The appropriations debate and with regard to Defense Authorization moving ahead. Two other issues we are following, one is Homeland Security grants. Were still working off a system built 10 years ago. We need to move to system 2. 0 or 3. 0 and get more sophisticated about the grant funding. The last one would be veterans. A lot of folks are coming back from the theater about how do you get them employed. The government is famous for silos. Governors have been taking the lead in saying we need to work ,o break down these silos combine data and information so we can best help and assist our veterans. , further Committee Members the governor only session, our chair asked us to look at the issues which we will follow up on. Governor snyder, anything else youd like to add . Thank you for your leadership. Its been great. I want to thank the representatives from the red cross. I appreciate all the wonderful work you do. Thank you for your service and all your colleagues. The guard is something we are truly proud of. Thank you. Homeland security and Public Safety committee stands adjourned. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2014] as the room empties, that wraps up our live coverage from the National GovernorsAssociation Annual winter meeting in washington, d. C. Back tomorrow be live at 10 45 a. M. And 2 45 p. M. Iowa Governor Terry branstad will be our guest tomorrow on washington journal. Then we will hear from the president of the Service Employees union with a look at labor issues and workers, and a u. N. Report on north korea and crimes against humanity. The u. S. Institute of peace. That is live on washington eastern at 7 00 a. M. Writer on cspan. Right here on cspan. This weekend, American History tv debuts its new serious, real america, featuring archival films reduce by the u. S. Government. Industry and educational institutions. The u. S. Ed by government, industry, and educational institutions. Workers duringn americas military buildup of the 1940s. Wherever industry rolled out the materials of war. Above the clamor of heavy cranes. Along 1000 docs were idle ships , the call persisted. That was the call for help, which was still echoing in the deployed area when women began to respond. They could do anything within their strength that men could do for uncle sam. The wings overhead. Your sisters are singing. It is the song of women, american women on the warpath. Real america starting sunday at 4 00 p. M. Eastern on tv. 3s American History next, Energy Secretary ernest monees ernest moniz. The first new reactors in the u. S. In 30 years. The secretary spoke for about an hour. Unlike most of his one dozen predecessors, ernest moniz is serving at a time of Unprecedented Energy supply and security for the u. S. As his department reported in its annual Energy Outlook for 2014, expansion in Domestic Production of crude oil and natural gas is reshaping the economy. Increased production, much from the use of controversial Hydraulic Fracturing Technology has oil output nearing 1970 levels of 9. 6 Million Barrels per day. That production will cut americas reliance on imported crude oil to about 25 in a few years. It has also led to secretary monizs recent statement that it might be time to lift the decadesold u. S. Ban on exporting crude oil. The increased amounts of natural gas on the market are forcing the closure of many coal plants and supporting the Obama Administrations drive to reduce Greenhouse Gas emissions. In addition, there is enough supply so natural gas can be exported to mexico, canada and overseas. In addition, the production of electricity from wind and solar power is at record levels. Secretary moniz embraces president obamas all of the above Energy Strategy including support for Nuclear Power as longterm carbonfree power source and hydraulic fracturing to produce natural gas until a new generation of low Carbon Energy technology emerges. Those positions have not endeared him to many in the environmental community. The secretary is helping to develop the Energy Review, which will focus on the development of a comprehensive strategy for the infrastructure involves in transporting, transmitting and delivering energy. A nuclear physicist, he led the Energy Program at the Massachusetts Institute of technology before he joined the Obama Administration last may. He was under secretary of energy during the clinton administration. Please join me in welcoming to the National Press club, ernest moniz, secretary of energy. [applause] thank you. It is a great pleasure to be here at the press club and to note also, i learned this is the president s first lunch as president. I feel honored doubly. I also want to thank the Speakers Committee for pulling this event together. You have also been introduced to some of my colleagues who may pitch in on some of the questions. It has been a busy few weeks since the president gave his state of the union speech. Traveling across the country, highlighting and reinforcing some of the messages in terms of the administrative efforts to promote production and create jobs and opportunities and address serious issues surrounding Climate Change. I will start with the travel log. Three weeks ago i was in virginia to talk about stem creation. This is a critical challenge. We need to draw upon all of our talents among the population. It