Episode 182: Dr. Shuchi Talati, U.S. DOE
Today's guest is Dr. Shuchi Talati, Chief of Staff, Office of Fossil Energy & Carbon Management at the U.S. Department of Energy.
The mission of the Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management is to minimize the environmental impacts of fossil fuels while working towards net-zero emissions.
Dr. Talati joined the DOE at the beginning of the Biden-Harris Administration. Before assuming her current role, Shuchi worked as the Deputy Director of Policy at Carbon180, where she focused on policies to build sustainable and equitable carbon removal at scale. In addition, Dr. Talati was a Scholar in Residence at American University and she worked at the Union of Concerned Scientists, where she led efforts to guide sound governance around solar geoengineering and carbon removal approaches to limit global warming. Dr. Talati was the 2017-2018 AAAS/AIP Congressional Science Fellow in the U.S. Senate and served at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Obama Administration. Dr. Talati holds a B.S. in environmental engineering from Northwestern University, an M.A. in climate and society from Columbia University, and a Ph.D. from Carnegie Mellon University in engineering and public policy.
I was excited to sit down with Dr. Talati because of her role and expertise in the energy policy sector. Dr. Talati explains her position at the Department of Energy and why she dedicated her career to CDR (Carbon Dioxide Removal). We dive into the role of fossil fuels, carbon removal, nuclear energy, and offsets as climate solutions. We also have a lively conversation about the role of policy and government in the energy transition and why understanding energy poverty is critical to a successful clean energy transition. Dr. Talati is an incredible guest, and this is a must-listen episode.
Enjoy the show!
You can find me on twitter @jjacobs22 or @mcjpod and email at info@myclimatejourney.co, where I encourage you to share your feedback on episodes and suggestions for future topics or guests.
Episode recorded October 13th, 2021
In Today's episode we cover:
Overview of Shuchi's role at the DOE and what the department does as a whole
The mandate for the Department of Energy
Shuchi's climate journey and her path to the DOE
Why Shuchi focused on CDR (Carbon Dioxide Removal) as a climate solution
A discussion about how close we are to deploying wide-scale carbon removal as laid out in the most recent IPCC report
The market for carbon removal, where policy is at to address the problem, and who determines the value of carbon removal and storage
The offset market, the existing standards, and how we can have a healthy functioning offset market in the future
The role fossil fuels play in the global energy system today and what their role should be in the future
How fossil fuels are subsidized, why these subsidies exist, and the origination of them
How energy poverty relates to climate change and how Shuchi thinks about solutions for this vast problem
The role of market forces versus the role of the government when tackling the climate crisis
How Republicans and Democrats are finding common ground across the aisle, and that most of the partisan disagreement is on approach rather than the validity of climate science
A discussion on the feasibility of nuclear and what the future looks like for zero carbon energy production
Why risk is not being factored in at the level it should be in regard to financial markets
Links to topics discussed in this episode:
Carbon Dioxide Removal: https://www.c2g2.net/carbon-dioxide-removal/
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Hello everyone. This is Jason Jacobs and welcome to My Climate Journey. This show follows my journey to interview a wide range of guests to better understand and make sense of the formidable problem of climate change and try to figure out how people like you and I can help. Today's guest is Dr. Shuchi Talati, the chief of staff for the Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management at the US Department of Energy. As a principal member of the FECM leadership team, Shuchi is responsible for supporting Assistant Secretary and advancing the office's mission.
I was excited for this one because fossil energy and carbon management are such important topics as it relates to the clean energy transition. We cover a lot in this episode, including Shuchi's journey and what led her to doing the work that she's doing now. And we also talk about big oil and the role of big oil in the clean energy transition and the role of fossil fuels in the clean energy transition. We talk about energy, poverty versus climate change and how to balance those interrelated yet distinct issues.
We talk about carbon removal, whether we'll need it, how much we'll need it, where it is in the adoption curve, some of the barriers to adoption, what it will take to get it to where it needs to go and what kinds of timeframes and how realistic is it that we'll get there. We also talk about the role of policy, the role of government, the role of innovation, both breakthrough innovation, as well as deployment. And we talk just generally about what some of the biggest blockers are to the clean energy transition and how we can unlock faster progress. Shuchi, welcome to the show.
Dr. Shuchi Talati: Thanks for having me.
