United States Department of Energy

38.886944 -77.026111Coordinates: 38 ° 53 '13 " N , 77 ° 1' 34" W.


United States Department of Energy

Set up:	4th August 1977
Seat:	James Forrestal Headquarters Complex , Washington, DC
Supervisory authority:	President of the United States
minister	Dan Brouillette
Deputy	vacant
Household:	$ 30.6 billion (2012)
Employees:	13,341 civil servants (2013) 93,094 employees (2008)
Homepage:	energy.gov

The United States Department of Energy (officially United States Department of Energy , DOE ) is a ministry within the Federal Government of the United States , responsible for energy and nuclear safety. Fall within the remit of the Ministry

the state nuclear weapons program
the production of nuclear reactors for the Navy
Energy saving programs
Research in the field of energy generation (see National Research Institutions )
the disposal of radioactive waste
Energy production

The ministry emerged from several government agencies that managed various aspects of energy policy. The first goes back to the Manhattan Project nuclear weapons program and was the Atomic Energy Commission . It was dissolved in 1974 and replaced by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Energy Research and Development Administration of civil and military nuclear research. In response to the first oil crisis in 1973/74 (the oil price tripled in a short time), Jimmy Carter , US President from 1977-1981, united these two and other authorities under the umbrella of a new ministry. The Congress adopted the relevant law on 4 August 1977, the Ministry started its work on 1 October 1977th The chief official of the ministry is the energy minister.

National research institutions

Headquarters of the Ministry of Energy

The Ministry of Energy maintains a system of large-scale research facilities, the so-called National Laboratory System , in which basic scientific research and military research (including on nuclear weapons) is carried out. This includes:

More functions

The Office of Scientific and Technical Information in the Ministry of Energy offers access to databases on its website containing information from scientific research and development of the Ministry and other authorities and institutes.

The Ministry awards the Ernest Orlando Lawrence Prize every two years to outstanding US scientists who conduct research in the area of responsibility of the Ministry.

The Department of Energy has a department called the Office of Intelligence , as intelligence work and of open and covert sources international information on nuclear weapons and non-proliferation (nuclear non-proliferation), energy security , science and technology in the field of energy and nuclear energy , nuclear safety and nuclear waste procured and evaluates. The analyzes of the specialist scientists are made available to the entire intelligence community and to the federal government.

President Barack Obama created a new position in the White House, Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change, and appointed Carol Browner to the new post. Browner previously worked for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Reshuffle under President Trump

In the course of Donald Trump's presidency , Rick Perry was appointed energy minister, a climate change denier who has rejected many scientific findings on global warming and does not accept the scientific consensus on man-made warming. In 2011 Perry, who was then aspiring to the presidency, had a. a. declares that it wants to completely abolish the Ministry of Energy.

On March 16, 2017, the Trump administration presented its budget plans, which have yet to be confirmed by Congress. Accordingly, the budget of the Ministry of Energy is to be reduced by 5.6% and redistributed within the authority. For example, the budget of the National Nuclear Security Administration , which is responsible for the military use of nuclear energy and the nuclear arsenal , is to increase by 11.3%, while other parts of the ministry are to cut their funds by 17.9%. Among other things, the budget of the science office is to be reduced from a good 5 billion euros by 900 million dollars.

In 2019, efforts were made to frame fossil fuels positively. In a press release from the Ministry of Energy, natural gas was described as a particularly clean energy source and given the term "freedom gas", while elsewhere it was referred to as "peace molecules". This framing found lively echoes in the media and social networks and was compared , among other things, with George Orwell's Newspeak .

List of ministers

No.	Surname	Term of office	in the President's Cabinet
1	James Rodney Schlesinger	Aug. 6, 1977 - August 23, 1979	Jimmy Carter
2	Charles William Duncan	Aug. 24, 1979 - January 20, 1981	Jimmy Carter
3	James Burrows Edwards	January 23, 1981 - November 5, 1982	Ronald Reagan
4th	Donald Paul Hodel	November 5, 1982 - February 7, 1985
5	John Stewart Herrington	February 7, 1985 - January 20, 1989
6th	James David Watkins	March 1, 1989 - January 20, 1993	George Bush
7th	Hazel Reid O'Leary	January 22, 1993 - January 20, 1997	Bill Clinton
8th	Federico Fabian Peña	March 12, 1997 - June 30, 1998
9	William Blaine Richardson	August 18, 1998 - January 20, 2001
10	Edward Spencer Abraham	January 20, 2001 - February 1, 2005	George W. Bush
11	Samuel Wright Bodman	February 1, 2005 - January 20, 2009	George W. Bush
12	Steven Chu	January 21, 2009 - April 22, 2013	Barack Obama
13	Ernest Jeffrey Moniz	May 21, 2013 - January 20, 2017	Barack Obama
14th	James Richard Perry	March 2, 2017 - December 1, 2019	Donald Trump
15th	Danny Ray Brouillette	December 4, 2019 -	Donald Trump