Lisa Jackson, vice president of environment, policy and social initiatives at tech giant Apple, opened the U.S. Department of Energy’s ARPA-E Energy Innovation Summit with a strong corporate endorsement of President Biden’s proposed clean energy standard, aimed at decarbonizing the U.S. power system by 2035.

“I cannot tell you how excited we are to have an administration that’s poised to take more stringent action than we’ve ever seen to advance the clean energy economy,” said Jackson, former EPA administrator under President Barack Obama, during a virtual “fireside chat” with Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm. “We support the passage of a clean energy standard, which we think will drive large amounts of new renewable generation and do so in a way that shows people where they need to go and when they need to get there.”

DOE’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) funds emerging technologies in sectors that, its researchers and program managers believe, will be critical for getting the U.S. to net zero by 2050.

The opening day of the four-day conference was marred by an afternoon computer crash, when too many attendees tried to get on the event’s website, effectively closing down some panels. The opening session, however, sent a strong message of the critical role of collaboration — be it public-private, cross-sector or bipartisan — in driving energy innovation that will keep the U.S. competitive in both global and domestic clean energy markets.

“We cannot be working on clean energy in silos,” Granholm said. “We have to join with our partners across the federal government, in our communities, around the world and throughout the private sector. Only with our collective resources can we reach these goals at the speed we need.”

Granholm and acting ARPA-E Director Jennifer Gerbi also rolled out numbers and charts documenting the impact the program has had, with more than 1,000 projects nationwide generating $4.9 billion in private investment and 88 companies. With the notable exception of South Dakota, ARPA-E projects have been funded in every state across the country, Gerbi said.

She also emphasized the range of technologies the program has funded and its agility to move with and keep ahead of the market.

“Early on, we had a very strong showing of batteries for electric vehicles, and that has without question, resulted in disruptive change that is quite apparent today,” she said. More recently, the agency announced $40 million in funding for research focused on reducing nuclear waste from small modular reactors, and $35 million each for projects that will reduce greenhouse gas emissions from biofuel production and cut methane emissions from the oil and gas industry.

The online conversation between Granholm and Jackson was basically an exercise in cross promotion, with the secretary talking up Biden’s American Jobs Plan and the role of innovation in bringing new opportunities to communities that have been left behind in the energy transition.

Meanwhile, Jackson listed a range of Apple initiatives, such as the company’s new “impact accelerator for black- and brown-owned businesses that work in the clean energy economy.” With total corporate emissions already carbon neutral, the company has committed to a carbon-neutral supply chain and life cycle for all its products by 2030. It has also been releasing data on its greenhouse gas emissions for a decade, she said.

“It really has shown us and given us a roadmap to how we’re going to get to carbon neutral by 2030,” Jackson said. “We couldn’t have made that pledge in good conscience if we weren’t pretty intimately familiar with where our carbon emissions and our suppliers’ emissions, and even our customers’ emissions are coming from. … Public and mandatory disclosure would also create a baseline of reliable information, so if you’re an investor, if you’re a stakeholder and you want to follow a company and put your money in companies who are doing it the right way, you would have something to do that.”

Slashing Coal in the UK

In 2012, the U.K. got 30% of its electricity from coal; today, that coal generation has now been slashed to 2%, thanks to the country’s booming offshore wind industry, said Kwasi Kwarteng, secretary of state for business, energy and industrial strategy.

The country has also committed to cutting its greenhouse gas emissions by 78% from 1990 levels by 2035, Kwarteng said, a goal adopted under Prime Minister Boris Johnson, with wide bipartisan support.

“When you saw the debates in Parliament, in the House of Commons, there was quite a large measure of cross-party support,” he said. “So, in terms of the decarbonization agenda, the fight against climate change, we’ve been lucky the division hasn’t really split along partisan lines.”

The government also established a framework for offshore wind auctions that has brought significant private investment, Kwarteng said. “The only way to get to net zero is by involving private [companies], as well as state investment,” he said. “If you rely on the government to do it, I don’t think we’ll get there. If you rely on the private sector to get there exclusively, I think it will be very challenging. It has to be a mix or a dialogue, if you like, between the two.”

Kwarteng said the U.K. is looking at hydrogen and small modular nuclear reactors as technologies where the country can potentially drive innovation. He also pointed to the role of international collaboration and the recent strong joint communique issued by the G7 climate and environment ministers.

“Rolling the clock forward, we’ll look back in amazement that we were burning hydrocarbons for so long. Generations will marvel at that,” he said.

Innovation and National Security

The Defense Department has a national security interest in energy innovation and works with DOE to leverage its research and advanced technologies, Deputy Secretary Kathleen Hicks said in the opening session’s closing keynote.

Climate change affects U.S. military security “by simultaneously increasing demands on the [armed forces] while impacting our capacity to respond to those demands,” Hicks said. “The climate crisis is a destabilizing force for the entire globe, and no nation, including the United States, can find lasting security without addressing it.

“Most military installations rely on the commercial grid and are vulnerable to events like extreme weather and cyberattacks that threaten to disrupt the grid,” Hicks said. “We need to adapt to this new reality, deploying microgrids that can power our bases with energy storage and distributed generation like solar. We need to build differently and be more efficient and resilient to ensure a base can support critical missions.”

Middle of the Journey

The need for urgent action now to meet ambitious climate goals was another theme across presentations.

Kwateng noted that the U.K. has already cut its GHG emissions by 45% from 1990 levels, but “we’re in many ways in the middle of the journey. The 78% target can only be made possible by what we’ve done so far,” he said.

Similarly, Jackson said that Apple is working with its supply chain to get them on board for a carbon-neutral 2030. So far, 110 companies across 17 countries have committed to the goal, she said.

“We made clear, frankly, that by 2030, we’re requiring you to use clean energy, and it needs to be 100%, so work with us now,” Jackson said. “This is where innovation is really needed to get a manufacturer to say, ‘OK, I am willing to stake my business. I need energy to run my business, but I am willing to do it because clean energy is becoming more available.’”