Jason Jacobs: Thanks for coming on. I was excited for this one. I feel like if I look at my career, I've grown up all in small high-growth startups. You seem like a policy person through and through. And gosh, policy is such an important lever for climate and therefore I've been investing the time and trying to get myself up to speed but I still feel like a newbie to be honest. So it's a real honor to have you on the show and I feel like I can learn a lot from you.
Dr. Shuchi Talati: You're way too kind, but I'm always excited to talk about climate and energy policy. And I've also been so lucky to have had the opportunity to learn from so many amazing people in this field. So excited for this conversation.
Jason Jacobs: Awesome. Well, maybe for starters, just talk a bit about the work that you do at the DOE both personally and the department that you're a part of just to give some context to listeners?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: So I'm the chief of staff of the Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management at the Department of Energy. I joined the administration on January 20th. So I've been here almost a year and it's been incredibly exciting and incredibly chaotic, but I think in, definitely a good way. I think this administration and just so you know, all the people who have joined it are just so excited to do good work and DOE is at the center of that. And so when I joined as chief of staff, you know, my priority was to really think critically about the role of fossil fuels or the fossil fuel industry and also to think about carbon banishment, what that means as we strive towards that zero by 2050.
And so, you know, really important pieces of that include frontline communities that have borne the brunt of the fossil fuel industry and those impacts, but also communities that have been huge parts of the labor input that have gone into both coal mining, natural gas extraction, and also, you know, the workers at these power plants. And so really thinking about what the energy transition means for both of these kinds of communities and how we can do the best work possible for them and for climate.
Jason Jacobs: And so in terms of the mandate for the department, is it really focused on policy or other, other levers that are in your purview?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: So the Department of Energy is largely an R&D organization and really focusing on innovation and also demonstration and, and deployment of really critical technologies across the energy space. There are applied program offices like Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management, the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, but also offices that really think about what that means outside of the innovation space. Like the Office of International Affairs, the Office of Policy, Office of Congressional and Intergovernmental Affairs. And so these are all really important groups of people that are working together for one coherent mission, which is to demonstrate and deploy these critical technologies to solve climate change.
Jason Jacobs: And maybe talk a bit about your journey, what is it that led you to do the work that you're doing? And you can start as far back as you want.
Dr. Shuchi Talati: I started out as a biomedical engineering major and then quickly figured out I was not good at biology. And so it was, and really had the opportunity to think about what I wanted to do and, and the work that really inspired me and climate change was kind of really starting to come to the fore at that point in time and I was just really motivated to kind of pour myself into that work. And so I switched majors to environmental engineering and at the same time did my first policy internship in Congress. That kind of combined nexus of science and policy was just so inspirational to be me and was kind of my main motivator for moving forward in the science policy space.
I did my masters in Climate and Society at Columbia, and it was a program that deeply motivated me to kind of stay at the center of science policy and to, you know, think really hard about what climate policy really means for both, you know, for society domestically and internationally and how you can make the most critical change on a personal level. After that, I worked for a little while in the NGO sector and decided to pursue a PhD in engineering public policy. Again, staying at the center of the science policy nexus and thinking, you know, really hard about what it means to apply science and technology to making the best possible policy.
And so during that time, I got to work a lot on carbon management, capturing and storage, carbon dioxide removal. We really get the opportunities to have the luxury of thinking critically about issues and being able to research that and really just get inspired by your advisors and the work that exists. And I was really lucky to have that space. I really enjoyed my PhD, but didn't personally wanna stay in academia. I think research is, is an incredibly exciting space, but I wanted to really apply my work. After that pursued a AAAS fellowship in Congress and got to go back to Congress many years later after that first internship and work on applied climate policy. And it was at the start of the Trump administration and so it was a really partisan political time, but I got to see just bipartisan work actually happened even in the midst of the most partisan circumstances.
After that time, I got really motivated to continue work on carbon dioxide removal. That was, the year that I was in Congress was when 45Q was expanded to, you know, include direct air capture when we were actually starting to have applied conversations about what carbon dioxide removal would be on the federal level and how we can motivate work in that space, which was really, I mean, that has, that had never happened before that time. And that's something that I was incredibly excited to pursue. And so went into the NGO sector to think a lot more about CDR governance policy and how we could move the federal needle on that. And so when the Biden ministration came in with a concern and focus on CDR, I was honored to have, you know, been asked to join the administration.
