{"schema_version":1,"research_id":"eoa_inverse_innovation_exp06_external_evaluation_20260803","source_assessment_id":"bounded_rivalry_governance__chemistry_materials:P1:v0","cell_id":"bounded_rivalry_governance__chemistry_materials","search_queries":["site:nature.com solid electrolyte interlaboratory study ionic conductivity reproducibility","site:ornl.gov battery manufacturing facility user proposal access solid state battery","site:energy.gov solid-state battery manufacturing scale up shared facility funding","site:nist.gov solid electrolyte standards ionic conductivity measurement","battery research user facility proposal review pilot line access allocation committee materials facility","site:anl.gov battery materials scale up facility access proposal review MERF","site:ornl.gov user facility proposal review battery manufacturing facility access","solid state battery benchmark standardized testing protocol consortium official","sulfide solid electrolyte hydrogen sulfide safety handling study official","solid electrolyte film scale-up manufacturing challenges review roll to roll dry room sulfide","all-solid-state battery pilot scale manufacturing solid electrolyte film process yield study","materials competition benchmark held-out validation prize challenge battery prior art","site:science.osti.gov user facilities access policy proposal merit review safety proprietary research DOE","site:anl.gov Center for Nanoscale Materials user agreement safety review intellectual property proposal access","DOE Office Science user facilities policies access merit review proprietary users","materials science grand challenge competition benchmark experimental validation prize official","JARVIS Leaderboard NIST official materials benchmarking reproducibility validation","site:nist.gov JARVIS leaderboard materials design methods","JARVIS Leaderboard paper npj computational materials","site:osha.gov hydrogen sulfide hazards permissible exposure limit","site:cdc.gov hydrogen sulfide occupational safety hazard","sulfide solid electrolyte moisture hydrogen sulfide peer reviewed open access"],"sources":[{"source_id":"S1","title":"Benchmarking the reproducibility of all-solid-state battery cell performance","publisher":"Nature Energy","url":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s41560-024-01634-3","source_class":"PRIMARY_RESEARCH","publication_date":"2024-09-18","accessed_at":"2026-08-03","claims_supported":["A 21-group interlaboratory study found large variability in all-solid-state-cell assembly and electrochemical performance despite common materials and a common cycling protocol.","Only 39 of 68 attempted cells cycled to cycle 50; preparation and handling failures were prominent.","The authors report no standardized all-solid-state-cell setup, advocate multiple measurements and triplicate reporting, and identify processing-history differences that impede comparison."]},{"source_id":"S2","title":"Department of Energy Issues $16 Million Lab Call to Strengthen Domestic Capabilities in Solid-State and Flow Battery Manufacturing","publisher":"U.S. Department of Energy, Advanced Materials and Manufacturing Technologies Office","url":"https://www.energy.gov/cmei/ammto/articles/department-energy-issues-16-million-lab-call-strengthen-domestic-capabilities","source_class":"GOVERNMENT_OR_REGULATOR","publication_date":"2023-04-13","accessed_at":"2026-08-03","claims_supported":["DOE expressly identified translation of solid-electrolyte R&D to large-format/high-volume manufacturing, precision processing, and verification and validation of scalability as funding needs.","The call required national-laboratory and industry collaboration and offered $4 million of DOE funding per solid-state manufacturing project with 20% cost share.","DOE is an identifiable funder, although this source does not request the proposed contest-governance design."]},{"source_id":"S3","title":"Battery Manufacturing Facility","publisher":"Oak Ridge National Laboratory","url":"https://www.ornl.gov/content/battery-manufacturing-facility","source_class":"OFFICIAL_ORGANIZATION_DATA","publication_date":"2025-12-19","accessed_at":"2026-08-03","claims_supported":["ORNL operates an open-access battery manufacturing R&D center that integrates components into complete cells and quantifies their advantage.","Relevant capabilities include dry space, gloveboxes, mixing, tape casting and slot-die coating, roll-to-roll calendaring, solid-state-battery processing, environmental chambers, and battery cycling.","The facility and its operations leadership are a credible adopter/authorizer class for comparative pilot-scale validation, but no adoption commitment was found."]