Secretary Peña's Confirmation Hearing Statement
January 30, 1997

Mr. Chairman, Senator Bumpers, Members of the Committee. It is an honor to come before you today as President Clinton's nominee for Secretary of Energy. I want to express my great appreciation to the President for his confidence in me for this position. I also pledge to you and the members of this Committee that I will work closely and cooperatively with you in addressing the challenging issues that lie before us.

Mr. Chairman, as Secretary of Transportation I had the challenge of shaping a unified mission for ten quasi-independent agencies, while reducing our workforce by 10,000 people. I believe over the last four years I have proven myself to be an effective manager of this complex, multi-missioned Department. If I am honored by your confirmation, I look forward to bringing my management experience to DOE.

I would now like to focus on my four key priorities for the Department to address some of our Nation's most important needs:

• Enhancing our energy security and developing and deploying clean energy;

• Ensuring a safe and reliable nuclear weapons stockpile and reducing the global nuclear danger;

• Cleaning up former nuclear weapons sites and finding a more effective and timely path forward for disposing of nuclear waste; and

• Leveraging science and technology to advance fundamental knowledge and our country's economic competitiveness with a stronger partnership with the private sector.

These four needs present unparalleled opportunities and daunting challenges that will greatly affect the future of our Nation and indeed the world.

ENERGY

Each day, Americans depend on the benefits of energy, usually without considering the role it plays in our quality of life. But there have been three major oil disruptions in the past 23 years, each causing domestic and international turmoil. By 2010, U.S. oil imports will grow to 60 percent of domestic consumption, and the Persian Gulf nations will provide more than 70 percent of the world's oil exports, surpassing their peak of 67 percent of global oil imports in the embargo year of 1974. This is unacceptable.

I believe we must have a credible energy strategy that meets our commitment to be responsible stewards of the environment and provides for our energy security. We need a strategy that:

• increases domestic energy production through smarter regulation and technological advances to improve production economics and reduce environmental impacts of both oil and natural gas development;

• expands utilization of natural gas;

• diversifies our oil supply options in areas such as the Western Hemisphere, Central Asia and the Caspian Sea;

• reduces U.S. dependence on foreign oil by making us more efficient in our use of all energy;

• develops clean, renewable energy supplies, alternative transportation fuels, and clean coal technology;

• maintains our Strategic Petroleum Reserve at levels that respect our international responsibilities in order to blunt the impact of a future oil shortage;

• maintains the safety of domestic and foreign nuclear power reactors;

• addresses the challenge of global climate change; and

• enhances the competitiveness of the electric utility industry and other sectors of the energy industry.

I believe that we will not reverse our slide toward energy insecurity without a set of strategies that address both energy production and consumption and that are coupled with specific targets and timetables to measure performance.

NATIONAL SECURITY

For almost fifty years, our national security has relied on the deterrent provided by nuclear weapons. These weapons -- designed, built, and tested by the Department of Energy and its predecessor agencies -- helped win World War II and the Cold War, and they remain a key component of our national security. However, with the end of the Cold War, we must reduce the dangers of nuclear weapons worldwide. That is why President Clinton signed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty last year. As the President noted at the time, a comprehensive ban on nuclear testing "has been the longest sought and hardest fought arms control treaty in history." With that treaty the Department has a vitally important national security responsibility -- to maintain the safety and reliability of the nation's nuclear deterrent without testing. I cannot imagine a more serious national security responsibility. I will ensure that we have the necessary capabilities and resources to meet this challenge. At the same time, we must make substantial progress in:

• ensuring the timely development of a new tritium source through our dual-track production strategy;

• disposing of excess nuclear weapons materials, particularly by pursuing our dual-track plutonium disposition strategy; and

• safely dismantling excess warheads pursuant to arms control treaties.