was impressive, in particular, to see how at hampton university, it has evolved into a Research University partly by drawing on collaboration within nearby department of energy and nasa facilities and recruit the president to be an ambassador for the new minorities and Energy Program. Two weeks ago i was in texas, the university of texas in austin and san antonio. There, talking about domestic oil and gas production. Meeting with students and entrepreneurs doing some things that are pretty fascinating. We explored how it is and can work more to move through energy efficiency. This was made possible by an extraordinary publicprivate partnership. Private enterprise, State Governments and utilities that are the customers for the solar generated electricity. In a few minutes, i will talk about tomorrows travel and another piece of the president s all of the above approach to energy and climate. I will note the travel encompassed california, texas, virginia and tomorrow another southeastern state. We are saving the north tour for spring and summer, although as we have seen, we have had a real touch of winter going pretty far south and that is something we need to Pay Attention to, and in fact, also was pointed out a theme that we are focusing on at the department of energy, which is the resilience of the Energy Infrastructure. Reinforcing different parts of the energy system, let me return to the state of the union where you heard the president reiterate the importance of energy and climate. I will make a brief quote. One of the biggest factors in bringing more jobs back is the commitment to american energy. The all of the above american Energy Strategy i announced a few years ago is working. Today america is closer to Energy Independence than we have been in decades. So today what i want to do is elaborate more on the strategy. Note that all of the above is not a slogan, it is a policy and a pathway to creating jobs, and that the same time, reducing Carbon Emissions that recently stood at the lowest level in 20 years. All of the above, as we will discuss, certainly encompasses fossil fuels, Nuclear Power, renewables, energy efficiency, but it starts with a commitment to lowering Carbon Emissions and addressing the mitigation responsibilities that we have for Climate Change. So lets start looking at the sources and discussing it in this context. As you all know, we are producing more natural gas than ever before. The Energy Administration forecast this will continue for the foreseeable future. About half of the drop we have seen in Carbon Emissions are due in fact to the low to moderate priced gas, particularly through substitution for coal in the electricity there. We are producing a lot more gas, but we are using it as what is sometimes referred to as part of the bridge to a lower carbon future. At the same time, this has had a remarkable effect on domestic manufacturing. The president said businesses have or will invest 100 billion in new factories that use natural gas. Frankly, i think this was probably appropriately on the conservative side. The administration will be committed to supporting innovative manufacturing across the United States. In fact, last month, the president traveled to North Carolina and announced that North CarolinaState University had been selected to lead the newest manufacturing innovation hub, one dedicated to semiconductors for power electronics, which has implications across many parts of the Energy Industry and this will bring together companies, universities, federal Resource Centers under one roof to both generate this next generation of power electronics. The president announced lands to plans to launch six more manufacturing hubs this year. We are ready started one in concert with the department of defense. We will do more this year. That will include the department of energy. Oil tremendously increased production. We are producing more crude oil at home than we are importing. How does this fit in with the climate . The climate commitment that i indicated earlier. It fits in because in no way does this increase production, which has dramatically decreased imports. Obviously helps in terms of balancing payments. But we continue to focus on reducing dependence on oil. Here we have a threepronged strategy. First, efficiency standards for vehicles. The standards enacted in the president s first term are projected to save 2 Million Barrels per day of oil by 2025 and saved a u. S. 1. 7 trillion in fuel costs. The other prongs of the approach include an ongoing commitment to develop nextgeneration biofuels. Those costs are coming down. Finally, to continue to advance electrification of vehicles. The cost of vehicle batteries has dropped significantly in the last four or five years. We have a significant ways to go but we should all keep focusing on the fact that these costs are dropping. If ive returned to the efficiency standards, just yesterday the president directed the epa to develop an issue, the next phase of medium and heavy duty vehicle fuel efficiency standards by the end of march. The department of Energy Office of energy and Renewable Energy is working with industry on what is called a super truck collaboration to in fact advanced the technologies that will be needed to meet the new standards coming forward. The idea is to improve