Over the last decade, the transportation sector has seen some major breakthrough technology advancements. We’ve seen the introduction of new lightweight materials, the development of renewable biofuels and bioproducts produced from biomass, mass production of plug-in electric vehicles, and the market introduction of fuel cell electric vehicles. Increasing information technology, connectivity, and vehicle automation have dramatically changed the way vehicles are produced and marketed. We’ve also witnessed how new mobility services like bike-share, car-share, and ride-share have fundamentally changed the way we move people and goods.  

All of these developments that we are seeing in research, innovation and our society—smartphones, connectivity, online commerce, globalization—make this an exciting time to convene leaders in policy, research, as well as the automotive and tech industries to get different perspectives on what the future holds for the U.S. transportation sector.

That is why I am excited to announce the inaugural 2016 Sustainable Transportation Summit on July 11-12, 2016 at the Walter E. Washington Conference Center in Washington, D.C.

The summit, hosted by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy’s (EERE), will highlight progress and achievements in sustainable transportation research and development, and efforts to bring new technologies to market. It will also serve as a forum to share ideas and perspectives on opportunities to accelerate the commercialization and deployment of advanced transportation technologies and smart mobility systems over the next decade.

On Day 1, Energy Secretary Ernest J. Moniz will deliver the keynote address, followed by a series of plenary sessions featuring established experts across industry, academia, and government. Throughout the afternoon, speakers will engage in a dynamic discussion with several different perspectives on critical sustainable transportation topics, including deep decarbonization for U.S. transportation systems, consumer adoption of new vehicle technology, net-zero carbon fuels, and the future of mobility. 

On Day 2, attendees will have the opportunity to choose from one of six concurrent tracks representing high-profile transformative initiatives from EERE’s Vehicle, Bioenergy, and Fuel Cell Technologies Offices, including:

• EV Everywhere: EV Market Acceleration – This session will share EV Everywhere progress and new resources developed over the past six months and obtain stakeholder input to help frame and focus plug-in electric vehicle (PEV) research and market acceleration efforts in the coming years.
• H2USA – This session will provide an overview of H2USA, a public-private partnership among the Energy Department, industry, state agencies, and other stakeholders to address key challenges in deploying hydrogen infrastructure. It will also introduce a new initiative called H2@ Scale, which offers the potential of renewable hydrogen as a flexible, clean energy carrier that enables aggressive market penetration of renewables while deeply decarbonizing our energy system.
• Biotechnology for Sustainable Transportation – This session will seek to introduce transportation stakeholders to novel biomaterials and engineered biological systems with unique applicability to vehicle efficiency and sustainability.
• Charging Location Dynamics: From Homes to Workplaces to Transportation Corridors – This session will highlight lessons learned, facilitate discussion about remaining barriers to expanding workplace charging programs, explore plans for corridor charging, and brainstorm the possibility of extreme power charging, a potential game-changer for accelerating PEV use.  
• Clean Cities & SMART Mobility – This session, as part of a series of interrelated SMART/Clean Cities workshops, will bring together Clean Cities and SMART Mobility stakeholders to discuss opportunities to align programs for mutual benefit.
• Co-Optimization (Co-Optima) of Fuels and Vehicles – This session will highlight breakthroughs in low carbon transportation fuels and discuss strategies to improve vehicle efficiency in tandem to maximize energy savings, emissions reduction, and on-road vehicle performance.

Register today and join hundreds of transportation and mobility leaders from industry, government, and academia to learn more about the technology, policy, and market innovations that hold the potential to shape the transportation system of the future. 

Also, don’t miss the Energy Department’s Bioenergy Technologies Office’s ninth annual conference—Bioenergy 2016: Mobilizing the Bioeconomy through Innovation—immediately following the Sustainable Transportation Summit, on July 12-14. Partnering with the Clean Energy Research and Education Foundation, this year's conference will focus on opportunities to grow future feedstock supplies and breakthrough technology barriers to achieve a stronger bioeconomy.