This second installment of the QER builds on QER 1.1 — “Energy Transmission, Storage, and Distribution Infrastructure”, which was released in April 2015. QER1.1 made 63 recommendations, which DOE and its partners have been actively implementing. As detailed in the recent “Report Card,” 29 of the recommendations have already been fully implemented and an additional 21 are currently underway. Many of the recommendations requiring legislative action have been taken up by Congress, with 21 of the legislative recommendations now fully or partially reflected in Federal law. DOE will work with Congress and other agencies to achieve similar positive impact based on the recommendations from QER1.2

Modernizing the Nation’s electricity system is a strategic imperative. Reliable and affordable electricity provides necessary energy services for consumers, business, and national defense and underpins virtually every sector of the modern U.S. economy. This first-of-its-kind review of the electricity system provides analysis-based recommendations on how the Federal Government can most effectively work with states, localities, industry, and other stakeholders to meet future electricity needs, fully realize America’s economic potential, and secure the United States as a global leader in clean-energy innovation.

Here’s how:

Protect the Electricity System as a National Security Asset.  The QER analyzes the interactions and interconnections that characterize the electricity system, as wells as the risks the system faces and concludes that the electricity system should be treated as a National security asset. The QER also provides recommendations to align investments and interests in support of the overarching National interest in electricity system security against threats both natural and manmade.  The report recommends:

• Amending the Federal Power Act, including new authorities under the FAST Act, to clarify and affirm that the electricity system—from bulk power to distribution—is a national security asset, making its protection a fundamental Federal responsibility.
• Adopting integrated electricity-security planning and standards on a regional basis.
• Assessing interdependencies of natural gas/electricity system infrastructure for cyber security protection to determine whether additional measures are needed to protect the electricity system. 

Maximize Economic Value and Consumer Equity. Consumer options for electricity services and energy efficiency have grown dramatically, enabled in part by the smart grid and the Internet of Things, and supported by significant consumer demand for a range of new services. Consumers can now both produce and consume power through distributed generation technologies and an advanced distribution infrastructure, a significant change in the customer-utility relationship. Advances needed to increase economic value and consumer equity in this context include:

• Increasing Federal support for state efforts to quantitatively value and incorporate energy efficiency, demand response, distributed storage, and distributed generation into resource planning.
• Evaluating the potential to improve incentives and programs to cut electricity bills for low- and moderate-income households.
• Supporting electrification and opportunities for economic development by advancing energy technologies on tribal lands.
• Leveraging electric-utility broadband build-out to expand public broadband access in rural areas.

Build a Clean Electricity Future. Reducing greenhouse gas and other harmful emissions is a key imperative for the power sector and builds on the success of environmental policy in reducing adverse public health and environmental impacts from electricity generation throughout the 20th century.  Ensuring a clean and flexible electricity system will require continually reducing the cost and improving the environmental performance of energy technologies. Achieving these goals will require a number of actions, including:

• Significantly increasing Federal investment in clean electricity Research Development & Demonstration and implementing regional, clean-energy-innovation partnerships.
• Analyzing financing for advanced large-scale generation, while also expanding tax incentives for renewable electricity, electric vehicles, and energy efficiency.
• Extending the timeframe and total capacity allowed under the production tax credit for nuclear power generation and providing tax credits for carbon capture, utilization, and sequestration.
• Reducing the electricity intensity of newly constructed residential and commercial buildings by at least 50 percent relative to typical, present-day, new building construction by 2030.
• Assessing business model inequities associated with Federal electricity financial incentives to include an examination of the usage of tax credits for tax-exempt entities.

Ensure Reliability, Security, and Resilience. Traditional electricity system operations are evolving that can enable a more dynamic and integrated grid, creating both enormous opportunities and the potential for new risks and vulnerabilities. The emerging threat environment, particularly with respect to cybersecurity and increases in the severity of extreme weather events, poses challenges for the reliability, security, and resilience of the electricity sector, as well as to its traditional governance and regulatory regimes. Key steps needed to minimize these risks include:

• Materially expanding existing Federal programs to demonstrate the integration and optimization of distribution-system technologies.
• Providing incentives for energy storage.
• Enhancing coordination between energy-sector information-sharing and analysis centers and the intelligence communities to synthesize threat analysis and disseminate it to industry in a timely and useful manner.
• Supporting grants for small utilities facing cyber, physical, and climate threats.
• Accounting for emerging threats during reliability planning.
• Providing funding assistance to enhance analytical capabilities in state public utility commissions.