},{"source_id":"S4","title":"User Proposal Review and Evaluation Process","publisher":"Argonne National Laboratory Center for Nanoscale Materials","url":"https://cnm.anl.gov/pages/proposal-review-and-evaluation-process","source_class":"OFFICIAL_GUIDANCE","publication_date":"undated","accessed_at":"2026-08-03","claims_supported":["A major materials user facility already performs safety and feasibility screening, confidential external peer review, numerical scoring, rank-based allocation, conflict handling, feedback, and expiring access awards.","CNM management retains responsibility for efficient allocation, while unsuccessful applicants may revise and resubmit.","This is close prior art for competitive scarce-facility allocation, but it does not document coded specimens, staff reproduction, resource caps, spillover reserves, complementary vouchers, or held-out performance testing."]},{"source_id":"S5","title":"Sulfide-based composite solid electrolyte films for all-solid-state batteries","publisher":"Communications Materials","url":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s43246-024-00482-8","source_class":"AUTHORITATIVE_SECONDARY","publication_date":"2024-03-30","accessed_at":"2026-08-03","claims_supported":["Large-scale thin-film fabrication remains technically difficult; pressing can produce cracking, brittleness, excessive thickness, and size limitations.","Wet and dry processing routes have material tradeoffs involving binder distribution, conductivity, film thickness, pressure, solvents, and roll-to-roll suitability.","Pilot selection therefore cannot credibly rely on conductivity alone; process yield, thickness, mechanical integrity, retained performance, and route compatibility are decision-relevant."]},{"source_id":"S6","title":"Moisture Stability of Sulfide Solid Electrolytes: Systematic Comparison and Mechanistic Insight","publisher":"The Electrochemical Society of Japan / J-STAGE","url":"https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/electrochemistry/93/6/93_25-71011/_article/-char/en","source_class":"PRIMARY_RESEARCH","publication_date":"2025-06-01","accessed_at":"2026-08-03","claims_supported":["Controlled experiments show chemistry-specific moisture instability and hydrogen-sulfide generation in sulfide solid electrolytes.","At 0 degrees Celsius dew point, Li6PS5Cl generated approximately 22.7 ml H2S per gram, far more than the compared Li3PS4 and Li4SnS4 materials.","Hazard and degradation burdens can differ materially among formulations, supporting chemistry-specific EHS review and attributed handling burdens rather than a generic safety label."]},{"source_id":"S7","title":"Hydrogen Sulfide — Hazards","publisher":"U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration","url":"https://www.osha.gov/hydrogen-sulfide/hazards","source_class":"GOVERNMENT_OR_REGULATOR","publication_date":"undated","accessed_at":"2026-08-03","claims_supported":["Hydrogen sulfide is acutely toxic and highly flammable; very high concentrations can rapidly cause death.","OSHA lists a 20 ppm general-industry ceiling, while NIOSH lists 10 ppm as a ten-minute recommended ceiling and 100 ppm as immediately dangerous to life and health.","Any prospective sulfide-electrolyte contest requires existing EHS controls, exposure assessment, emergency procedures, and authority to halt work; a scoring rule cannot replace these obligations."]},{"source_id":"S8","title":"JARVIS-Leaderboard: A Large Scale Benchmark of Materials Design Methods","publisher":"National Institute of Standards and Technology","url":"https://www.nist.gov/publications/jarvis-leaderboard-large-scale-benchmark-materials-design-methods","source_class":"PRIMARY_RESEARCH","publication_date":"2024-05-07","accessed_at":"2026-08-03","claims_supported":["NIST's JARVIS-Leaderboard is an established, community-driven materials benchmarking platform covering computational and experimental methods.","It uses datasets, methods, metadata, comparisons to experiment, and experimental round-robin benchmarks to promote reproducibility and validation.","It is close prior art for auditable materials leaderboards, but it does not allocate a scarce pilot-line slot or incorporate facility-resource caps, EHS spillovers, appeals, penalties, and award reopening."]