We expect these efforts will contribute to meeting the President's 18 percent, 10-year goal, which represents an average annual rate of improvement of about 1.96 percent. Data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) suggest steady progress. Since 2002, EIA reports annual improvements in greenhouse gas emissions intensity of 1.6 percent and 2.1 percent in 2003 and 2004, respectively. Further, a June 2006 EIA preliminary "flash estimate” estimate of energy-related carbon dioxide emissions-which account for about four fifths of total greenhouse gas emissions-shows an improvement in carbon dioxide emissions intensity of 3.3 percent in 2005. Although we are only a few years into the effort, the Nation appears on track to meet the President's goal.

While acting to slow the growth of greenhouse gas emissions in the near term, the United States is laying a strong scientific and technological foundation to reduce uncertainties, clarify risks and benefits, and develop realistic mitigation options through better integration and management of its climate change related scientific and technological activities. In February 2002, President Bush announced the creation of a cabinet-level Committee on Climate Change Science and Technology Integration, co-chaired by the Secretaries of Commerce and Energy. Two multiagency programs were established to coordinate Federal activities in climate change scientific research and advance the President's vision under his National Climate Change Technology Initiative (NCCTI). These are the U.S. Climate Change Science Program (CCSP), led by the Department of Commerce, and CCTP, led by DOE.

CLIMATE CHANGE SCIENCE PROGRAM'

CCSP is an interagency research planning and coordinating entity charged with investigating natural and human-induced changes in the Earth's global environmental system, monitoring, understanding, and predicting global change, and providing a sound scientific basis for national and international decision-making. CCSP combines the near-term focus of the Administration's Climate Change Research Initiative-including a focus on advancing the understanding of aerosols and carbon sources and sinks and improvements in climate modeling-with the breadth of the long-term research elements of the U.S. Global Change Research Program.

In July 2003, CCSP released its Strategic Plan for guiding climate research. The plan is organized around five goals: (1) improving our knowledge of climate history, variability, and change; (2) improving our ability to quantify factors that affect climate; (3) reducing uncertainty in climate projections; (4) improving our understanding of the sensitivity and adaptability of ecosystems and human systems to climate change; and (5) exploring options to manage risks associated with climate variability and change. CCSP is now in the process of implementing its 10-year Plan. The President's fiscal year 2007 budget request includes $1.715 billion for the climate change science. The knowledge gained through CCSP will be invaluable in helping CCTP plan for needed technology development.

To address the challenges of energy security, economic development, and climate change, there is need for a visionary, long-term perspective. The International Energy Agency estimates there are about 2 billion people who lack modern energy services. Many countries are focusing efforts on providing power to their citizens. Although projections vary considerably, a tripling of energy demand by 2100 is certainly not unreasonable. When one considers further that energy-related carbon dioxide emissions account for about four fifths of all greenhouse gas emissions, the scale of the challenge becomes apparent. Most anthropogenic greenhouse gases emitted over the course of the 21st century will come from equipment and infrastructure not yet built, a circumstance that poses significant opportunities to reduce or eliminate these emissions.

As we look to the future, providing the energy necessary to power economic growth and development while at the same time reducing greenhouse gas emissions is going to require costeffective transformational technologies that can fundamentally alter the way we produce and use energy. Given the huge capital investment in existing energy systems, the desired transformation of the global energy system may take many decades. A robust research effort undertaken today can make new, competitive technologies available sooner rather than later and accelerate modernization of capital stock.

Other greenhouse gases from non-energy related sources-methane, nitrous oxides, sulfur hexafluoride, and fluorocarbons, among others—also pose a concern. They have higher warming potentials than carbon dioxide. In aggregate, these gases present a large opportunity to reduce global radiative forcing and, in many cases, the technical strategies to reduce their emissions are straightforward and tractable. Finding ways to mitigate these other greenhouse gases is an important part of CCTP's technology strategy.

The United States is leading the development of many advanced technology options that have the potential to reduce, avoid, or sequester greenhouse gas emissions. CCTP was created in 2002, and subsequently authorized in Title XVI of the Energy Policy Act of 2005, to coordinate and prioritize the Federal Government's investment in climate-related technology and to further the President's National Climate Change Technology Initiative (NCCTI). The fiscal year 2007 Budget includes nearly $3 billion for CCTP-related activities.

CCTP's principal aim is to accelerate the development and reduce the cost of new and advanced technologies with the potential to reduce, avoid, or sequester greenhouse gas emissions. It does this by providing strategic direction for the CCTP-related elements of the overall Federal technology portfolio. It also facilitates the coordinated planning, programming, budgeting, and implementation of the technology development and deployment aspects of U.S. climate change strategy. CCTP also is assessing different technology options and their potential contributions to reducing greenhouse gas emissions over the short, mid, and long term to help inform budget decisions and priorities.

STRATEGIC PLANNING FOR TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT: CCTP conducts its planning under conditions of uncertainty and across a wide range of possible futures. The pace and scope of needed change will be driven partially by future trends in greenhouse gas emissions that are

subject to great a deal of ambiguity. The complex relationships among population growth, economic development, energy demand, mix, and intensity, resource availability, technology, and other variables make it impossible to accurately predict future greenhouse gas emissions on a 100-year timescale.

In August 2005, CCTP issued its Vision and Framework for Strategy and Planning. This document provides an overall strategy to guide and strengthen our technical efforts to reduce emissions. Shortly thereafter, CCTP released its draft Strategic Plan for public review and comment. More than 250 comments were received and addressed. We appreciate the thoughtful comments we received, which have improved the document.

