Remarks as Prepared for Delivery by Secretary Granholm Opening DOE’s “U.S. Energy Earthshots: Decadal Goals to Power the Clean Energy Transition” COP27 Event

Thanks so much, Brad, and hello everyone!

I call the Department of Energy America’s “Solutions Agency.”

We see big, audacious challenges like the climate crisis and we create bold, ambitious, and achievable goals to tackle them.

That’s exactly why we launched our Energy Earthshots initiative last year.

We’ve set specific cost targets for lynchpin technologies we need to meet our climate goals and build a clean energy economy.

And we know they’re achievable because we’ve got our innovation powerhouses—the 17 National Labs—on our side.

In fact, we’ve done it before, a decade ago, through President Obama’s SunShot initiative—which helped make solar the cheapest electricity on the planet and helped speed deployment. Not just in the United States, but around the world.

And as we know, speed is everything when it comes to tackling the climate crisis.

So we’ve been moving fast to grow our Energy Earthshots initiative.

A year ago, in Glasgow, I announced our third Energy Earthshot—and we’re now up to six.

Plus, we’ve backed our goals up with action.

Take our Hydrogen Shot—aiming for $1 per 1 kilogram of clean hydrogen in one decade to revolutionize clean transportation and industry.

Thanks to President Biden’s legislative victories, we’re now accepting applications for regional clean hydrogen hubs in the U.S. that will allow us to take great leaps towards that goal.

We launched our Long-Duration Storage Shot to cut the cost of energy storage that lasts more than ten hours, and yesterday we announced that we’re investing $350 million in demonstration projects for these technologies.

We’re tapping into the heat beneath our feet with our Enhanced Geothermal Shot, and harnessing the energy above our heads with the Floating Offshore Wind Shot.

And because we see these Energy Earthshots as benefitting the whole world, we’re marrying two of them with international partnerships.

When we launched the Carbon Negative Shot at COP26, we simultaneously created a new Mission Innovation mission with several partners on carbon dioxide removal.

And this September at the Global Clean Energy Action Forum, we announced the Industrial Heat Shot to decarbonize sectors like steel and cement.

At the same time, DOE joined the Clean Energy Ministerial’s Industrial Deep Decarbonization Initiative.

And today, we’re proud to announce that the United States will join the Mission Innovation Net-Zero Industries Mission. We’re excited to collaborate with Australia, Austria, and other partner countries working to create solutions for clean steel, cement, chemicals, and more.

So it’s been a big year for the Energy Earthshots. But we’re just getting started.

Early next year, DOE plans to host three Summits on our newest Energy Earthshots—geothermal, floating offshore wind, and industrial heat. And I hope you’ll all join us!

We need partnership and collaboration—from folks all over the world—to meet these targets for the benefit of all humanity.

And over the rest of the session, we’ll talk about what that partnership and collaboration could look like—and what achieving these Earthshots would mean for communities and industry.

First, we’ll play a short video highlighting some key breakthroughs connected to the Long Duration Storage Shot.