Jason Jacobs: And given that, it sounds like your early passion was around helping address the problem of climate change and of course, as you talked about the intersection of science and policy, there's such a wide landscape of potential solution areas, what is it that led you to CDR versus anywhere else where you could have anchored?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: I think the CDR space when, especially a few years ago, there weren't a lot of people in it. And it was a recognition for me personally, that CDR was gonna be absolutely vital to reaching our climate goals. The entire climate energy space is fascinating and there are amazing, amazing people in all parts of it. And this was one where I thought policy and governance needed more thought and needed kind of more individuals dedicated their time to it. If you look at kind of the governance landscape, it's really tricky. You know, carbon management is, is a very sensitive issue and thinking through how to do it right, how to do it responsibility, equitably, to ensure that deployment is just and sustainable, takes a lot of policy. That was the reason I really wanted to pursue it and to make sure that I can be part of shaping that.
Jason Jacobs: And from what I understand and the caveat here is that, if you look at, say the IPCC report, it suggests that we will need a lot of carbon removal, but directionally, it doesn't specify how or at what price or who pays for it. So how close are we from your standpoint to being able to fulfill anything close to what we'll need to fulfill to meet those projections?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: We're far from where we need to be in terms of deployment but I am so motivated by the momentum that we have in this administration. It's clear that CDR will be needed on any pathway to that zero or on any pathway to 1.5. Thinking through how to do that well and what that means is a really hard question. And as you said, like there are countless approaches that are kind of encapsulated by the CDR. There's engineered approaches like direct air capture or enhanced mineralization. There's more land-based approaches like soil carbon sequestration or afforestation. There's also ocean based approaches like direct ocean capture or ocean alkalinity enhancement. These are all very different.
I think what is really important is that we ensure they lead to durable storage. So they're actually removing carbon from the atmosphere permanently and that we're able to verify the actions that were deployed. And so that means carbon accounting, verifiable carbon accounting. And also when it comes to deployment, ensuring that we're doing it equitably and through engaging the public. I think in the past, we really haven't thought through how to build out new industries 'cause we, that's not really something that we had the opportunity to do. I think we very much have that for this and it's rare. And so to think through what are new industry needs and how to deploy it is something that we are absolutely focused on doing responsibly and in the best possible way. And I think the fact that we don't know what that means is actually a good thing 'cause that means more people can provide input into actually shaping that.
Jason Jacobs: In terms of the utility of CDR, I mean, it seems that essentially we're taking it out of the air and storing it. Is there any value that's getting created in that exchange? And if so, who pays for it? And if not, then who pays for it?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: I think one really critical question is here is who gets to a certain value. And we put value on a lot of things that don't inherently have monetary value. And so at some point it's the role of federal government to pay for these types of removals. Now that said, that as policy does not exist yet and, you know, when it comes to having carbon to, you know, convert or store, some doesn't inherently have any market value, but some do. And so for example, we could utilize carbon right now for building materials which do have inherent value. We can also convert the CO2 into chemicals which have inherent value, but in terms of really thinking through what we need for all the scales that we're talking about, we're really going to have to invest a geologic storage.
And in terms of that having value, it doesn't yet. We need government incentives. Now for, something like 45Q does exist where you get $50 a ton for storing carbon, um, from direct air capture. So we're starting to see those abouts come up. It's really not enough to pay for direct air capture right now. And so hopefully we'll see an expansion if reconciliation does pass to 45Q to enable industries to actually start investing in these spaces and be able to make a profit.
Jason Jacobs: So you're saying that the hope is that the carbon that gets removed can be utilized to create products for example or serve other purposes and that if there were things like solid accounting and mandates and or incentives to motivate companies to balance the carbon books essentially, then that would help this market to form at the scale that it needs to?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: Yes, you did. And an interesting thing that we started to see over the last year too, is, is a lot of companies making net zero commitments or even net negative commitments and that means CDR. And so we're starting to see companies themselves assigning value to removing carbon. Now that said, a voluntary offset market is something that is not yet regulated. And so deciding what a real offset means and if we are applying carbon accounting in the best way to those offsets, I don't think that's happening yet. And so I think it does take the federal government to really define what high quality offsets are and how companies and the private industry should be interacting with the market. And I think that's something that is the role of the public sector to have that oversight and to ensure transparency.