Invest in a Modern Workforce. A skilled workforce that can build, operate, and manage this modernized grid infrastructure is essential for the 21st century electricity system. Building a dynamic electricity workforce will require support from the Federal Government, including by:

• Strengthening Federal and regional efforts focused on electricity workforce development and transition assistance.
• Supporting cyber-physical systems (CPS) curriculum, training, and education for grid modernization and cybersecurity.
• Enhancing and aligning skills-based training and electricity-sector workforce development.

Enhance Electricity Integration in North America. Leaders in the United States, Canada, and Mexico have publicly and repeatedly affirmed support for increasing energy integration, and there is a general understanding across the continent that the benefits of cross-border electricity trade can be improved with deeper system integration. A subset of the policies needed to accomplish this goal include:

• Advancing North American grid security through sharing of best practices and exploration of potential future cooperation on grid security issues.
• Facilitating the permitting of cross-border transmission-facilities by expanding the Regulatory and Permitting Information Desktop (RAPID) Toolkit.
• Increasing North American clean-energy and technical coordination and enhancing cooperation on energy information exchange across North America.

The full report, details on the process for stakeholder input, and the related analyses are available at energy.gov/qer.

This week, I’m in San Francisco to host the first gathering of global energy ministers since last December’s climate negotiations in Paris. These leaders represent countries that make up 75 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. The focus of these meetings will be to expand international collaboration in clean energy research, development, demonstration and deployment to combat climate change, drive economic growth, and help ensure energy security.

In San Francisco, energy leaders will participate in the 7th Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM7), an alliance of countries that are global leaders in clean energy. It’s also the inaugural Mission Innovation Ministerial, a separate but largely overlapping group of countries that has committed to double support for clean energy research and development.

In addition, the week will feature a variety of other clean energy-focused events including the Clean Energy Education & Empowerment’s (C3E) Women in Clean Energy Symposium and the CEM Startups and Solutions Technology Showcase in San Francisco's Union Square.

The Clean Energy Ministerial is an alliance of 23 major countries and the European Commission that are working together to accelerate clean energy deployment. Their collaborations are already producing innovative local and national clean energy policies, ambitious emissions reductions, efficiency programs and technology collaboration.

For example, South Korea, South Africa, Chile and India have either adopted or proposed 16 efficiency standards and policies to make appliances such as water heaters, televisions and ceiling fans more energy-efficient through CEM’s Super-Efficient Equipment and Appliance Deployment initiative.

As a result, India became the first country in the world to set comprehensive quality and performance standards for LEDs, aided by technical expertise in the United States. India then used those standards to initiate a bulk purchase program for hundreds of millions of LEDs at a remarkably low cost.

Another example of the CEM’s collaborative structure is the Clean Energy Solutions Center, which helps policymakers implement and design policies and programs. The Solutions Center has already provided no-cost clean energy policy support to over 90 countries and it is developing a new capability to help identify financing strategies. The Center is expanding to include a Finance Portal.

While CEM is pushing deployment of today’s clean-energy technologies, energy ministers and business leaders are also meeting for the inaugural Mission Innovation Ministerial, focused on developing the cutting edge clean energy solutions of tomorrow.

During the first day of the Paris climate negotiations last year, President Obama joined 19 other world leaders to announce Mission Innovation, an effort to double investments in clean-energy-technology research and development by 2021. Supporting breakthroughs in clean energy will lower the costs of clean energy technologies and in turn help to combat climate change, enable life-changing energy services to the poor and enhance global energy security.

During the Mission Innovation Ministerial, ministers from these countries will announce specific action plans from their respective governments to achieve those goals.