}],"problem_evidence":{"support":"STRONG","rationale":"The central technical problem is visible: S1 directly demonstrates severe interlaboratory variability, nonstandard assembly histories, substantial preparation failure, and the need for replicated reporting. S5 shows that conductivity, film thickness, mechanical behavior, yield, and scalable processing are coupled tradeoffs. S6-S7 establish potentially material chemistry-specific worker hazards. What remains unverified is the proposal's behavioral premise that teams at a particular facility actually cherry-pick, overconsume instruments, conceal changes, coordinate, or externalize waste.","source_ids":["S1","S5","S6","S7"]},"stakeholder_evidence":{"support":"MODERATE","rationale":"DOE has expressly funded solid-electrolyte manufacturing scale-up and scalability verification, while ORNL operates an open-access facility intended to quantify material and process advantages. Argonne demonstrates that facility management can govern ranked access. These identify credible funder, adopter, and authorizer classes, but no source expresses demand for this particular bounded-contest package or willingness to change an existing allocation process.","source_ids":["S2","S3","S4"]},"prior_art":{"proximity":"ADJACENT_PRIOR_ART","closest_analogues":[{"name":"CNM competitive user-access allocation","similarity":"Safety/feasibility screening, confidential external review, numerical scoring, rank-based allocation of scarce facility resources, conflict management, feedback, and expiring awards are already operational practice.","remaining_difference":"The proposed system adds coded physical specimens, standardized replicated measurements, staff reproduction, a held-out panel, equal input credits, attributed waste liability, complementary validation vouchers, anti-collusion referral screens, and an explicit post-pilot recalibration loop.","source_ids":["S4"]},{"name":"All-solid-state battery interlaboratory benchmark","similarity":"Common materials, specified electrochemical testing, multiple participating groups, raw-data aggregation, multiplicate measurements, and reporting recommendations directly resemble the proposed validation layer.","remaining_difference":"The study did not rank teams for a scarce pilot resource, cap competitive inputs, impose spillover accounting, provide appeals, or compare governance designs.","source_ids":["S1"]},{"name":"NIST JARVIS-Leaderboard","similarity":"A materials leaderboard with defined datasets, metrics, metadata, reproducibility infrastructure, comparisons to experiment, and experimental round robins embodies audited benchmark competition.","remaining_difference":"It is an open benchmarking platform rather than a safety-qualified contest for indivisible physical scale-up capacity and lacks the proposed externality, due-process, award-expiry, and challenger provisions.","source_ids":["S8"]},{"name":"ORNL Battery Manufacturing Facility comparative validation workflow","similarity":"An open-access pilot-capable facility already integrates users' components into complete batteries and quantifies process or material advantages with relevant coating, dry-room, roll-to-roll, and testing infrastructure.","remaining_difference":"The public description does not show a frozen contest rulebook, equal resource credits, held-out finalist reproduction, portfolio awards, penalties, appeals, or a challenger window.","source_ids":["S3"]}],"distinctive_claim_remaining":"Configuration-level distinctiveness remains plausible, not component novelty: conditional on a safety-qualified scarce-access setting, adding frozen physical-test rules, capped inputs, blinded replicated scoring, staff reproduction on held-out conditions, attributable spillover accounting, complementary runner-up vouchers, and award reopening will select films with better subsequent pilot reproducibility and processability while reducing rank-seeking resource use and shifted burdens relative to ordinary qualified peer review. The claim fails if selection, later pilot outcomes, resource use, or spillovers do not improve against simpler review, lottery, or queue comparators.","confidence":"MODERATE"},"implementation_evidence":{"support":"MODERATE","rationale":"The physical testing and manufacturing capabilities exist at facilities such as ORNL, and CNM demonstrates workable confidential review, safety screening, scoring, and