Jason Jacobs: I mean, as you've kind of alluded to the offset market, it takes a bunch of crap and they, they take crap around transparency, they take crap around incentives, they take crap around additionality, they take crap around quality. What the standards look like in the offset market today and from whom and what should they look like and from whom in a more healthily functioning offset market?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: I think the dangerous thing right now is, is individual companies are defining what their own qualities [laughs] offsets are. And I think we're seeing different definitions that are helpful or not. And you know, I'm not gonna say who's who, but I do think having a standardized definition of what a high quality offset is can't come from the private sector. It has to come from the public sector. And ensuring that there's oversight over what these offsets are actually accomplishing, also, I think, needs to come from the public sector because public oversight is absolutely essential. These are not goals that only benefit these companies, these are goals to benefit the public. And so the public should be a huge part of understanding if that's actually happening.
Jason Jacobs: We've been talking a lot about CDR, but given that fossil energy is one of the core pillars in your department's charter, can you talk a little bit about the role that fossil fuels are playing in the global energy system today and the role that they should play in the future and over what time period?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: The role of the fossil fuel sector is still a really big one. You know, they contribute the bulk of the fuels to generate electricity today, the bulk of transportation fuels. But as we have a national and global recognition of what our climate targets need to be, we need to be really critical if they think about what the future of the sector is and how it should be framed. From a very personal and out of an administration perspective, whenever we can choose a non-fossil option, we absolutely should because getting to net zero means that mitigating emissions is our absolute priority. And so if we can not build something that uses fossil fuels and uses solar energy, we would 100% should.
Now there are sectors where that's not possible. For those spaces, we have to make sure that we are doing the cleanest version of fossil fuels possible. I think an example of that, that plays a role in the kind of the global market right now that's deeply controversial is LNG. So obviously there is an international dependence on the US exporting LNG, but our natural gas supply chain isn't clean. And so we need to really focus on mitigating methane emissions to ensure their national gas supply chain is leak tight.
I think another example is cement, right? The fuel to actually create cement right now is largely coal. That fuel could change but the process emissions that come from creating cement are not from fossil fuels, but emissions are being created. And so you do need something like carbon capture and storage, even if the fuels might change. And so there are situations where poisons carbon capture really need to play this important role in our net zero framework. That doesn't mean that carbon capture and storage is the biggest part of net zero by any means but to say that we don't need it, isn't true. And I think that the, the questions are, how do we do it well and how do we do so economically?
Jason Jacobs: One of the things that's come up again and again, as we look at the or talk about the clean energy transition is that, uh, fossil fuels are still being heavily subsidized. Can you talk a little bit about how those subsidies work, where those subsidies come from and why they're still in place?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: So I don't have a ton of expertise in this space, but I will say that one of the executive orders from the Biden administration was to eliminate fossil fuel subsidies. And so, you know, we've been thinking really critically about what that means for R&D and, and how to apply that. Now that's not something that I can talk about publicly in terms of what we're actually doing, but I do wanna emphasize that this is something that this administration is very focused on and I think Congress has to play a bigger role at actually eliminating the subsidies that you're talking about.
I do think it's trickier than we want to think because of the international space and how we think about energy justice. So it's not an easy question and eliminating these subsidies isn't something that we can do overnight, but thinking about phasing them out and phasing in subsidies for things like CDR and to increase subsidies for renewables is a broader conversation that we need to have.
Jason Jacobs: Well, I'm really glad you brought up energy justice because I was gonna head in that direction anyways. How do you think about energy poverty and climate change and how to prioritize when determining what solutions and how fast and things like that? Like how do those two problems interrelated?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: That's a really good question. It's hard. I think one of the biggest things for me that I have learned is that decisions should not be made in a vacuum from the federal government perspective. We need to be having a lot more conversations on the ground to understand what these communities are going through and what changes they would like to see. Obviously, there are technologies that we need to deploy and we need to do so quickly. There's, there's no question about that.
But ensuring that we have community input and that we're not just driving for public acceptance, but driving towards actually co-decision-making in a lot of these different projects and in terms of siting decisions and all of these guard rails, I think we need a different framework for thinking through how decisions are made. And I think that's a governance question across the climate energy space.