We have to make sure that we have the world’s best and brightest working on these tough issues. That means making full use of women’s talents, yet the energy industry remains one of the global sectors with relatively little representation of women.

That’s why we started the Clean Energy Education & Empowerment Women in Clean Energy Symposium in 2011, with the goal of increasing the visibility of and encouraging more participation by women in clean energy. Since its inception, CEM countries have named 46 C3E Ambassadors and honored dozens of women around the world for their leadership in energy accelerators, education and deployment. On May 31, C3E will celebrate its fifth anniversary with a symposium at Stanford University.

It makes sense that the world’s energy leaders are gathering in California’s Bay Area. The state is a leader in progressive clean energy policies and deployment—while California’s Bay Area is a global hub of the clean-tech industry and venture capital. Plus, it is home to world-class universities, three of our DOE national labs, and some of the most innovative technology companies in the world. That makes California the perfect stage for global leaders to renew and advance their commitment to clean energy.

When it comes to energy, however, you can read about what’s new on the device that’s in your pocket. That’s because today, the Department of Energy (DOE) released the second Quadrennial Technology Review (QTR), which explores the current state of technologies in key energy sectors and the R&D opportunities available in the mid-term.  

The QTR provides a blueprint for the Energy Department’s energy-technology development and for enabling the science that will make future technology breakthroughs possible. But the QTR also makes it clear that it’s up to us to carry these opportunities through and make them a reality.

Global climate change, which is caused primarily by carbon pollution from energy use, is one of the most significant threats to the well-being of people now alive as well as to that of future generations. The QTR identifies game-changing clean and efficient energy technologies that will reduce emissions of the offending substances. The more of these clean-energy options we deploy—in the transportation sector, in industry, in buildings, in electric power generation—the better our chances of avoiding an unmanageable degree of climate change.

Since the last QTR was published in 2011, the number of large-scale carbon capture and storage demonstration projects has doubled globally. A combined construction and operating license regulatory framework, plus Federal help with financing, is enabling the construction of first four new nuclear reactors in more than 30 years. And renewable energy technologies have dramatically reduced costs and gained market share. And since that first QTR, generation of electricity from solar power  has increased tenfold and wind generation of electricity has increased by 50 percent.

But it’s not just about the energy we produce. It’s about the energy we save. The nation has embraced energy efficiency as a way to reduce energy use and costs, but substantial efficiency opportunities remain untapped. For example, DOE and industry are working on tomorrow’s efficient refrigerators that will be able to react to signals from utilities and use sensors to control changing temperatures while eliminating the need for polluting refrigerants.

Breakthroughs in next-generation high-tech tools – including x-ray light sources and supercomputers – are helping scientists find new ways to deliver cheaper, faster clean-energy innovation. For example, new neutron imaging techniques at DOE laboratories are helping American companies like Morris Technologies, now GE Aviation, develop fuel efficient, 3D-printed turbine blades for jet engines.

As the American energy landscape transforms, the QTR provides the DOE, the private sector, and research institutions a foundation to inform decisions about the portfolio of R&D investments to explore in the years to come.

As we head into the international climate negotiations this fall, the United States is serious about its ambitious commitment to reduce carbon emissions by 26 to 28 percent by 2025. Technologies catalogued in the QTR will be an essential component of making these reductions a reality.

The range of options available to meet our energy needs is increasing, and this diversification creates a more dependable system and offers consumers new choices. For example, rooftop solar power, combined with next-generation energy storage, will help consumers cut electric bills while supplying the grid clean power during outages. The QTR helps us see what is possible.  We can now see what our clean energy future looks like, but we have to keep the momentum going.

That’s why today, we’re hosting a Clean Energy Investment Summit at the White House, where we’re announcing $4 billion in independent commitments by major foundations, institutional investors, and others to fund innovative solutions to help fight climate change, including technologies with breakthrough potential to reduce carbon pollution.

Taken together, these commitments far surpass the initial $2 billion goal set at the launch of the Administration’s Clean Energy Investment Initiative last February.  And we look forward to seeing this initiative continue to build momentum in the months ahead. 