I will actively guide DOE's other major national security responsibility: nuclear nonproliferation. We cannot allow nuclear weapons materials to fall into the hands of terrorists or rogue states who could use them in unthinkable ways. DOE's unique expertise in designing, manufacturing and protecting the U.S. arsenal allows it to play a lead role in controlling the materials and technology needed to build bombs. Already the Department has a number of successful efforts underway to control specialized materials and technology internationally, and I am committed to demonstrating concrete successes and achieving even greater progress.

ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY

Our third challenge is environmental cleanup and nuclear waste disposal. Mr. Chairman and Members, I understand the significant responsibility and challenge that the Secretary of Energy has in cleaning up the former nuclear weapons sites. My experience with Rocky Flats, which produced plutonium triggers for our nuclear arsenal, makes me sensitive to the concerns of millions of Americans who want prompt, safe, and efficient cleanup of their communities. The Department now is achieving "on the ground" results under a program that is far more cost-effective than it was four years ago. This is being accomplished by working cooperatively with the states, local officials, and citizens and through improved contracting, technology, development and risk management. I am committed to having the Department complete remedial actions at many sites over the next decade.

The disposal of commercial nuclear spent fuel and defense high-level waste is an equally daunting problem. This effort requires that we answer with confidence the fundamental scientific question on the viability of Yucca Mountain for nuclear waste disposal. The Government is on the verge of answering this most basic question.

I will work to further improve the scientific underpinning of our radioactive waste program. I will make every effort to ensure we are in a position to determine the viability of Yucca Mountain as a disposal site in 1998. I will, of course, work cooperatively with this Committee within the confines of the President's stated policy on nuclear waste disposal.

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

My next priority is to ensure that the United States maintains its leadership in science and technology. The Department's National Laboratories are the "crown jewels" of U.S. scientific leadership, conducting breakthrough research in, among other things, high energy physics, cancer genetics, global climate change, superconducting materials, accelerator technologies and supercomputing. The laboratories provide unique research opportunities to more than 15,000 scientists working in hundreds of U.S. companies, universities and federal laboratories. From stockpile stewardship and clean energy to environmental cleanup and nuclear waste disposal, all of DOE's key programs depend on the laboratories' path-breaking science and technology.

Over the last few years our laboratories have made great strides in operating more efficiently. But I believe we can do even better. I will continue to respond to the solid advice offered by the Galvin Commission, including reducing unnecessary regulation by DOE. In turn, I believe each laboratory should have world class status in their core competencies and form closer partnerships with the private sector.

MANAGEMENT

I will make the DOE work more productively and efficiently for the American people. Secretary O'Leary, after developing a new Strategic Plan, led an ambitious set of initiatives to reengineer processes, privatize major functions, overhaul the Department's contracting practices and accomplish the hard job of downsizing through its Strategic Alignment Initiative. The result is a Department that works smarter and cheaper. I will continue this effort to make the Department a leader in management efficiency and excellence.

I also believe we must ensure the health and safety of our workers and the public and continue to protect the environment. In recent years, much progress has been made in identifying and controlling the many hazards across the DOE complex. Continued progress in managing the risks associated with the Department's once and future missions will require that everyone who works for the Department -- managers and workers, federal staff, contractors and subcontractors -- be engaged in safety management. Protection of environment, safety and health is an attitude, a core value, a way of doing business. I recognize, and I am committed to providing, the leadership necessary to make excellence in safety management a living reality at DOE.

I believe we must continue progress in the Department's Openness Initiative. Secretary O'Leary made great progress in declassifying information, enhancing public participation in the Department's decisionmaking, while maintaining protection of information and facilities that are truly sensitive. These actions have earned the Department greater public trust which is so necessary for success in all of its missions. I will maintain this commitment to openness.

Mr. Chairman, I will conclude by reaffirming my commitment to work with you and your colleagues in the Congress on a cooperative, straightforward, honest and open basis. The work of this Department is vital. I am enthusiastic about meeting the challenges and seizing the opportunities before us on behalf of the American people.