Text version of opening remarks by U.S. Department of Energy Deputy Secretary David Turk at the DOE Hydrogen Shot Summit, August 31, 2021.

David Turk: Well, thank you, Secretary Granholm, for getting us off to such a terrific start. And if I could maybe even more importantly thank you for your tireless and passionate leadership. It's such a pleasure, such an honor to be your deputy, and I know this is felt by all of us at DOE, all our national labs, and I should say all of us in the U.S. federal government, in industry. Your leadership on clean energy, your leadership on energy more generally is so very much appreciated, so thank you for everything that you do.

Let me also add to the Secretary's welcome to our over 4,000 participants. I'll be serving as the emcee. We've got an incredibly full agenda. I think this is—mostly my job is to keep us on time and to introduce the embarrassment of riches that we have with us today. Incredible leadership from around the world, incredible expertise from the public sector, from researchers, from industry. So let's just get started. We've got a trio of guest speakers right at the outset.

The first up is Secretary John Kerry, who's such a dedicated public servant, one of our leading advocates for literally decades on climate action, not only in the U.S. but around the world. He's served, of course, as Secretary of State under President Obama. He's also our very first special presidential envoy for climate change, working literally around the world to secure bolder international commitments to combat the climate crisis. I had a chance recently, about a month ago, to join Secretary Kerry for the T20 Energy and Climate Ministers Meeting, and I can't tell you how tireless Secretary Kerry is and how passionate he is to try to do whatever he can leading the U.S., leading the international effort. So we're thrilled to have Secretary Kerry join us here at the Summit today, and let's hear from him.