expiring access. NIST and the interlaboratory study demonstrate reproducible benchmark and round-robin components. A paper-only shadow evaluation is therefore technically and operationally feasible. Prospective feasibility is less certain because facility-specific data rights, confidential formulation stewardship, staff capacity, composite-score reliability, cleanup-credit accounting, appeal independence, penalty authority, and the opportunity cost of reserved pilot capacity have not been verified. Sulfide routes also require chemistry-specific EHS controls that cannot be traded against performance points.","source_ids":["S1","S3","S4","S6","S7","S8"]},"scores":{"meaningful_impact":{"score":4,"rationale":"Misallocating scarce pilot capacity can waste an expensive scale-up cycle and suppress learning from more reproducible approaches; the underlying reproducibility and scale-up problems are well supported. Realized impact is unmeasured.","source_ids":["S1","S2","S5"]},"stakeholder_pull":{"score":3,"rationale":"DOE expresses strong pull for solid-state manufacturing scale-up and validation, and ORNL is a plausible adopter, but there is no expressed pull for contest-governance reform itself.","source_ids":["S2","S3"]},"incremental_advantage":{"score":3,"rationale":"The package could improve predictive validity and burden attribution over ordinary peer review, but its advantage over a simpler blinded multi-criteria review has not been demonstrated.","source_ids":["S1","S4","S8"]},"distinctiveness_plausibility":{"score":3,"rationale":"Most components have close analogues in user-facility review and materials benchmarking; distinctiveness lies in their integrated application to a scarce physical pilot-line award.","source_ids":["S4","S8"]},"technical_implementability":{"score":4,"rationale":"Required coating, controlled-atmosphere, characterization, cycling, and staff-supported validation capabilities visibly exist. Reliable cross-chemistry scoring and staff reproduction remain empirical questions.","source_ids":["S3","S5","S6"]},"adoption_authority_feasibility":{"score":3,"rationale":"Facility management already controls access and safety review in analogous settings, but authority for penalties, cleanup-credit reserves, confidential cross-team comparisons, and independent appeals is not externally verified.","source_ids":["S3","S4","S7"]},"evidence_readiness":{"score":3,"rationale":"A retrospective shadow study is bounded and can use existing records, but those records are proprietary or access-controlled and their completeness is unknown.","source_ids":["S1","S4"]},"safety_net_benefit":{"score":4,"rationale":"Chemistry-specific safety qualification, attributed waste burdens, incident logging, and cleanup reserves could protect technicians and prevent unsafe formulations from gaining an artificial scoring advantage, provided existing EHS authority remains controlling.","source_ids":["S6","S7"]},"scalability":{"score":3,"rationale":"The governance template could transfer across materials facilities, but standardized physical tests, hazard panels, score weights, and staff-reproduction capacity will remain facility- and chemistry-specific.","source_ids":["S3","S4","S5"]}},"score_confidence":"MODERATE","costs":{"first_evidence":{"band_2026_usd":"10K_TO_50K","scope":"Six-to-eight-week paper-only shadow evaluation of one completed allocation cycle: data extraction and de-identification, rubric preregistration, two blinded reviewers, resource/waste reconstruction, sensitivity analysis, and controlled reporting.","confidence":"LOW","assumptions":["Existing records are machine-readable enough to avoid extensive archival reconstruction.","Roughly 150-350 combined staff and reviewer hours are required.","No new material handling, testing, participant compensation, software procurement, or change to an award occurs."],"source_ids":["S4"]},"initial_deployment_startup":{"band_2026_usd":"50K_TO_250K","scope":"Prospective governance design before launch: rulebook, statistical plan, confidential-data controls, reviewer and appeal procedures, EHS mapping, resource-credit ledger, waste-attribution method, training, and dry-run administration.","confidence":"LOW","assumptions":["Existing institutional software, legal agreements, laboratory infrastructure, and EHS systems can be adapted.","The estimate excludes construction, major instruments, production materials, pilot-line operation, prizes, and