When we look at something like CDR, there are a range of different approaches that different communities might gravitate to that have different regional resources or expertise that make the most sense for those spaces. We should be thinking about how to optimize those kinds of questions and those kinds of technologies through conversations with people on the ground.
Jason Jacobs: Some would say if we don't get off fossil fuels immediately, every minute we're on them longer, we are wreaking havoc from a climate standpoint. And others would say that if we get off them too quickly, we're wreaking havoc from an energy poverty standpoint, can both be true?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: I think both are true and I think that's why this is so hard. There's no easy answer. I think we have to be doing everything possible to help climate vulnerable populations and to mitigate emissions to get to net zero, to get to net negative emissions. But we also have to take into consideration those that haven't benefited from the last 150 years of burning fossil fuels either that are only just starting to kind of move towards having energy independence, having society where they have a lot more freedoms. And that's not a decision that the United States should be making in a vacuum.
There needs to be a lot more international participation one, but also conversation focused on the Global South and not conversation about the Global South, but with the Global South. How do they wanna see these changes implemented? Most of the climate vulnerable populations are in the Global South, but those are also the ones experiencing the most energy poverty. We shouldn't be making any of those decisions for them. So how do we have a coordinated conversation where we can help in the best possible way, but not make any decisions for anyone else?
Jason Jacobs: One confusing thing that I've come across is that the climate advocates will say that the reason we're not off fossil fuels is because the fossil fuel industry is lying and they're stalling and they're withholding information and they're lobbying and they have trade groups and we have all the solutions we need to get 80%, if not a hundred percent there today, you know. Like this discussion, there's another perspective that says, well, if we get off too fast, then the most vulnerable populations will suffer. So we need to be careful and these issues are complicated. Where does the truth? Why do we have the solutions we need? Is, is it really political will that we're lacking or do we not have the solutions we need? And if we don't have the solutions, where are the biggest gaps?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: I think we have a lot of the solutions we need. I think we're seeing a lot of that funding starting to change, you know, if the infrastructure package passes, if reconciliation passes, to really start deploy a lot of these at scale. I'll say some of these technologies, you know, we haven't demonstrated yet and we're not ready to deploy at a commercial scale, for example, direct air capture. That's not to say that we can't do that within 20 years, but that will take concerted focus, effort and funding.
I do agree that we need to ensure that a lot of these solutions are decoupled from the fossil fuel industry. There is a lot of harm that has been caused and a lot of sensitive conversations that we absolutely need to be careful of. And I think this office is one where we get to start drawing those lines. It's incredibly difficult to sit in a place where we know we need technologies that historically the fossil fuel industry has developed and supported, but that doesn't mean that we have to continue depending on them to build a new industry.
I think, again, both are true, right? I think there's harms that have been caused and there's accountability that needs to happen for, for these harms that have been perpetrated, but there's also partnership and creativity that we need to consider moving forward. And that's not to say, I wanna give fossil fuel companies a pass, but not all fossil fuel companies are the, are the same either. And so thinking through kind of what that means critically for the future and ensuring that environmental justice is not just a major priority, which it is, but then it's woven through all of our decisions is going to be a core part of how we work.
Jason Jacobs: Okay. And then maybe talk a little bit about the role of market forces and the role of government and how those do interrelate and how they should interrelate when the machine is functioning optimally?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: Yeah. There's a lot of roles for the government to play that were not yet played and I'm super excited to help build a lot of these things that don't yet exist. When it comes to the market, I think public oversight is something that some people move away from that I think we really needed, especially when it comes to things like offsets. I also think there are things that need to be developed that really only the government can do. And I think demonstration of technology is a good example of that, right? Like there's this huge valley of death for a lot of technologies and the government is the only entity that can really take those risks and kind of get some of these technologies across the finish line to actually have commercial deployment.
And so the government plays actually a really critical role in the private market when it comes to technology deployment that often people forget. From a Department of Energy perspective, being a lot more communicative about the role of our agency and the role of our investments and the successes that we have seen or helped foster is something that we really need to do. We've been critical to seeing a lot of wins in these spaces and I'm absolutely certain we're gonna see so many more.
