ERIA Forum

Remarks of Acting Assistant Secretary for FECM Dr. Jennifer Wilcox as prepared at ERIA Forum on September 13, 2021

Good morning.  My name is Jennifer Wilcox, Acting Assistant Secretary for the Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management in the U.S. Department of Energy. 

I’m happy to join you by video this morning.  I’d like to start by thanking the Economic Research Institute for the Association of Southeast Asian nations and East Asia and the Brunei Darussalam Ministry of Energy for hosting this forum – and for providing me the opportunity to highlight what we’re doing in the US department of energy’s Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management to help our country reach a net zero carbon economy by 2050. 

Our mission centers around investments in approaches that minimize both social and environmental impacts of our continued dependence on fossil fuels.

Our efforts are aligned to further advance President Biden’s mission to cut emissions by 50% by 2030; to produce 100% clean electricity by 2035; and to reach a net-zero carbon economy by mid-century.

This mission – and the work required to achieve it – is more urgent than ever before because climate change has become a climate crisis, and we have very little time left to avoid some of the worst impacts and threats from the climate crisis

Technology approaches like carbon capture and storage, or CCS – as well as carbon dioxide removal – will play an enormously important role over the next decade.

Decarbonization is the cornerstone of the President’s strategy.  And it means that we have to look at every sector – energy, manufacturing, transportation, the entire economy. 

Given that fossil fuels continue to play a key role in the economy – in the U.S. and around the world – their decarbonization is critical if we’re to meet net-zero carbon emissions in time.

Just look at the global demand for natural gas – which drove record high U.S. LNG exports last year. 

And fossil energy provides roughly 2/3 of global electricity – and over half of US power generation.

Avoiding carbon emissions where we can, will always be less expensive that pulling it back out of the atmosphere.

CCS provides us with the opportunity to use fossil assets responsibly

We also want to expand the potential of CCS – to include carbon capture not just from the power sector, but also industrial sectors like cement and steel production.

Moving forward, we want to take carbon capture out of its silo and leverage some of the work we’re already doing to expand the potential of CCS to include low-carbon supply chains for cement, concrete, steel, paper, chemicals, and fuels.

And sourcing low-carbon hydrogen will be critical for the production of clean synthetic fuels, including ammonia, and chemicals – meanwhile turning waste  CO₂ into a feedstock. There’s significant potential in applying carbon capture to help advance a low-cost and low-carbon hydrogen economy.

We also have to be aware that fossil supply chains like coal, oil  and natural gas have CO2 equivalent emissions associated with their production – in many cases methane – which is an even more potent greenhouse gas than CO2.

One area we’re particularly concerned about is methane emissions from our oil and gas delivery infrastructure and ensuring that we have a leak-tight natural gas supply chain.

Our Natural Gas Infrastructure Program is focused on developing next-generation pipeline materials and technologies for detecting and mitigating methane emissions, including enhancing both the cyber and physical security of natural gas pipeline infrastructure. And we’re committed to reducing methane flaring and venting from the natural gas supply chain.

At the same time, secure and reliable CO₂ storage is critical to helping us meet our climate goals.  And we have a robust R&D portfolio in the carbon storage space to improve storage and operational efficiency, as well as strengthen our understanding of overall cost and de-risking strategies to reduce these costs. 

These are all critical to enabling and supporting a CCS industry that is safe, economically viable and environmentally responsible – and that can help drive an economy-wide strategy to achieving net-zero carbon emissions goals.

And I want to emphasize that climate models make it clear that both carbon removal and decarbonization through point-source carbon capture will be needed to meet climate goals.

Carbon dioxide removal – or CDR – is the removal of CO2 from legacy emissions or the accumulated emissions in the atmosphere. Given CDR involves the removal of CO2 from air, which is 100x or more dilute compared to point sources, it’s ultimately more expensive and may use more of Earth’s limited resources, such low-carbon energy, land, and water.  For this reason, CDR approaches should be deployed responsibly, which means they should not be used to offset emissions that can be avoided, such as decarbonizing fossil with point-source carbon capture. CDR should be decoupled from fossil and used to offset only the TRULY hard-to-abate sectors like agriculture, shipping, and aviation.

In our Office we’re leveraging our expertise in carbon capture to invest in direct air capture approaches using chemicals, minerals, and even biological systems.

So, at the end of the day, there are a lot of moving pieces involved in getting us to net zero – and a lot of work to go around to deploy critical technologies at scale. 

But it’s not just the work we are doing that will help make the difference. For instance, CCS technologies are set to play an important role in supporting clean energy transitions in Asia, as well.   And we’re seeing groundbreaking efforts to develop and deploy those technologies in the region – including the recently launched Asia CCUS Network. 

This kind of regional cooperation is vital to achieving net zero emissions, and we encourage your continued collaboration toward this goal.

So, my message today is that we have a unique opportunity – and a compelling responsibility – to help tackle the climate crisis and advance to a net zero, clean energy economy.

We all know that this won’t be easy.  This kind of transformational work never is.  It’s always challenging, and it requires collaboration across government, industry, and academia – and across international borders.

And we at the Department of Energy welcome the opportunity to work with our partners in Asia and around the world to meet that challenge and ensure that the Earth is a livable home, not just for us but for future generations.

Thank you