President Obama has nominated the MIT nuclear physicist Dr. Ernest Moniz to head the Department of Energy.
President Obama Makes a Personnel Announcement, WhiteHouse.gov
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Gas has to be a bridge to somewhere
Mr. Moniz has extensive government experience. From 1997 to 2001, he was the Under Secretary of Energy at the DOE. Before that, Moniz served for two years at the Office of Science and Technology Policy in the office of the president. Moniz is already among Obama’s outside advisers on energy and is a member of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. He also served on an administration “blue ribbon” commission on nuclear waste policy.
He has long been seen as the front-runner to replace outgoing Energy Secretary Steven Chu. In the video below you get to know him better.
Dan Rather Reports, excerpt from interview with Dr. Ernest Moniz
Moniz has made it clear that he believes gas is only a medium-term fix for addressing climate change: "Gas has to be a bridge to somewhere. And that somewhere is the carbon-free options. So we need to work hard on having a bridge to somewhere and to having that span be as short as possible," he said at a 2012 Bloomberg conference.
"Ernie knows that we can produce more energy and grow our economy, while still taking care of our air, our water and our climate," Obama said. The Team At the same occasion Obama announced Gina McCarthy to head the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) saying “they're going to be making sure that we're investing in American energy, that we're doing everything that we can to combat the threat of climate change, that we're going to be creating jobs and economic opportunity in the first place," said the president. "They are going to be a great team. And these are some of my top priorities going forward." The nominations are subject to Senate confirmation. New Appointments at U.S. Energy Department and EPA, IEEE Who Is Ernest Moniz, Obama's Choice for Energy Secretary?, NationalJournal |