the efficiency, the 10 mile per gallon, by at least 50 in class eight trucks, heavy duty long haul trucks. They are about four percent of the vehicles and use about 25 of the transportation fuel. They do not get very good mileage. Increasing that is a high leverage situation. Literally as i walked out the door on the way here today, i witnessed the first product of that super truck collaboration. This was a peterbilt super truck. It had achieved already a 75 increase in fuel efficiency. The technologies contributing to it from advanced engine technology, advanced powertrain technology, aerodynamics and other innovations, they will start working their way into the commercial products. Things like this will be critical for meeting the new challenges. The message is that Oil Production greatly increasing. Oil imports decreasing but we continue to work heavily on the oil demand side. In fact, the u. S. Trade deficit fell to a four year low in november in no small part because of the booming Domestic Energy production. Those are some of the fossil fuel initiatives. We have also seen remarkable progress in clean and Renewable Energy. In the last five years, we have almost doubled the amount of wind and solar electricity. We intend to see a doubling of that in the next five years. One of the tools we used for advancing renewables, in addition to research and development and programs and the like is our loan program. I want to spend a little time on that. Let me mention one program that sums up the administrations all of the above approach in our loan portfolio. We are supporting right now first a portfolio of more than 30 billion invested in more than 30 projects around the country. We recently announced up to 8 billion in available Loan Guarantees for advanced fossil Energy Projects that will reduce Carbon Emissions and increase efficiency. We provided more than 8. 4 billion in loans to the Auto Industry to allow domestic auto producers to ritual american retool american factories to produce cleaner and more efficient vehicles that are increasingly in demand at home and around the world. These range from loans to establish Major Companies like ford, retooling factories in six states, to start ups like tesla with a very different business model. A very highperformance vehicle, which will start export next month. We have committed more than 24 billion in Loan Guarantees to a variety of clean Energy Renewable projects across the country. These are supporting one of the Worlds Largest wind farms. Several of the Largest Solar Energy systems and more than a dozen new or retooled auto manufacturing plants. Last week i was in california for the opening of the solar Energy Generating system. The Worlds Largest concentrating solar power system. It received a 6. 1 billion Loan Guarantee from the department of energy. Back in that time, where if you recall, some of us are already forgetting it was not exactly easy to get Debt Financing in that time. So this program was really critical for kickstarting major utility scale projects. This project is a remarkable feat of innovation and engineering. Over 300,000 mirrors the size of garage doors reflect the energy to three massive towers were water is heated, converted to steam and then spinning turbines. Nearly 400 megawatts of power. This is on the order of what one needs to surface, nearly 100,000 homes. So they have now demonstrated to the private sector that this technology is feasible on a scale that has not been seen before. It opens up an export market for this technology and suitable geographies. We all know there are first mover problems in terms of new technology at a new scale and that is essentially what we are doing, getting over the first mover problem for commercial scale activities. I should say that we have also had remarkable success through investments in largescale technology as well. Helping to finance the first five plants, larger than 100 megawatts in the United States. Again, proving to industry these projects were viable. Subsequently, 10 utility projects are now privately financed without department support. That is the nature of the program. Kickstart and get the first movers out there and then have the private sector come in. Last year was a banner year for solar. 2. 3 gigawatts, 2300 megawatts of solar were installed in the United States in 2013. I want to emphasize that we have issued or made provisional commitments of over 30 billion of Loan Guarantee. We have substantial remaining authorities over 40 billion. We are planning to move forward across the Energy Spectrum with more projects, assuming we can find good commercial type projects that could benefit from this kind of Debt Financing. I should also add efficiency is critical. Indeed, we believe certainly in the long term a solution to Climate Change will require major efforts on the demand side, and clean energy on the supply side. One of the ways the department of energy is moving forward on this is by picking up the pace on issuing appliance efficiency standards. Already just a few weeks into 2014 we finalized efficiency rules covering external power supplies. No individual one of these may sound overwhelming but the cumulative effect of all of the new efficiency standards will be to reduce Carbon Emissions by more than 3 billion tons. That is not bad for a series