In addition, as part of today’s Summit, the Administration is announcing a series of new executive actions to that will further encourage private-sector investment in clean-energy innovation. These include:

• Launching a new Clean Energy Impact Investment Center at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to make information about energy and climate programs at DOE and other government agencies accessible and more understandable to the public, including to mission-driven investors;
• Facilitating Issuing guidance on impact investments by charitable foundations in clean energy technologies and other potentially mission-aligned sectors; and
• Improving financing options from the U.S. Small Business Administration for private investment funds seeking long-term capital.

Thanks to past investments, consumers are already benefiting from breakthrough technologies developed by our nation’s world-class researchers and entrepreneurs. We’ve seen major advances in solar photovoltaics, wind power, advanced batteries, energy-efficient lighting, and fuel cells – and the cost of solar energy systems has plummeted by over 50 percent in the past five years alone.

We must continue investing in these kinds of innovations if we are to maintain our leadership in reducing carbon pollution while also growing the economy.  

Today’s announcements will help ensure that even more American-made clean energy technologies can make the leap from an idea, to the laboratory, to the global marketplace. We look forward to continuing to unleash the power and potential of innovations that serve both our economy and our environment, and to the as-yet-unimagined breakthroughs still to come.

Ed. note: This is cross-posted on the U.S. Department of Energy's website. See the original post here.

Three times as strong and twice as light as the lightest commonly used metals, advanced composites have the potential to revolutionize advanced manufacturing, transforming clean energy products from wind turbines to next-generation passenger vehicles that are made right here in America. These versatile composites are currently used for satellites, airplanes and luxury cars, but by driving down costs and making these materials more accessible to manufacturers across a number of industries, we can make virtually any product made out of metal lighter, stronger and less expensive.

Supporting the further development of these advanced composites will help give America’s resurgent manufacturing sector a more competitive edge in the global economy. After a decade of decline, American manufacturing is coming back, adding 786,000 new jobs since February 2010. Today’s new action is the kind of investment we need to build on this progress, creating the foundation needed for American manufacturing growth and competitiveness in the years to come.

That is why the Obama Administration announced today that the University of Tennessee will lead the Energy Department’s new Manufacturing Innovation Institute for Advanced Composites. Headquartered in Knoxville, the institute will focus on making advanced composites less expensive and less energy-intensive to manufacture, while also making the composites easier to recycle.

With these improvements, manufacturers will be able to reinvent products that are at the foundation of our clean energy economy – many of which directly impact our daily lives. Wind turbine manufacturers could build longer, lighter and stronger blades that create more energy. Automobile manufacturers could build passenger cars that are 50 percent lighter and use 35 percent less gasoline, saving American families money when they fill up their gas tanks.

A great example is the 3D-printed Shelby Cobra that the President will see during his visit to Techmer Engineered Solutions. The car demonstrates a number of cutting edge technologies, and shows how the National Network for Manufacturing Innovation Institutes could leverage each other’s strengths and achieve more together than they could on their own. The Cobra was 3D-printed with advanced composites that cut its weight in half while improving performance and safety. The motor is powered by wide bandgap power electronics that are more efficient and less expensive than traditional silicon technologies, and the electric vehicle can be charged wirelessly. The Cobra’s innovation may be rivaled only by its manufacturing process. The car was developed by six people in just six weeks, when it normally takes a year and a team of dozens to achieve a similar demonstration from design concept to prototype.

To learn more, watch our latest video on how advanced composites could revolutionize clean energy technology and our daily lives.

During his recent State of the Union address, President Obama reiterated the importance of American energy: “One of the biggest factors in bringing more jobs back is our commitment to American energy. The all-of-the-above energy strategy I announced a few years ago is working, and today, America is closer to energy independence than we’ve been in decades.”

In the month since the President’s speech, I’ve been traveling across the country to highlight the Administration’s efforts to promote production of domestic energy, create jobs and opportunities for American families, and address the serious issues posed by climate change. The President’s all-of-the-above energy strategy is a path to progress on all three points.

