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The Heavy Vehicle Propulsion Materials Program was begun in 1997 to support the enabling materials needs of the DOE Office of Heavy Vehicle Technologies (OHVT). The technical agenda for the program grew out of the technology roadmap for the OHVT and includes efforts in materials for: fuel systems, exhaust aftertreatment, valve train, air handling, structural components, electrochemical propulsion, natural gas storage, and thermal management. A five-year program plan was written in early 2000, following a stakeholders workshop. The technical issues and planned and ongoing projects are discussed. Brief summaries of several technical highlights are given.

Approximately two thirds of the world's energy consumption is wasted as heat. In an attempt to reduce heat losses, heat exchangers are utilized to recover some of the energy. A unique graphite foam developed at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) and licensed to Poco Graphite, Inc., promises to allow for novel, more efficient heat exchanger designs. This graphite foam, Figure 1, has a density between 0.2 and 0.6 g/cm3 and a bulk thermal conductivity between 40 and 187 W/m·K. Because the foam has a very accessible surface area (> 4 m2/g) and is open celled, the overall heat transfer coefficients of foam-based heat exchangers can be up to two orders of magnitude greater than conventional heat exchangers. As a result, foam-based heat exchangers could be dramatically smaller and lighter.