcontinent 

Independent System Operator, Inc. 

Description: Tariff Amendment: 

2016–02–03_SA 2863 2nd Amendment 

to ATC Construction Management 

Agreement to be effective 10/30/2015. 

Filed Date: 2/3/16. 

Accession Number: 20160203–5201. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 2/24/16. 

Docket Numbers: ER16–883–000. 

Applicants: Bishop Hill Energy LLC. 

Description: § 205(d) Rate Filing: 

Amended and Restated Assignment, CoTenancy, and Shared Facilities 

Agreement to be effective 4/4/2016. 

Filed Date: 2/3/16. 

Accession Number: 20160203–5221. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 2/24/16. 

Docket Numbers: ER16–884–000. 

Applicants: Roosevelt Wind Project, 

LLC, Milo Wind Project, LLC. 

Description: § 205(d) Rate Filing: 

Roosevelt-Milo Cotenancy and Common 

Facilities Agreement & Notice Waiver 

Request to be effective 12/18/2015. 

Filed Date: 2/3/16. 

Accession Number: 20160203–5235. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 2/24/16. 

Docket Numbers: ER16–885–000. 

Applicants: Entergy Louisiana, LLC, 

Entergy New Orleans, Inc., Entergy 

Arkansas, Inc. 

Description: § 205(d) Rate Filing: 

Union Power Station Joint Operating 

Agreement to be effective 12/31/9998. 

Filed Date: 2/3/16. 

Accession Number: 20160203–5239. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 2/24/16. 

Docket Numbers: ER16–886–000. 

Applicants: Midcontinent 

Independent System Operator, Inc. 

Description: § 205(d) Rate Filing: 

2016–02–03_SA 2677 GRE–NSP 1st Rev 

GIA (J278) to be effective 2/4/2016. 

Filed Date: 2/3/16. 

Accession Number: 20160203–5241. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 2/24/16. 

Docket Numbers: ER16–887–000. 

Applicants: Milo Wind Project, LLC. 

Description: § 205(d) Rate Filing: Milo 

Certificate of Concurrence to RooseveltMilo CFA and Notice Waiver Request to 

be effective 12/18/2015. 

Filed Date: 2/3/16. 

Accession Number: 20160203–5245. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 2/24/16. 

Docket Numbers: ER16–888–000. 

Applicants: Midcontinent 

Independent System Operator, Inc., 

Montana-Dakota Utilities Co., Division 

of MDU Resources Inc. 

Description: § 205(d) Rate Filing: 

2016–02–04_MDU Attachment O—30.9 

Filing to be effective 4/4/2016. 

Filed Date: 2/4/16. 

Accession Number: 20160204–5040. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 2/25/16. 

Docket Numbers: ER16–889–000. 

Applicants: Midcontinent 

Independent System Operator, Inc. 

Description: § 205(d) Rate Filing: 

2016–02–04_SA 2718 Termination of 

Duke Energy Indiana-Duke Energy J333/ 

J334 GIA to be effective 4/16/2016. 

Filed Date: 2/4/16. 

Accession Number: 20160204–5110. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 2/25/16. 

Docket Numbers: ER16–890–000. 

Applicants: Summer Solar LLC. 

Description: Baseline eTariff Filing: 

Summer Solar LLC MBR Tariff to be 

effective 3/4/2016. 

Filed Date: 2/4/16. 

Accession Number: 20160204–5120. 

Comments Due: 5 p.m. ET 2/25/16. 


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