Department of Energy (DOE) Public Access Policy

Overview

Effective for publications published on or after October 1, 2024, the 2023 DOE Public Access Plan now requires that all DOE funded recipients submit their full-text accepted manuscript to DOE no later than the publication date of the article. This update eliminated the previous 12-month embargo period allotted in the 2014 Public Access Plan.

This page provides an overview of the DOE 2023 Public Access Plan.

Requirements apply to scholarly publications arising from activities undertaken with DOE funds, in whole or in part, unless otherwise prohibited by law, regulation, or policy

Key Requirements

Must submit full text accepted manuscript, including conference proceedings or papers published in peer-reviewed journals, and the associated metadata no later than the publication date of the article
Must include acknowledgment statement, with the award or contract number, in the full text of the publication

Acknowledgement Statement

“This material is based upon work supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of [insert the sponsoring SC Program Office, e.g., Basic Energy Sciences], [Add any additional acknowledgements or information requested by the sponsoring SC Program Office] under Award Number(s) [Enter the award number(s)].”

Sample Acknowledgement Statement

“This material is based upon work supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences Energy Frontier Research Centers program under Award Number DE-SC-0001234.”.

See the OSTI site for more information

All financial assistance recipients
Per DOE policy includes publications produced by DOE federal employees, contractors, and financial assistance recipients.

Per the DOE PAGES FAQs page this 2023 Public Access Plan is effective for publications emanating from DOE-funding published on or after October 1, 2024.

DOE’s government license allows DOE to distribute copies of accepted manuscripts to the public
Authors will not be in violation of any copyright by submitting manuscripts and metadata to DOE
The public may obtain a copyrighted manuscript from DOE and may use and re-use the manuscript in accordance with US copyright law but does not have the right to reproduce, make derivative works, further distribute, publicly display or perform the work
DOE cannot transfer any of its rights to the public

DOE will ensure compliance through mechanisms already in place for reporting and closeout of awards

DOE leads the US government ORCID consortium

ORCID (open researcher and contributor ID): non-profit organization enabling transparent and trustworthy connections between researchers, their contributions, and affiliations by providing a PID for individuals to use with their name as they engage in research, scholarship, and innovation activities

DOE used digital object identifiers (DOIs) as a PID for research results through its scientific and technical information processes

Version of record (VOR): final published article, including copyediting, stylistic edits, and formatting changes per a specific journal publisher. It is considered the VOR because of potential post-publication updates such as errata, retractions, or other changes
Accepted manuscript: version of the article that has been accepted for publication and includes all changes made during the peer-review process, which is also called the final peer-reviewed accepted manuscript or the author accepted manuscript
Persistent identifier: digital identifier that is globally unique, persistent, machine resolvable and processable, with an associated metadata schema
ORCID (open researcher and contributor ID): a type of persistent identifier (PID) for individuals/researchers that meets the common/core standards of a digital persistent identifier service defined in the National Security Presidential Memo 33 (NSPM-33) Implementation Guidance
DOI: digital object identifier, type of persistent identifier (PID)