cleanup liability.","Independent legal, EHS, metrology, and process-review effort is required."],"source_ids":["S3","S4","S7"]},"operational_launch":{"band_2026_usd":"250K_TO_1M","scope":"One prospective contest round, including standardized specimen testing, staff reproduction of finalists, held-out validation, two runner-up vouchers, administration, metrology, consumables, waste handling, appeals reserve, and the resource-equivalent opportunity cost of protected pilot access.","confidence":"LOW","assumptions":["Existing ORNL-like dry-space, coating, roll-to-roll, glovebox, and cycling assets are available without capital purchase.","Three to eight entrants and two to four finalists participate.","The pilot slot uses an existing line and does not require a new dedicated solid-state pilot facility.","DOE's multi-million-dollar manufacturing projects provide an upper-scale anchor, not a direct quote for this contest."],"source_ids":["S2","S3","S5"]},"annual_recurring":{"band_2026_usd":"250K_TO_1M","scope":"One or two rounds per year: independent testing and reproduction, validation vouchers, contest administration, data stewardship, audits, EHS and waste monitoring, appeals, post-contest review, and metric recalibration.","confidence":"LOW","assumptions":["No major equipment replacement or facility expansion is included.","Testing intensity and finalist count remain similar to the launch round.","Unused cleanup reserves are returned and are not counted as net recurring cost; realized cleanup is included.","Staff time and pilot-line opportunity cost dominate cash-equivalent cost."],"source_ids":["S2","S3","S4"]}},"verified_pipeline_gates":{"externally_supported_problem":{"status":"YES","reason":"Direct interlaboratory evidence demonstrates nonstandard preparation, large performance variability, and substantial preparation failure; scale-up and chemistry-specific hazards are independently documented.","source_ids":["S1","S5","S6","S7"]},"externally_credible_adopter_or_authorizer":{"status":"YES","reason":"ORNL operates a relevant open-access battery manufacturing facility, DOE funds scale-up validation, and analogous facility management already authorizes ranked access. No commitment to adopt this proposal was found.","source_ids":["S2","S3","S4"]},"distinct_testable_incremental_claim":{"status":"YES","reason":"The proposal specifies an incremental comparison against qualified review: whether the integrated governance package improves subsequent pilot reproducibility/processability and reduces strategic resource use and shifted burdens.","source_ids":["S1","S4","S8"]},"bounded_next_evidence_step":{"status":"YES","reason":"One de-identified completed cycle can be shadow-scored without new synthesis or changed awards, with preregistered comparators, agreement measures, sensitivity tests, and explicit falsifiers.","source_ids":["S1","S4"]},"no_unresolved_safety_or_authority_stop":{"status":"UNCERTAIN","reason":"A paper-only shadow study can avoid material exposure and altered rights, but site-specific authorization for record access, confidential formulation use, derived rankings, penalties, cleanup credits, appeals, and any prospective sulfide handling has not been verified. Existing EHS authority must remain noncontestable.","source_ids":["S4","S6","S7"]},"credible_cost_scope_and_range":{"status":"UNCERTAIN","reason":"The four ranges are bottom-up resource-equivalent estimates anchored by known facility capabilities and DOE project scale, but no direct staffing, testing, pilot-slot, waste, insurance, or opportunity-cost quotation was found.","source_ids":["S2","S3","S4"]}},"next_evidence_step":"With a willing facility partner, conduct a preregistered, access-controlled shadow evaluation of exactly one completed allocation cycle over six to eight weeks. Before opening records, freeze eligibility, score dimensions and weights, missing-data rules, reviewer roles, confidentiality controls, and four comparators: the historical decision, a blinded simple committee rubric, a safety-qualified lottery, and first-come allocation. Two blinded reviewers should independently score every eligible submission using only contemporaneously available records; separately reconstruct instrument use, replication evidence, failed specimens, attributable waste, and any later pilot outcomes already recorded. Report inter-reviewer reliability, rank stability under weight perturbations and leave-one-dimension-out