of actions addressing essentially every day appliances. We have also seen remarkable breakthroughs on the technology side. Today led lights, perhaps the factor of six more efficient. A single fixture replacing a 60 watt bulb with 130 of lifetime Energy Cost Savings to consumers, and the prices are now below 10. I can guarantee you you will see them significantly below 10 this year. This is the kind of Cost Reduction that will drive the transformation of our system to clean energy. Let me say a few words about Climate Change specifically. Going back to the state of the union, the president stated the strong commitment to reducing domestic Carbon Emissions. The president said, when our childrens children look us in the eye and ask if we did all we could to leave them a safer, more stable world with new sources of energy, i wanted to be able to say yes, we did. One feature of that is the reaction to what we have been seeing in terms of the number of extreme weather events. Clearly i am not here to tell you we can tie any storm or drought or Climate Change individually to warming, but the patterns are alarming and they have been statistically anticipated for quite some time. 2025 years. What we see is warming amplifying the effects of such things as storms. Superstorm sandy was an example of a category one hurricane transformed into a storm that devastated much of the northeast coastline. Last summer president obama in the Climate Action plan emphasized not only the issues of cutting Carbon Emissions to avoid as much as possible the impacts of Climate Change, but he also emphasized the importance of preparedness to the consequences of Climate Change. Importance of preparedness to the consequences of Climate Change. Sometimes called, adaptation. The department of energy has some major roles to play, particularly in leading response around the Energy Infrastructure. We put out a report last summer detailing vulnerabilities of the Energy Sector to Climate Change. In 2012, several power plants in illinois had to get special permits to operate with higher than normal allowed discharge temperatures for cooling water. This past summer wildfire damage threatened california, leaving the governor to declare a state of emergency, even though the fires were distant from the major load centers. July of 2012, a number of companies that extract natural gas and oil through hydraulic fracturing were denied access to water for weeks or more in several states. So that is just emphasizing the energywater nexus that is one of the areas of Major Concerns with Climate Change. So resiliency in particular the electrical grid and fuel supply will be a major focus this year as we work throughout the administration on the quadrennial Energy Review. Its first installment of 2014 will focus specifically on the transmission, storage and distribution of energy, and as we have seen, even only in the past weeks our infrastructure challenges require urgent attention. President obama expanded on these resiliency efforts last week and he announced that his 2015 budget submission would include a new 1 billion Climate Resilience fund. Through this fund, we will be able to help communities plan and prepare and further support Breakthrough Technologies that will make us more resilient in the face of a changing climate. Let me end by returning to my southern itinerary since the state of the union. As we have said, the itinerary has reflect that all of the above. I have mentioned fossil fuels, efficiencies and renewables. Tomorrow i will travel to waynesboro, georgia to finalize a 6. 5 billion Loan Guarantee for the construction of nuclear reactors. In 2010, the department of energy offered conditional commitments to support construction of the countrys first new generation Nuclear Power plant in nearly 30 years. This was in the spirit of the first mover challenge of getting new Nuclear Plants built, and three separate commitments made to three of the four owners of the plant. Tomorrow, the department is closing on two of those commitments to Georgia Power and another power operation, constituting 6. 5 billion of Loan Guarantees. Truly, i want to emphasize we are working across the board to try to push the Technology Forward into the marketplace for all of our Energy Sources. These will be new 1100 megawatt ap 1000 nuclear reactors. Earlier, the doe cost shared the moving design of the certification onto a program to stimulate the development of nextgeneration reactors with passive safety features. Once completed, the new units will produce enough safe and Reliable Energy to power 1. 