December 12, 2024

Energy Secretary visits, praises ORNL research

Energy Secretary visits, praises ORNL research

U.S. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm toured Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s facilities on Monday and praised its research.

“The solutions that are being worked on here at the lab are the ones that we have to deploy,” she said, adding that the lab’s technologies will help the United States achieve 100{18fa003f91e59da06650ea58ab756635467abbb80a253ef708fe12b10efb8add} green energy.

“This lab is thinking into the future,” Granholm said.

As explained on the official White House website, the Biden administration aims for net zero emissions economy-wide by no later than 2050. The administration wishes to achieve a 50{18fa003f91e59da06650ea58ab756635467abbb80a253ef708fe12b10efb8add} to 52{18fa003f91e59da06650ea58ab756635467abbb80a253ef708fe12b10efb8add} reduction from 2005 levels in economy-wide net greenhouse gas pollution in 2030.

Granholm toured the Grid Research Integration and Deployment Center (GRID-C) in the Hardin Valley area just outside of Oak Ridge and spoke about the lab’s electric car, as well as the battery and electric infrastructure research. She was joined by U.S. Congressman Chuck Fleischmann, R-Third District, and Oak Ridge Mayor Warren Gooch. GRID-C projects she toured included technologies to charge electric vehicles more quickly, recycle batteries more easily, construct new batteries in different ways and protect electric grids from disasters.

“This critical grid research will deploy clean energy generation for decades to come,” Granholm Tweeted from her official Twitter account.

U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm, right, speaks to the media after touring GRID-C at Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Hardin Valley campus in Knoxville, Tenn., on Monday, Nov. 22, 2021. In the background is Oak Ridge Mayor Warren Gooch, left, and U.S. Rep. Chuck Fleischmann, center.

“I welcome Secretary Granholm to the greatest lab of 17,” Fleischmann told reporters at the event, referring to the 16 other national labs that are part of the U.S. Department of Energy.

Fleischmann said Granholm had also met earlier Monday with ORNL and National Nuclear Security Administration officials and spoke, not just about the lab, but about other projects, including the Uranium Processing Facility at the Y-12 site. Granholm  shared on Twitter that she toured ORNL facilities that included the Frontier Supercomputer, the Spallation Neutron Source, a facility for biofuel research for airplanes, and the Manufacturing Demonstration Facility.