Jennifer Granholm

Under Jennifer M. Granholm’s leadership, the U.S. Energy Department has quickly become a powerhouse of the clean energy transition. Across the country, she is helping bring the Biden Administration’s climate goals to life. This includes adding 800 new or expanded clean technology manufacturing facilities, and 60 GW of clean energy capacity this year alone—that’s equal to the power output of 30 Hoover Dams. She has also spearheaded a transformation within the department, restructuring it to better execute, and work with the private sector to achieve, its climate mission.

What is the single most important action you think the public, or a specific company or government (other than your own), needs to take in the next year to advance the climate agenda?

It’s all about the grid. There is no doubt that we can build all the solar arrays and wind farms and hydrogen and geothermal and advanced nuclear systems we need to power the world with 100% clean electricity—but as long as we’re trying to connect those projects to ancient power infrastructure, we’ll fall short of our goals. 

This isn’t just for the sake of climate change. It’s for the sake of all the communities that right now simply cannot count on reliable, affordable power. An aging grid can be the reason someone loses electricity for weeks at a time after a hurricane, or why their electricity rates are too high, or why they’ve never had electricity in the first place. This is an energy justice issue, too. 

The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law delivered unprecedented funding for grid upgrades—and it’s made a big difference. For example, by 2031, the Department of Energy will have helped develop 11 times more miles of new and upgraded transmission lines than we did in 2021. But get this: utilities are requesting almost seven times as much funding as we have available. There is a dire need for more. 

Congress should invest in grid infrastructure the same way they invest in transportation infrastructure: with consistent, sustainable funding, instead of a one-off grant here and there. Just like communities can expect their potholes to get filled and their highways to get repaved, they should be able to expect the grid will be repaired, expanded, and improved over time. That’s how we guarantee reliable power, and that we can transition our energy systems quickly enough to defeat climate change.

What’s one sustainability effort you personally will try to adopt in the next year, and why?

One solution I’m eager to try is to turn my electric vehicle into a virtual power plant, or VPP. Picture this: it’s a summer Friday, you just got home from work, and your EV is charging in the garage. But when it’s hot out—electricity demand and rates are peaking. If your utility runs a VPP program, you can let them use your EV battery as a temporary clean energy source for your A/C, your TV, even the grid itself. Then, when things quiet down overnight, they’ll charge your car back up. You still wake up with a full battery, but you also saved the grid—and your wallet—the extra stress of powering your home during peak demand. Everyone wins. And you can do the same with rooftop solar or home batteries. We at DOE want to make these types of solutions available to anyone interested in living more sustainably.

What is a climate solution (other than your own) that isn't getting the attention or funding it deserves?

The first would be artificial intelligence tools for solving climate change. Our National Labs have been looking into how AI can do everything from optimizing grid planning, to discovering new battery chemistries, to identifying places where we can extract critical minerals with minimal environmental impacts. These are all super data-driven, time-intensive projects—the kind that AI can tackle in weeks instead of years, which frees up scientists and policymakers to focus on the more complex problems ahead. We should be putting a whole lot more funding and support behind them.  

The second would be enhanced geothermal. Geothermal is the ubiquitous “heat beneath our feet,” and one of our most promising leads on the Holy Grail of climate solutions: clean, reliable, flexible power. Enhanced geothermal is a newer technique that can draw the energy from virtually anywhere, anytime, and it’s just on the cusp of being commercially viable. If government and industry can come together and fund this at the necessary scale, we may not be able to give the planet eternal youth, but we can heal its wounds.