Department of Energy, U.S.

THE MISSION OF the U.S. Department of Energy is: “to advance the national, economic, and energy security of the United States; to promote scientific and technological innovation in support of that mission; and to ensure the environmental cleanup of the national nuclear weapons complex.” To achieve this mission, the Department of Energy (DOE) has outlined five strategic themes: energy security, nuclear security, scientific discovery and innovation, environmental responsibility, and management excellence.

To the DOE, environmental responsibility most generally means responsibly protecting the environment from the impact of production of nuclear arms. Therefore, a chief role of the Department of Energy within the environmental sector is to clean and decontaminate sites of nuclear power production or use. To advise the U.S. president about current and novel science and technology related to climate change, the secretary of defense as well as the secretary of commerce alternate in heading a committee known as the Committee on Climate Change Science and Technology Integration (CCCSTI), not the secretary of energy. Within the Department of Energy, the Office of Fossil Energy manages plans to reduce carbon emissions.