Granholm, the 1st woman energy secretary of the US, made the remarks while responding to a question during a hearing on the department's budget by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
She told lawmakers during the Congressional hearing:
- I'm very interested in continuing to ensure that India and the US have a strong partnership and there are a lot of energy tools that can help India achieve its own goals which are very aggressive as well
- It's a tool that we can use to help or harm our allies or enemies
- I'm especially prioritising our relationships with the quad, Australia, Japan, and India
- There's certainly an opportunity to help our ally India with natural gas and expand our natural gas to those
- How do you feel about the Department of Energy's plan to strengthen that energy partnership within just specifically as it pertains to natural gas exports to them?
She noted:
- And that is another strategy that we're working on...to make sure that we can have natural gas that is carbon free