EXCLUSIVE: Energy Department Gets New CIO

The Energy Department has selected its next chief information officer.

Agency officials confirmed to Nextgov that Michael Johnson, currently the assistant director for intelligence programs at the Office of Science and Technology Policy, will replace Energy’s interim CIO, Don Adcock.

Adcock stepped into the CIO role in an acting capacity last September, when CIO Bob Brese left the department after four years for a job in the private sector.

At OSTP, Johnson handled a range of national security issues across intelligence, homeland security and cybersecurity as well as information sharing.

Johnson was essentially OSTP’s representative within the intelligence community. In that capacity, he served on the Senior Information Sharing and Safeguarding Steering Committee, the Committee on National Security Systems and a slew of White House interagency committees.

Johnson is a trained computer engineer, scientist and intelligence analyst who helped transform the way the intelligence community shares information, first as a principal deputy to the IC CIO and later as the deputy associate director of National Intelligence for information sharing for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

Johnson later served as the chief scientist within the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Intelligence and Analysis before coming to OSTP. He also has previous ties to the Energy Department, serving as senior adviser to its director of intelligence and its CIO.