5 million homes. The president did make it clear he sees Nuclear Energy as part of americas low Carbon Energy portfolio, and it already is a major part of carbonfree portfolio. To conclude, obviously an exciting time in the energy world. We are producing more Domestic Energy here in the United States than ever before. The promise of clean, affordable Domestic Energy is finally coming true on a massive scale. We did not get here by accident. The advances in clean, Renewable Energy did not happen by accident. In fact, monday was the fiveyear anniversary of the signing of the american recovery and reinvestment act. Worth remembering the president took office in the middle of the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression at a time the economy was losing over 700,000 jobs per month in the midst of the worst sixmonth time for gdp growth in over 60 years. The recovery act was an unprecedented effort to jumpstart the economy, save and create jobs and make a down payment on addressing long neglected challenges so the country could thrive in the 21st century. Some of the most important investments were in clean and Renewable Energy. The recovery act helped provide more than 16 billion in Loan Guarantees to 25 Energy Projects. At a time when Debt Financing was just not available. These and other investments, the science office, they are establishing tomorrows Clean Energy Technologies to meet the domestic needs or affordable and secure clean energy, and to position us as a major supplier to the global market. To finish, a nonprofit estimated the world will need a Global Investment of 36 trillion or nearly 1 trillion per year on average over the next four decades to address Climate Change on the scale we believe is required. While of course applying energy and managing the demand side. That is a pretty serious investment. Many of us think that doing nothing will be far more expensive. Unlike most of his one dozen predecessors, Energy Secretary ernest moniz is serving at a time of Unprecedented Energy supply and security for the United States. As his department reported in its annual Energy Outlook for 2014, expansion in Domestic Production of crude oil and natural gas is reshaping the economy. Increased production, much from the use of controversial Hydraulic Fracturing Technology has oil output nearing 1970 levels of 9. 6 Million Barrels per day. That production will cut americas reliance on imported crude oil to about 25 in a few years. It has also led to secretary monizs recent statement that it might be time to lift the decadesold u. S. Ban on exporting crude oil. The increased amounts of natural gas on the market are when those technologies are deployed, we cannot afford to be at the back of the train. We want to be driving the train, leading the world in these industries. Investing in clean energy is not a decision that limits economic potential, but an opportunity to lead the Global Clean Technology markets that are forming right now. Tomorrow, maybe i will ask the three and a half thousand construction workers how they feel about the opportunities in this new economy. Thank you. [applause] thank you. You made several references to the state of the union address. I know you were not present because you were designated to watch the shop while the other cabinet members went to the hill. I hope your colleagues are envious of you because you got to come to the National Press club while they had to stay elsewhere. Thank you again. You have hinted some of the older Energy Regulations need to be revisited and reviewed. How and when do you see that happening . First, i have to clarify that i did not say the restrictions should be lifted. To clarify, the response to a question on the differences and how gas and oil exports are managed was simply to point out that many steps were taken in the energy world in the 1970s in response to the oil embargo. For example, the creation of the department of energy and obviously the energy world has changed and one might be reexamining a whole set of issues in the context of todays energy market. What will be the focus of your first review . As i stated, the focus is on infrastructure and storage and distribution of energy. I think as we narrow that down further, i think we have seen in the past months really two major focus areas. One is the electricity grid and how we develop a grid for the future. One that is more resilient perhaps. One that allows largescale renewables. One that may provide new services to consumers, and in doing so, to address the whole variety of risks that we face. We mentioned in our remarks the risk of extreme weather. Obviously Cyber Security is a major issue. A very significant fraction of the Cyber Attacks in this country are in fact on Energy Infrastructure. Who another are physical risks. Some of you may have seen chronologies of physical threats to the electricity infrastructure. Another risk is the interdependency of the infrastructure. As we saw and sandy when the grid going down took out access to transportation fuels. That is one major focus. Another major focus will be around the infrastructure for distributing fuels. Again, in the last weeks we have seen the problems in new england with natural gas prices. We have seen the continuing concerns about propane. Again, the issue was getting the product from where it was to where we needed it and the infrastructure was not there. Had you been working on Climate Change issues for countries that produce a lot of emissions, such as india . How do you believe they should reboot Energy Sources . We are carrying on extensive dialogue of cooperation with china and india, for example. China is by far the largest coal user. Around 4 billion tons per year. That is maybe five times what the United States is using at the moment. With both china and india, i will be going to india in about two weeks. I was in china recently. In china, when i was there, all of the senior government officials focused immediately upon the bad air quality issue. It is not just Carbon Emissions but air quality. The day