Four weeks ago, I was in Virginia to talk about science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education and job creation in the energy field. I visited Hampton University, a historically black university that has evolved into an impressive research university -- partly by drawing on collaboration with nearby Energy Department and NASA facilities. While there, I was able to announce that Hampton’s President, Bill Harvey, has become an Ambassador for the Energy Department’s Minorities in Energy program.

Three weeks ago, I was at the University of Texas in Austin and in San Antonio to talk about domestic oil and gas production and meet with students and entrepreneurs who are doing remarkable work to advance clean energy and advanced manufacturing. In San Antonio, Mayor Castro and I discussed how the Energy Department could do more with cities to advance clean energy and energy efficiency.

U.S. Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz, center left, and San Antonio, Texas, Mayor Julián Castro, center right, take a look at a solar car built by students at San Antonio's James Madison High School. During his Feb. 6, 2014, visit, Secretary Moniz also discussed domestic oil and gas production, advanced manufacturing and how the Energy Department could do more with cities to advance clean energy and energy efficiency. ( Photo courtesy of the University of Texas at San Antonio)

Two weeks ago, I was in southern California to help inaugurate Ivanpah, the world’s largest solar thermal plant. Using the same amount of water as two holes at the nearby golf course, Ivanpah produces enough clean energy to power nearly 100,000 homes. This facility was made possible by an extraordinary public-private partnership between the Energy Department’s Loan Programs Office, private enterprise, state government and utility companies.

And last week, I traveled to Waynesboro, Georgia, to mark the announcement of $6.5 billion in loan guarantees to support construction of advanced, “first mover” nuclear reactors -- the first to be licensed and begin construction in the U.S. in nearly three decades. The Vogtle Plant project will produce enough clean electricity to power 1.5 million homes while preventing 10 million tons of carbon pollution annually.

As I’ve seen first-hand in my travels, all-of-the-above isn’t just a slogan. It’s a clear-cut pathway to creating jobs while reducing carbon emissions, which recently stood at their lowest level in 20 years. And it’s borne out by the numbers.

We’re producing more natural gas than ever before -- a trend the Energy Information Administration forecasts will continue into the foreseeable future.  Nearly half of the drop we have seen in U.S. carbon emissions is due to the market substitution of natural gas for coal in the electrical sector. And natural gas has had a remarkable effect on domestic manufacturing. As the President noted in his State of the Union address, businesses plan to invest almost $100 billion in new factories powered by natural gas.

For the first time in 20 years, we are producing more oil at home than we import from the rest of the world. Yet we continue to work to reduce our dependence on oil -- through growing use of advanced biofuels, the rapid growth of the electric vehicle market, and the increased efficiency of our cars and trucks. The CAFE standards enacted during the President’s first term are projected to save 2 million barrels per day of oil by 2025 and to save the U.S. $1.7 trillion in fuel costs.

Last week I got to sit in the cab of a Class 8 demonstration truck developed in the Energy Department’s SuperTruck collaboration with industry. The goal of SuperTruck was to incorporate innovative technologies to increase the fuel economy of Class 8 trucks by 50 percent. If all 18-wheelers in the U.S. were built to SuperTruck standards, we could cut our fuel consumption by nearly 300 million barrels of oil a year, saving $30 billion in annual fuel costs.

We have also seen remarkable progress in clean and renewable energy. In the last five years, we have more than doubled the amount of electricity we generate from wind and solar -- and we are going to double it again in the next five years. And we are committed to being on the path to meeting the President’s goal of doubling energy productivity by 2030.

In the face of climate change, economic recovery and volatile foreign energy supplies, the President’s commitment to develop all available sources of American energy is a strategy that creates jobs, cuts carbon pollution and makes our country more secure. We simply can’t afford to do less -- and, indeed, we will continue working to do more.

Hidden inside nearly every modern electronic is a technology -- called power electronics -- that is quietly making our world run. Yet, as things like our phones, appliances and cars advance, current power electronics will no longer be able to meet our needs, making it essential that we invest in the future of this technology.

