Earth Equity News

Senate Confirms Nominees for Interior, DOE. By Noelle Straub, Greenwire, October 27, 2009. "Filling some of the remaining holes in the Obama administration's energy and environmental team, the Senate yesterday confirmed one Interior and two Energy department nominees. The Senate unanimously approved Marcia McNutt to be science adviser to the Interior secretary and the first woman director of the U.S. Geological Survey; Arun Majumdar to direct the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E); and Jose Antonio Garcia to be director of DOE's Office of Minority Economic Impact... Majumdar, who has been associate laboratory director for energy and environmental sciences at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, will head ARPA-E, a new Energy Department agency dedicated to developing breakthrough technologies. The agency, authorized in 2007, is designed to select and fund high-risk, high-reward research into technologies that can curb energy imports and greenhouse gas emissions. It is modeled after the military's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency... At the confirmation hearing, Majumdar pledged to grow the agency into 'a robust engine of American innovation' and said speed, calculated risks, internal competition and agility will be the keys to its success. Asked how long members of Congress should give the agency before beginning to gauge its effectiveness, Majumdar said the timeline depends on what types of technology are being developed, but it could be three to five years or longer. He also discussed ways to boost energy efficiency. Majumdar, a native of India, is an engineering and materials science professor at the University of California, Berkeley."