Building on the guidance in the Vision and Framework, the Strategic Plan released yesterday articulates a vision of the role for advanced technology in addressing climate change, defines a supporting mission for CCTP, establishes strategic direction and guiding principles for Federal R&D agencies to use in formulating research and development portfolio, outlines approaches to attain CCTP's strategic goals, and identifies a series of next steps toward implementation.

CCTP's strategic vision has six complementary goals: (1) reducing emissions from energy use and infrastructure; (2) reducing emissions from energy supply; (3) capturing and sequestering CO2; (4) reducing emissions of non-CO2 greenhouse gases; (5) measuring and monitoring emissions; and (6) bolstering the contributions of basic science.

Ten Federal agencies support a broad portfolio of activities within this framework. Participating Federal agencies in CCTP include the Departments of Energy, Agriculture, Commerce, Defense, Health and Human Services, Interior, State, and Transportation, as well as the Environmental Protection Agency, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and the National Science Foundation.

The Strategic Plan provides a comprehensive, long-term look at the nature of the climate change challenge and its potential solutions. It defines clear and promising roles for advanced technologies by grouping technologies for near-, mid- and long term deployment. Together these technologies will facilitate meeting CCTP goals. It also outlines a process and criteria for setting priorities by organizing and aligning Federal climate change R&D and discusses in detail the current climate change technology portfolio, with links to individual technology roadmaps and goals. CCTP and the participating agencies periodically conduct and support strategic planning exercises to identify gaps and opportunities in climate change technology and realign the portfolio as appropriate.

The Strategic Plan also identifies a number of next steps outlining an ambitious agenda for advancing climate change technology development. These include strengthening the Federal R&D portfolio, intensifying basic research support of the applied technology R&D programs, extending international cooperation, and exploring a number of supporting technology policy mechanisms.

Many CCTP activities build on existing work, but the Administration also has expanded and realigned some activities and launched new initiatives in key technology areas to support the CCTP's goals. The President's NCCTI includes 12 discrete activities that could advance technologies to avoid, reduce, or capture and store greenhouse gas emissions on a large scale. The Administration's budget proposal for fiscal year 2007 included $306 million for these NCCTI priorities.

CCTP anticipates that a progression of advanced technologies will be available and enter the marketplace in the near, mid, and long terms. Figure 1 provides a schematic roadmap for the technologies being pursued under CCTP. Readers wishing a fuller explanation of the technology research described below should consult CCTP's Research and Current Activities and Technology Options for the Near and Long Term reports, both of which are available on the CCTP web page. Short descriptions of each of the NCCTI priorities are also available on the CCTP web page.

ENERGY USE AND INFRASTRUCTURE: Improving energy efficiency and reducing greenhouse gas emissions intensity in transportation, buildings, and industrial processes can contribute greatly to overall greenhouse gas emission reductions. In addition, improving the electricity transmission and distribution "grid" infrastructure can reduce greenhouse gas emissions by making power generation more efficient of by providing greater grid access for wind and solar power.

Key research activities include FreedomCAR (Cooperative Automotive Research)3 program, a cost-shared government-industry partnership that is pursuing fuel cell and other advanced automotive technologies. Advanced heavy-duty vehicles technologies, zero-energy homes and commercial buildings, solid-state lighting, and superconducting wires that virtually eliminate electricity transmission losses are other areas of research that could yield significant emissions reduction.

ENERGY SUPPLY: Fossil fuels, which emit CO2 when burned, remain the world's energy supply of choice. A transition to a low-carbon energy future would, therefore, require the availability of cost-competitive low- or zero-carbon energy supply options. When combined with alternative energy carriers such as electricity and hydrogen-these options could offer the prospect of considerable reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

Renewable energy includes a range of different technologies that can play an important role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The United States invests considerable resources in wind, solar photovoltaics, and biomass technologies. We have made much progress in price competitiveness of many of these technologies, but there still is a need to reduce their manufacturing, operating, and maintenance costs. For example, new biotechnology breakthroughs offer the potential for extensive domestic production of cellulosic ethanol by both improving feedstocks and increasing the efficiency of converting lignocellulosic material to ethanol. DOE's Office of Science has awarded up to $250 million over five years (subject to appropriations) for two new bioenergy research centers to advance the science needed to develop new cellulosic conversion technologies, which could decrease greatly the greenhouse gas emissions from liquid transportation fuels.*

There will be a continuing need for portable, storable energy carriers for heat, power, and transportation. Hydrogen is an excellent energy carrier, produces no emissions when used in a fuel cell, and can be produced from diverse sources, including renewables, nuclear, and fossil fuels (which in the latter case could be combined with carbon capture). President Bush's $1.2 billion Hydrogen Fuel Initiative' is exploring these production options as well as the infrastructure needed to store and deliver hydrogen economically and safely. It is expected that the research being performed under the program will make possible a commercialization decision by industry in 2015 and possible market introduction of hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles by 2020.

The United States has vast reserves of coal, and about half of its electricity is generated from this fuel. Advanced fossil-based power and fuels, therefore, is an area of special interest. The FutureGen project is a 10-year, $1 billion government-industry collaboration-which includes India and the Republic of Korea-to build the world's first near-zero atmospheric emissions coal-fired power plant. This project will incorporate the latest technologies in carbon sequestration, oxygen and hydrogen separation membranes, turbines, fuel cells, and coal-to

3

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See: http://www1.eere.energy.gov/vehiclesandfuels/about/partnerships/freedomcar/index.html.

See: http://genomicsgt).energy.gov/centers/index.shtml

See: http://www.cere.energy.gov/hydrogenandfuelcells/presidents_initiative.html.

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See: http://fossil.energy.gov/programs/powersystems/futuregen/index.html.