Today, President Obama will announce that North Carolina State University will lead the Energy Department’s new manufacturing innovation institute for the next generation of power electronics. The institute will work to drive down the costs of and build America’s manufacturing leadership in wide bandgap (WBG) semiconductor-based power electronics -- leading to more affordable products for businesses and consumers, billions of dollars in energy savings and high-quality U.S. manufacturing jobs.

Integral to consumer electronics and many clean energy technologies, power electronics can be found in everything from electric vehicles and industrial motors, to laptop power adaptors and inverters that connect solar panels and wind turbines to the electric grid. For nearly 50 years, silicon chips have been the basis of power electronics. However, as clean energy technologies and the electronics industry has advanced, silicon chips are reaching their limits in power conversion -- resulting in wasted heat and higher energy consumption.

Power electronics that use WBG semiconductors have the potential to change all this. WBG semiconductors operate at high temperatures, frequencies and voltages -- all helping to eliminate up to 90 percent of the power losses in electricity conversion compared to current technology. This in turn means that power electronics can be smaller because they need fewer semiconductor chips, and the technologies that rely on power electronics -- like electric vehicle chargers, consumer appliances and LEDs -- will perform better, be more efficient and cost less.

One of three new institutes in the President’s National Network of Manufacturing Innovation, the Energy Department’s institute will develop the infrastructure needed to make WBG semiconductor-based power electronics cost competitive with silicon chips in the next five years. Working with more than 25 partners across industry, academia, and state and federal organizations, the institute will provide shared research and development, manufacturing equipment, and product testing to create new semiconductor technology that is up to 10 times more powerful that current chips on the market. Through higher education programs and internships, the institute will ensure that the U.S. has the workforce necessary to be the leader in the next generation of power electronics manufacturing.

Watch our latest video on how wide bandgap semiconductors could impact clean energy technology and our daily lives.

In recent years, costs for numerous critical clean energy technologies -- wind power, solar panels, super energy-efficient LED lights and electric vehicles -- have fallen significantly. The accompanying surge in deployment has been truly spectacular. Such a surge is tantamount to topping the barricades -- a level of cost reduction and market penetration that will enable a full scale revolution in the relatively near term. A new Department of Energy report, "Revolution Now: the Future Arrives for Four Clean Energy Technologies" documents this transformation and what it means for America’s energy economy. The clean technology revolution is upon us.

While these technologies still represent a small percentage of their respective markets, that share is expanding at a rapid pace and influencing markets. For instance:

• In 2012, wind was America’s largest source of new electrical capacity, accounting for 43 percent of all new installations. Altogether the United States has deployed about 60 gigawatts of wind power -- enough to power 15 million homes.   
• Since 2008, the price of solar panels has fallen by 75 percent, and solar installations have multiplied tenfold. Many major homebuilders are incorporating rooftop panels as a standard feature on new homes.
• In that same five years, the cost of super-efficient LED lights has fallen more than 85 percent and sales have skyrocketed. In 2009, there werefewer than 400,000 LED lights installed in the U.S.; today, the number has grown 50-fold to almost 20 million.
• During the first six months of 2013, America bought twice as many plug-in electric vehicles (EVs) as in the first half of 2012, and six times as many as in the first half of 2011. In fact, the market for plug-in electric vehicles has grown much faster than the early market for hybrids. Today, EVs rangingfrom the Chevy Volt to the Tesla Model S also boast some of the highest consumer satisfaction ratings in America. And prices are falling and exportmarkets are opening up. Since 2008, the cost of electric vehicle batteries -- which really drive the economics of EVs -- has dropped by 50 percent.

As these new markets continue to expand, so will the challenges and opportunities associated with transforming America’ energy system. Already increased energy efficiency and distributed solar energy are posing challenges to traditional utility business models. America will have to invest in building a smarter, more robust and resilient electrical grid with an extensive network of EV chargers and new approaches to consumer bills. These challenges are in fact emblematic of success for America’s clean energy markets.

But why are these markets growing so fast? Policy plays an important role -- and not just for renewables. For instance, from 1980 to 2002, the federal government’s production incentives for unconventional natural gas laid a foundation for that sector’s dramatic rise. Today, time-limited tax credits for wind, solar and electric vehicles, in concert with technology and manufacturing advances, are stimulating a similar market expansion.

