Nixon,maybe? not sure and im to lazy too look it up.
You won't believe it when I tell you - ready - Jimmy Carter. Remember the gas embargo. He had a solution - shale oil - and voila the DOE. See how much shale oil we use now.
Before DOE we had Energy Research and Development Aministration (ERDA), which Nixon created - which was the AEC with some additional energy research missions, but without the energy regulatory or subsidy parts of the present DOE.
Yeah, Nix-on-Dick started it and Bush II elevated it to cabinet level! Oy! If we could just get some Pubbies in office we wouldn't have to deal with all this crap. Oh, wait...