Committee Democrats Promote Clean Energy Future
(Washington, DC) – Today, the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology held a hearing to examine the Department of Energy’s (DOE) science and technology priorities. Testifying before the Committee was Dr. Ernest Moniz, the recently confirmed Secretary of Energy.
Ranking Member Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX) said in her opening statement, “It’s no secret that Congress’s inability to come to an agreement on a sensible budget plan has led to some devastating cuts with serious impacts to our nation’s future. I think this budget request is a step back in the right direction. If approved, the Office of Science, ARPA-E, the Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability, and the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy would all receive a much-needed boost to advance the development of clean energy technologies that will be vital to our national security, our economy, and our environment in the decades to come.”
The discussion during the hearing ranged widely from issues such as the development of small modular reactors, to the energy-water nexus, to national labs, to electric vehicle technologies, to renewable energy sources, to exascale computing.
Several Members on both sides of the aisle brought up the issue of climate change. Committee Democrats and Secretary Moniz stressed that climate change is a scientifically determined fact, and is primarily being caused by anthropogenic sources.
Secretary Moniz said, “The risks of global climate change threaten the health, security, and prosperity of future generations. DOE must continue to support a robust R&D portfolio of low-carbon options and key enablers: efficiency, renewables, nuclear, carbon capture and sequestration, energy storage, and smart and resilient grids. The President’s FY 2014 Budget requests resources to invest in programs that support research, development, and deployment of the energy technologies of the future that will reduce greenhouse gas emissions and increase energy security.”
Ms. Johnson also discussed DOE’s role in energy development. She said, “DOE-supported research was key to the development of high-efficiency gas turbines for coal plants, nuclear reactors developed at federal labs, and the directional drilling and hydraulic fracturing practices that have led to the shale gas boom of today. But we should remember that those achievements required decades of federal investment, the overwhelming majority of which was focused on fossil and nuclear energy. I continue to support research to make today’s technologies cleaner and more efficient, but I believe that it is time to level the playing field and introduce real competition to the markets. That is where the priorities set by this budget request come into play. We have to find the greatest value for our investment of the taxpayer dollar, and today it is the emerging energy technology sectors that can most benefit from government support.”
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