Of course, these are also great products that bring real benefits to consumers.

For example, no one likes the hassle of repeatedly buying and replacing incandescent light bulbs. A mother who installs a quality LEDfixture when her child is born will not need to replace it until that childgoes to college -- or even graduates. By that time, each LED light she installs will have saved her about $140 in electricity costs. By 2030, LED lights will save Americans $30 billion a year on energy alone.

Forty years ago, an oil embargo sparked panic, rationing and fuel lines across America. But today, Americans can declare their independence from oil, skip the gas lines and recharge at home for the equivalent of about $1.22 a gallon – as opposed to $3.56 for gasoline. We call this low-cost electric fuel an eGallon, and -- depending on where you live -- eGallon savings can be quite compelling. For instance, in Washington State a gallon of gasoline is almost $4, but the equivalent eGallon costs only 85 cents because of clean, low-cost electricity.

These market revolutions are enabled by robust private-public partnerships for research, development, demonstration and deployment -- including some sizable investments from the Energy Department. And the President’s Climate Action Plan, which calls for commonsense steps to reduce carbon pollution and address the effects of climate change, will further accelerate the development and diffusion of these, and other, transformative energy technologies. 

Today, we can finally say with confidence that America is witnessing the shift to a cleaner, more domestic and more secure energy future. It is not a faraway goal.

Dr. Ernest Moniz is the Secretary of Energy.

Learn more: 

• President Obama's Climate Action Plan

Today, the Energy Department released two new reports highlighting record highs for U.S. wind energy production and manufacturing and demonstrating America’s continued leadership in this rapidly growing global industry. Wind energy is now the fastest growing source of power in the United States – representing 43 percent of all new U.S. electric generation capacity in 2012 and $25 billion in new investment. The reports were prepared in partnership with the Department’s Lawrence Berkeley and Pacific Northwest National Laboratories.

In the first four years of the Obama Administration, American electricity generation from wind and solar power more than doubled. President Obama’s Climate Action Plan makes clear that the growth of clean, renewable wind energy remains a critical part of an all-of-the-above energy strategy that cuts carbon pollution, diversifies our energy economy and brings the next generation of American-made clean energy technologies to market. The Administration has committed once again to doubling renewable electricity generation from energy resources like wind power.

As the graphic above illustrates, America’s wind industry is booming. In 2012, over 13 gigawatts of new wind power capacity was added to the U.S. grid – nearly double the wind capacity deployed in 2011. This tremendous growth helped us surpass 60 gigawatts of total capacity at the end of 2012 – enough capacity to power all the homes in California and Washington State combined.  As energy production goes, so does manufacturing. The 2012 Wind Technologies Market Report estimates that 72 percent of the wind turbine equipment – including towers, blades and gears – installed in the U.S. last year was made in America. This growth in domestic wind manufacturing is creating thousands of new jobs across the country. Industry estimates the wind sector employs more than 80,000 American workers across a variety of sectors, including finance, engineering, construction and project development .

Nine states now rely on wind for more than 12 percent of their total annual energy consumption, and in Iowa, South Dakota and Kansas, wind is contributing more than 20 percent. At the same time, technological innovation and lower maintenance and hardware costs are spurring near-record low prices for wind power. In 2011 and 2012 the price of wind under long-term power purchase contracts averaged just 4 cents per kilowatt hour. 

Still, as these reports make clear, wind energy projections for future years are uncertain, due in part to policy uncertainty. That’s why the Obama Administration has called for the extension of the production tax credit which has played a vital role in the development of this clean, renewable energy source.  We’re also working to upgrade our electric grid to provide reliable, affordable clean energy to more and more Americans.

This Thursday, at 3pm ET, the Energy Department is hosting a special Google+ Hangout on wind energy in America where you can ask the experts how wind energy projects, technologies and policies are driving U.S. leadership in this competitive industry. I invite you to join the conversation and learn more at energy.gov/windreport.