Jason Jacobs: I've heard some people say that when Republicans and Democrats argue about the validity of science or the urgency or the timelines or things like that, that there's actually a lot less disagreement about those things and more about the approach from a solution standpoint. So although that's not what's being spoken, that's what's actually driving the resistance. Do you agree with that perspective and what are the best ways for us to find common ground across both sides of the aisle to put meaningful and durable policy in place?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: I think, well, yeah. I, I mean, I agree. I think we're seeing a lot of bipartisan movement in a lot of these technologies. I do think that we have to recognize that we're not as far as we need to be. We should have been at this space 20, 30 years ago and that's not something we can change. But I think there's often a need to say, well, both sides are for those decisions, but I think we, we need to recognize that this administration is really pushing for these climate solutions. And we absolutely wanna work with our bipartisan partners but we didn't have a net zero by 2050 goal before January.
Having these capitalizing goals, which sometimes might need to come from a particular party or from a particular administration is necessary. That's not to say bipartisan work isn't absolutely critical because it is. There's no way we move forward without bipartisanship and incredibly fateful that we've seen so much of that in the infrastructure package negotiations and in reconciliation. We're obviously not quite there yet. I'm, I'm hopeful that we will be.
But the recognition of how fast we need to move and what we need to do to get there is something we're not quite aligned on yet, but I'm very hopeful that climate and the goals we need to attain don't live at a partisan space anymore. It never should have. Science should never have lived in that space. The scientific method is proven. It's not one that has any sort of political motivation. I think we need to be a lot more conscious about moving this conversation outside of the partisan space as soon as we can.
Jason Jacobs: We've talked a lot about the infrastructure and the transition that needs to occur. What about demand? What about consumption? Where does that fit in? Consumption and demand have continued to increase. Should we assume that, that will happen in perpetuity and that that is synonymous with human progress? Or should we aspire for maybe a, a different way of living?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: I think we should always aspire for human progress and for everyone to have access to the same benefits that we do. That said, that doesn't mean that we can't be more efficient with our resources and that we can't use resources in a more strategic way. I do think demand will increase as we continue to see different countries moving forward, but that doesn't mean that we can't help kind of build out energy sources that aren't as polluting and to use resources more effectively and to really ensure that their communities are protected from the harms, from, from, from the extraction and fuel use sometimes.
Jason Jacobs: One thing I've wondered about is just that. I mean, we've spent a lot of time and, on this discussion and, and also just in general, a lot of the talk is about the US and what the US can do and what we can do federally and what we can do at the state level and what we can do locally. Is it really what it's about to get the US moving or is there also kind of a global and an international set of negotiations that need to happen and where do those fit in and how do those get prioritized and then how do those just manifest? Like what is the body that actually handles that on an international level?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: Domestic international conversations obviously need to be moving in parallel and the more domestic agreement we have, the more international commitments that we can make. This absolutely is an international conversation. Climate is not accomplished by one country. Addressing climate change can't happen by one country making decisions or even if, if the United States were to get to that zero, it doesn't matter unless everyone's getting to net zero.
I think a lot more conversation needs to be happening around the Global South with their input and participation. A lot of conversations focus on the EU and the United States and China, all of which have critically important contributions, but that doesn't mean other countries don't. And so I think being more inclusive in these conversations is something that I strive for and that I hope the administration strives for too.
You know, when it comes to negotiations, obviously, you know, the Paris Agreement was a huge moment in the global history of addressing climate change. I don't think it goes far enough and we need to do a lot more in order to actually meet any of our climate targets. Negotiations are going to continue to be really difficult but I think we need to pour more into them because that's the global stages where climate lives.
Jason Jacobs: A lot of times it seems like people break down different solution areas into breakthrough technology, deployment and policy and government and I'm oversimplifying, but is that how you think about the different areas for innovation and progress? And do you rank them in any way or are they all part of the flywheel and kind of equal citizens?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: I think policy touches everything. There is no commercial deployment without policy. There is no R&D without policy. Budgets are policy. I think that's a false separation between those sectors because those sectors depend on important policy decisions. Not to say that policy is more important than R&D, but it's about creating policy that supports R&D, that supports breakthrough technologies and deployment, policies also prioritization. And so all of those decisions affect these other sectors.
