Big-money prize challenges are not exactly a new concept: Think \u201cchallenge\u201d grants, The X Prize, the Millennium Prize, or your local public-radio station. [The daddy of them all may have been the Orteig Prize, a $25,000 reward\u2014a major chunk of change in its time\u2014for the first aviator to fly non-stop from New York to Paris or vice versa. Charles Lindbergh captured that prize with his historic 1927 flight,\u00a0 and the boom in air travel has continued ever since.]<\/p>\n
There have been others, of course, but until recently, challenges [as opposed to competitive, or non-competitive, bidding] have not been used to spur creative solutions to big problems addressed by government. Now, there\u2019s challenge.gov<\/a>, a new site for public and private collaboration on problem solving.<\/p>\n At the new website, gov<\/a>ernment agencies post challenges that are open to citizens. All of the challenges offer prizes\u2014monetary or non-monetary\u2014for accomplishing a particular goal. Some of the challenges are narrowly focused, like the \u201cGame Day Challenge,\u201d a competition for colleges and universities to find ways to reduce waste at their football games.<\/p>\n Some challenges offer significant monetary prizes, with open-ended deadlines that reflect the enormity of the task. \u00a0Examples include:<\/p>\n Green Flight Challenge<\/a>, created by NASA: \u201c\u2026build an aircraft that can fly 200 miles in less than two hours using the energy equivalent of less than 1 gallon of gas per occupant.\u201d \u00a0Total prize money: $1,650,000<\/a><\/p>\n Bright Tomorrow Lighting Prize<\/a>, [also known as the L prize], created by U.S. Department of Energy: \u201cto develop high-quality, high-efficiency solid-state lighting products to replace the common light bulb.\u201d Total prize money: $15 million<\/p>\n Others, on a smaller scale, offer citizens a chance to show off their photographic and design skills, tell personal stories that could help others, or share classroom tips. Among them is a challenge, with $12,000 in available prize money, to submit health recipes for school lunches\u2014an extension of First Lady Michelle Obama\u2019s \u201cLet\u2019s Move\u201d anti-obesity campaign. Other smaller scale challenges include:<\/p>\n Poster Contest on Carbon Monoxide Safety<\/a>, created by the US. Consumer Product Safety Commission: ..\u201dto create a poster that helps raise awareness about the dangers of CO in the home.\u201d $2,750 in prizes<\/p>\n