tests, missingness by team, selection disagreement, whether each guardrail changes eligibility or rank, and—where later outcomes exist—comparative prediction of reproducibility, process yield, retained performance, incidents, waste, and resource consumption. Falsify the incremental rationale if the composite cannot be applied reliably, records cannot support burden attribution, the simpler blinded rubric performs equivalently or better, shadow winners have no better later pilot outcomes, resource/spillover terms merely move burdens into unmeasured categories, or the historical process already incorporated these factors consistently. Do not infer misconduct from anomalies, contact entrants for new work, alter awards, or handle materials.","blocking_evidence":["No facility has expressed willingness to adopt or even shadow-test the bounded contest.","The prevalence of cherry-picking, concealed process differences, excessive instrument use, reciprocal allocation, sabotage, and shifted waste at an actual target facility is unknown.","No retrospective dataset has yet linked proposal information and candidate scores to later pilot reproducibility, yield, stability, incidents, waste, and resource use.","Cross-chemistry validity, reviewer reliability, missing-data behavior, and gaming resistance of the proposed composite score are untested.","Authority for confidential disclosure stewardship, derived shadow rankings, resource caps, cleanup-credit reserves, penalties, independent appeals, and coordination investigations is facility-specific and unverified.","No direct 2026 cost observations or quotations exist for independent reproduction, held-out testing, pilot-slot opportunity cost, waste handling, data stewardship, or appeal administration.","The effect on collaboration, entrant diversity, incumbent advantage, delays, and false suspicion cannot be resolved by open-web evidence."],"research_disposition":"PARTNERED_RESEARCH_PROGRAM","world_novelty_boundary":"This evaluation measured neither world novelty nor patentability, freedom to operate, market size, or realized impact. The search found established competitive peer-reviewed user-facility allocation, materials leaderboards, experimental round robins, standardized all-solid-state-battery benchmarking, and open-access pilot validation. It did not find, within the bounded eight-source search, a documented solid-electrolyte pilot-slot contest combining all proposed governance elements. Absence from these sources is not evidence of global novelty.","arm":"COMPLETE_PROPOSAL_PORTFOLIO","candidate_version":0,"controller_recommendation":{"action":"STOP_EMPIRICAL_RESEARCH_NEEDED","repairable":false,"material_progress_observed":true,"progress_targets":["Obtain written participation and data-access approval from one identifiable battery or materials user facility and its EHS, operations, privacy/confidentiality, and research-integrity authorities.","Create a de-identified data dictionary linking contemporaneous submissions, resource and waste logs, replication evidence, historical decisions, and any later pilot outcomes; quantify missingness before scoring.","Preregister the composite rubric, simple-rubric comparator, qualified lottery, first-come comparator, reviewer-agreement threshold, sensitivity analyses, and falsification criteria.","Complete the one-cycle blinded shadow evaluation and determine whether any proposed guardrail materially changes eligibility, ranking, burden attribution, or prediction of later pilot outcomes.","Verify prospective authority for confidential disclosures, staff reproduction, resource caps, waste reserves, penalties, appeals, and coordination referrals without displacing existing EHS or employment protections.","Replace resource-equivalent estimates with facility-specific staff-hour, metrology, consumables, waste, validation-voucher, pilot-slot opportunity-cost, and recurring-administration quotations."],"reason":"Open sources establish a consequential reproducibility and scale-up problem, credible facility and funder classes, technical plausibility, and substantial adjacent prior art. They cannot determine the proposal's central incremental effect, local prevalence, record completeness, score reliability, behavioral response, actual authority, or real cost. Those questions require access-controlled facility records and a partnered retrospective shadow test rather than further bounded web search."},"proposal_index":1}