8 Mar (NucNet): Massachusetts Institute of Technology physicist Ernest Moniz, a proponent of nuclear energy, has been nominated as the next US energy secretary by President Barack Obama.
Mr Moniz, whose nomination was announced this week, is the Cecil and Ida Green professor of physics and engineering systems, as well as the director of the MIT Energy Initiative and the Laboratory for Energy and the Environment.
Mr Moniz would replace Steven Chu, who has said he will resign once his successor is confirmed by the Senate.
Mr Moniz was undersecretary of energy at the Department of Energy from 1998 to 2001 during President Bill Clinton's administration. He is currently on Mr Obama’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.
Mr Moniz was a member of the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future, a panel commissioned by Mr Obama to examine how to deal with high-level nuclear waste and the spent nuclear fuel now stored on-site at nuclear power plants around the country.
The Nuclear Energy Institute, the policy organisation of the US nuclear energy and technologies industry, welcomed the announcement.
NEI president and chief executive officer Marvin Fertel said: “In nominating Ernie Moniz to be secretary of energy, President Obama has sent America a strong message that its energy leadership will be entrusted to an advocate of clean energy supplies, including nuclear energy.”
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