Thank you very much, Bob. And we have just come from a wonderful lunch with the Prime Minister and the Vice President, so I think this signing is yet another example of the deepening and broadening of our relationship and I am pleased to join with Minister Krishna and Dr. Ahluwalia for this occasion – a declaration of our shared commitment to develop clean energy technologies together to reduce our nations’ carbon emissions as part of our larger efforts to solve the climate crisis.
I was privileged when I visited India last summer to see clean energy technologies at work, to tour a state-of-the-art green building, one of the most advanced in the world. The economic opportunities that we can derive from these technologies are very compelling. But we also can do it in a way that tackles the challenge of climate change which threatens us all. By creating and implementing clean energy technologies on a broad scale, we can mitigate the effects of climate change and help people adapt to changes that have already occurred.
This memorandum is the result of months of close consultation between our governments. It builds on the efforts that both countries have taken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. For example, India recently announced it will develop 20 gigawatts of solar power by 2022. To put that number in perspective, it is more than the total estimated amount of solar power produced worldwide today.
This memorandum also establishes a clean energy research and development institute[1] which the United States intends to support with $50 million. It will include a joint research center with facilities in both the United States and India to make it easier for our scientists to conduct research together and to accelerate the deployment of clean energy technologies.
We’re signing this memorandum at a very critical time, right on the eve of the conference in Copenhagen. We look forward to continuing to work with India. Our two governments have agreed that the agreement produced at Copenhagen should cover mitigation, adaptation, technology, and financing, and pledges of transparent and meaningful action from both developed and developing countries. Both India and the United States have agreed to stand behind our own commitments to reduce emissions. With this agreement, we can help India and the United States make progress on addressing climate change, increasing energy security, and strengthening economic growth.
So I want to thank both of my colleagues and tell you how pleased we are to be deepening our collaboration. It is very timely and it will be, I believe, very strongly in the best interests of both of our nations as well as the world. Thank you very much.
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