that i arrived the index in beijing was roughly 10 times and that allowed here under epa regulations. They have a very strong motivation to address emissions across the board, but i also want to emphasize that i would say in all the discussions we have had, their commitment to addressing Carbon Emissions is real. Clearly they are balancing that against economic growth. One of the things were doing is trying to increase collaboration on the Carbon Dioxide capture utilization and sequestration technologies that are key for us and them it to be using coal in a low carbon world. A few questions from some of our international correspondents. One from russia. You had negotiations with your russian counterparts. Do you have new programs which you want to develop with russia in the near future . We did indeed complete the megawatts program. For those of you not familiar, perhaps a brief explanation is in order. Starting in 1993, the United States and russia went into a partnership in which 500 tons of highly enriched uranium from the Nuclear Weapons program was down blended and became used as fuel in american civil Nuclear Power plants. It is not widely known that half of the Nuclear Power plants were operating on the former russian weapons material for 20 years. This was a program that was completed on schedule, and probably the most successful Nonproliferation Program removing weapons material that we have had. With the head of the organization and russia, we are discussing a number of new initiatives, and have signed an agreement to have more collaboration. There is a very strong interest on collaborating on civilian Nuclear Power. There is a very strong interest on collaborating on National Security programs with our laboratories and a very strong interest in collaborating on things like unconventional gas and Oil Production. Another question from a japanese colleague. The u. S. Energy department authorized exports to japan last week. This is the third approval for japan. For the United States, what kind of interpretation would you put under those approvals . Are there more to come . I should clarify that we did indeed issue the sixth approval last week. One of those is final. Five are still conditional awaiting Environmental Review before those become final. I do want to clarify the department of energy does not choose where the cargoes go. What we do is make a Public Interest determination on export to countries with which we do not have a free trade agreement. That would include japan. Certainly the questioner is correct that three of the six to have as major customers, japan. That included the cameron license last week. We are continuing with the announced procedure in terms of evaluating license applications for Public Interest in the order that has been posted since 2012 on the website. As you would expect, mr. Secretary, a lot of these cards are questions related to the Keystone Pipeline. I think i could summarize with one question, what is your opinion on the project, and would you like to make a major announcement, because the National Press club is where news happens. I will not be making news in this case. My opinion and statements of fact is that secretary kerry, the department of state has responsibility for making the Public Interest determination, and we look forward to his doing so. [laughter] we will ask him to come tomorrow. Your predecessor thank you. Your predecessor started a number of initiatives focused on streamlining federal Agency Reviews of electric Transmission Infrastructure projects. What are your plans . Do you intend to keep it a high priority and how much can they realistically accomplish . First, it is the case that as suggested our authorities are somewhat limited, although there are certainly authorities that can be used, particularly for moving largescale renewables across large distances. All i can say is that we are looking at several possibilities. We actually did was commissioned through the loan program, there was a transmission line built and commissioned with loan support in nevada recently to move renewables across the state. Now there are some applications that would cross state lines or in Fact International borders, particularly in new england and are under active consideration. Levels of methane Greenhouse Gas have been rising since 2007. The news report says the budget is down for monitoring this. Do regulators know whether the fracking is the cause of increased methane levels . Do we have sufficient funding to stay on top of the potential problem with fracking . First, let me say that we have a very active interagency a methane emissions working group. A it involves the domestic policy council, department of energy, department of interior and the usda. There are methane issues in the agricultural side, which we will not talk about here. So first of all, we are very active in that. Certainly one of the major issues that i think is suggested is that we certainly need more data in terms of what are methane emissions. Not just from production wells, but and to end, including transmission and Distribution Systems for natural gas. Now, there have been recent publications, one that got a fair amount of attention in Science Magazine last thursday for example. The suggestion there, and i am just repeating what they said, quite a respectable