The History of the Prize

The Freedom Prize Foundation is an organization dedicated to reducing our country's reliance on oil. Through a bipartisan effort, the Freedom Prizes were authorized in the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (Public Law 109-58, Title X, Sec. 1008), which recognized the Freedom Prize Foundation's initiative as meriting the support of the Department of Energy. As such, the DOE has allocated $5 million as seed funding to support the inaugural year of the Freedom Prizes. The authorizing language of the Freedom Prizes states: "The Secretary, in cooperation with the Freedom Prize Foundation, shall support a program of awarding prizes, to be known as Freedom Prizes, to encourage and recognize the development and deployment of processes and technologies that serve to reduce the dependence of the United States on imported oil."