Jason Jacobs: And in that solutions bucket, it there's a chorus of people that say that they don't understand why we're not investing much more into nuclear and that nuclear is the best lever we've got and, and then there's a whole bunch of others that say nuclear is bad and nuclear has waste and nuclear is expensive and the US can't build big stuff anymore and if it was gonna be cost-effective, it would have been cost-effective a long time ago, et cetera, et cetera, in a personal capacity, do you have any view on that and what the future should be?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: So by no means am I a nuclear energy expert. So I do not wanna pretend that I am. You know, I'll say that the vast majority of our zero carbon energy right now comes from nuclear. And so we should really be conscious of that, but at the same time, nuclear waste continues to be a huge issue. That's not really an answer to your question. That's to saying that I think sometimes we, a lot of people who are making the arguments that you said, kind of dismiss nuclear out of hand.
I think that's really dangerous given how much we depend on it for our current zero, zero carbon energy space. I think the future of nuclear holds a lot of promise. I think there's really interesting R&D in the advanced nuclear space and I don't really think anyone can say what the future of that is. I think that's dependent on investments, depended on breakthroughs, and I don't really think we have the luxury of ruling anything out or say anything can't be part of our net zero plans.
Jason Jacobs: And I'll ask you a similar question but around natural gas. Some people say we need to get off it as quickly as possible. Some people say it's an essential bridge fuel and other people say it's a long-term pillar of the clean energy transition. What's your view?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: I'll say that, I don't like making declarative statements about such a broad space. I'll say that, you know, we have goals to reduce our emissions by 50% by 2030 and to have a hundred percent clean electricity sector by 2035. What the role of natural gas is in that space policy and the market will dictate. We're gonna have to be very careful thinkers about what that means and how we ensure that communities that depend on natural gas resource extraction think about this.
And so I don't think there's an answer here. Natural gas continues to be a really important part of our electricity sector, but how we create policy that leads to 100% clean electricity is going to be really important. And do you think we're going to need CCS on gas, at what scale? I don't know. I mean, that's something that we're trying to figure out that this administration will be making critical decisions around.
Jason Jacobs: And now that we're kind of doing our lightning round of lightening rod topics, I see that you have some geoengineering research in your past. I'm curious what your perspective is on that in terms of whether we'll need it and also just how important it is to be doing research in that area and where there's danger and where there's opportunity?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: So super caveat. This is my personal capacity. Absolutely not representing the administration in this part of the conversation. [laughs] Solar geoengineering research is important. Now I wanna caveat here that research and deployment are two very different things. Both require really thoughtful governance. The United States has started investing in solar geoengineering research already, very minimally, but we saw $4 million appropriated for the first time in FYI20, 9 million in FY21 and we'll see what happens in FY22. We need to ensure that there is a governance structure that has public oversight for that research. We also need to ensure that we understand what levels of research we're at and where we might be headed in the future.
For people who say, we really shouldn't be researching this because of moral hazard reasons, aren't considering kind of the moral implication of, of not doing this research. One, this research could show that solar geoengineering is not feasible. That's an outcome that could happen. We really don't know 'cause we haven't actually done enough to understand that. Making that assertion also, again, doesn't take into account the Global South. We can't claim to be speaking on their behalf or to be supporting climate justice if they're not part of the solar geoengineering conversation.
The really hard part about solar geo today is that it's inherently global, but that means decision-making is also inherently global. What does that mean for research? How do we think about creating research oversight frameworks on an international scale? These are all really, really hard questions that we're grappling with in other spaces like CRISPR, for example, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't be having the conversation. And I think the fact that the space has been so taboo for so long is actually really detrimental to people's safety and public participation and ensuring that they have a say in how it moves forward, solar geoengineering isn't going to not happen because we say, don't do it.
We don't have control over the other countries. We don't have control over independent actors. What can we do to ensure that research is done safely and effectively and that we are putting in the right guard rails that we need to? And that's true for deployment. I don't think we're anywhere near ready for deployment. If deployment is even feasible to actually lead to beneficial outcomes, but we don't know what other countries or other actors might do. How do we prepare for that? How do we think about that? And these are questions that we could leave to answer later. These questions require nationally answers.