group of authors, that the total methane emissions are probably somewhat higher than epas current estimate, although certainly in the ballpark. More than likely the production wells are not the major focus of that. We need more data and then to respond in a variety of ways. There are others in the private sector that are doing a terrific job as well. There is a Bluegreen Alliance of environmental groups and labor unions looking at the methane problem, and we will be convening the groups to redevelop an action plan. I would also say when it comes to production wells and unconventional shale or Oil Production, that certainly that technologies for capturing the methane are there. They are being increasingly used, socalled green completions. Recently in north dakota the State Government made a commitment to 95 capture of methane, much of which is being flared because of lack of infrastructure. Over the next few years i am certainly hoping we will see significantly reduced emissions. I teach my students that sometimes a followup question is important. Leaving aside that secretary kerry in the state department will have to make an ultimate decision, can you give us insight what is the insight the department of energy on the Keystone Pipeline impression . Followup questions often lead to the same disappointment as the initial question. [laughter] we are currently in a time in which the agencies are to make comments on the supplementary Environmental Impact statement. I was thinking of an answer to the followup question. Appreciate it. This is what we do good at the National Press club. I am so glad you could come and the other cabinet members had to say away while you could come to the National Press club. Where will the department of energy likely have the most impact on u. S. Energy policy during your tenure . Well, i might broaden it to energy technology. Certainly on the policy side, we have mentioned the quadrennial Energy Review under development. I do want to emphasize the review is led out of the executive office of the president where they will convene in agencies across the administration. The department of energy has a special role in terms of providing the executive secretary and the analytical capacity to analyze many of the crosscutting issues. The product of the first years activities will be a set of recommendations for advancing Energy Infrastructure questions and as we go to the next year and next year, that will broaden out to include the supply side, demandside, etc. That will be the mechanism and engine for driving administrationwide policies with Strong Political grounding. On the technology side, we will continue through the whole spectrum of programs from our efficiency and renewable programs. Our Nuclear Programs and loan programs. We will keep pushing the envelope across the entire spectrum of research, Development Demonstration and deployment. Let me say that many of you are quite aware that the role of the government in research and development is generally quite accepted. Once one goes to the deployment end of the spectrum, there is more divergence of views as far as the role of the federal government. I want to say that i think the need to accelerate the pace of change in response to climate challenges makes it essential that we continue to do investments such as those i mentioned earlier in the loan program that get the first movers out there in the commercial market, pushing the Technology Envelope so that the marketplace will eventually have the set of choices it needs for the various low Carbon Solutions that will be needed in different parts of the country in Different Countries of the world. That is the way were looking at it and expect to make Significant Impact in both of those realms. A question about solar power. Solar power is fast becoming as affordable as natural gas. Why is the Obama Administration failing to incentivize failing to give incentives for solar Power Infrastructure since it is more Climate Friendly . We are providing major incentives for solar power. It is a big spectrum. I already mentioned the loan program for the first five utility plants. We also have five solar thermal plants, two of which are operating. Beyond that, we have a whole variety of mechanisms. We have a program that has very explicit targets for lowering costs. What is important is that the programs are not only looking at the core solar conversion technologies, but also looking at the soft cost. If you want to put [inaudible] on your rooftop, the soft costs can dominate the overall budget cost. We believe there is a lot of room to reduce that. Costs of solar and onshore wind and batteries and leds have come down dramatically. One of the messages is, we should stop thinking that somehow these technologies are always 510 years away. We believe the costs are now coming into the range where there are lots of marketplace opportunities under appropriate regulatory standards. We are pushing solar very hard. I personally am extremely bullish on solar. I believe we will see it grow faster than almost any of the predictions we have had. But it will be part of a system. It is obviously variable in its output. At a minimum, the son is only out on average 12 hours per day. That leads to integration, either through grids, combination with perhaps gasfired, storage. Th