President Obama has pledged that the United States will join with our partners across the Americas to chart a low-carbon, clean-energy future. Energy and climate challenges affect us all, and it will take all of us to solve them. The Americas are blessed with talent, ingenuity and resources, and we can go further faster by working together than by working alone.

That’s why we hosted in Washington April 15 and 16 energy ministers from across the Western Hemisphere to advance the Energy and Climate Partnership of the Americas.

At the 2009 Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago, President Obama called on governments across the region to work together on a range of initiatives: promoting energy efficiency, developing renewable energy, shifting to cleaner fossil fuels, integrating national power grids, expanding access to electrical services to more people in more places, and meeting the urgent global challenge of climate change. Since then, more than a dozen new ECPA initiatives are showcasing our hemisphere’s best ideas and practices.

As part of ECPA, the United States and the Inter-American Development Bank are working with partners across the region to develop a regional clean-energy network that will link energy efficiency centres in Peru and Costa Rica with Chile’s Renewable Energy Centre in Santiago, Mexico’s Wind Centre in Oaxaca, a biomass centre in Brazil, and a geothermal centre in El Salvador. This new network will bring US and regional experts together to explore technologies and implementation strategies that will benefit us all.

Other governments are making critical contributions to ECPA as well. Brazil is leading an initiative to promote sustainable urban planning and energy efficiency in low-income households to respond to the challenges of urbanisation and climate change. Colombia, which sits at the crossroads of Central and South America, is promoting cross-border trade in electricity with Panama, the Andes, and Chile. Mexico, with a long commitment to help integrate Central American power markets, is training Central American officials on energy-efficiency best practices. And Trinidad and Tobago is leading a Caribbean initiative to bring renewable energy to the island nations.

It is a testament to the resourcefulness of our people and the commitment of our governments that so many countries in the hemisphere are participating in – and leading – this effort.

These initiatives are only the beginning. At our meeting, we mapped out new areas for collaboration, building on the best ideas of NGOs and the private sector, and setting the stage for even greater progress in the future.

As President Obama said in Trinidad, through this partnership we will “create the jobs of the future, lower greenhouse gas emissions, and make this hemisphere a model for cooperation.”

We are moving closer to making that vision a reality.

Hillary Clinton is US Secretary of State and Steven Chu Secretary of Energy.