Jason Jacobs: One of the last questions, and this is also in a personal capacity, but the financial markets seem pretty sophisticated and I'm just a startup entrepreneur. I'm, I'm no expert on global financial markets, but one thing that has come up again and again, as I've been learning about this area is climate risk. And I'm just curious your perspective on how much of that risk has been factored in and how on top of that risk the financial markets are and how exposed or flat-footed we might be given that some people say that that risk is not factored in anywhere near the level that it should be already let alone looking into the future?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: I totally agree with that last statement. I do not think it's factored in at the levels it needs to by any means. I think the risk is far greater than we realize and I think we see that with every new IPCC report that we haven't taken into account X, Y, and Z variables. And actually this might happen or this might happen at, at three degrees, at four degrees. That's not to say that we haven't thought about it and that some aspects of the global financial market have started really thinking about how to integrate that, but that can't be done in a silo and climate risk affects literally every sector. And so every sector has to take that risk seriously and I don't think we're there yet, which is, you know, unfortunate, but I, I really hope that there's a lot more motivation to do so.
Jason Jacobs: And a number of people that listen to our show, I mean, it's pretty diverse, the audience, but there's people that work in big tech, there's people that work in startups. They could work in all kinds of sectors, alternative protein, they might work in Ag, They might work in batteries and storage, they might work in wind, they might work in geothermal exploration, they might work and direct air capture or carbon capture and storage, they might work in CPG or carbon markets or aviation or cement or anything. I mean, pretty innovation focused, but there's a lot of others as well. So there's some quick context, but my question is, what message do you have for them? So you've got their ears. They're listening. How should they be thinking about government? How should they be interacting with government? How should they be planning for things that government might do in the future?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: As someone who is relatively new to the federal space, I think we need a lot more interaction with different sectors. We obviously have a lot, but I think a lot of people don't recognize that they could just email us. We would love to chat about innovative technologies, about ideas, about, you know, new spaces that you think we might not be aware of and that's super exciting. And I don't think we have enough people who are actually wanting to reach out to us or not wanting, but know that they can, right? And not even thinking about what those conversations could look like.
I would just really encourage everyone to kind of think through what government opportunities exist and to also interact with folks that are in this space. Good policy only gets made when there's a really deep understanding of every sector and how they interact and how we want them to interact. And we can't shape good policy until we have that information. And as much expertise as this agency has and as, as much as, you know, different policy experts have, they don't know things that you know. Please help us. Help us make the best policy for your technologies to be able to move forward and to deploy and to address climate change.
Jason Jacobs: You may have just answered this, but a related question is just, where do you need help? Who do you wanna hear from, if anybody?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: From kind of a government perspective and from a DOE perspective, what I really wanna do is interact with communities first. You know, we haven't had the opportunity because of COVID but going on the ground, seeing a lot of these places, talking to people about their concerns, about how they envision the future, about what they need, are conversations that I haven't had the opportunity to have on the scale that I think we need to have them. That's something that, you know, we have to do and that we have to deploy, but I think that feedback of people who are on the ground is what this agency really needs.
Jason Jacobs: Awesome. Well, Shuchi, is there anything I didn't ask that I should have or any parting words for listeners?
Dr. Shuchi Talati: I really enjoyed this conversation and we touched on a, a lot of deeply sensitive [laughs] spaces. I live in the center of controversy, so it's still hard for me to answer these questions but I hope everyone knows that we are doing everything that we can and this is not something that we can solve alone and that I hope becomes just a really critical part of all policy moving forward. It's not environmental policy, it's just all policy. And so ensuring that climate is really integrated into how we think about everything is what I hope for the future of this administration, but for the future of global policy.
Jason Jacobs: That's a great point to end on. So I can't thank you enough for making the time. I know you're busy and you're doing important work as well. So thanks again and wishing you every success. And if we can be, ever be helpful at MCJ, please let me know as well.
Dr. Shuchi Talati: Thanks so much Jason.
Jason Jacobs: Hey everyone, Jason here. Thanks again for joining me on My Climate Journey. If you'd like to learn more about the journey, you can visit us at myclimatejourney.co. Note that is .co not .com. Someday we'll get the .com but right now .co. You can also find me on Twitter @jjacobs22, where I would encourage you to share your feedback on the episode or suggestions for future guests you'd like to hear. And before I let you go, if you enjoyed the show, please share an episode with a friend or consider leaving a review on iTunes. They've always made be say that. Thank you.
