November 8th, 2024

• Stay up to date on all things energy by visiting the TEA Newsroom.
• America needs Affordable, Reliable, Clean energy security.
• EVs: A tale of woe in the absence of the market process.
• Biden won’t attend the UN climate summit again.
• Chinese solar firms go where US tariffs don’t reach.
• Seeking wiggle room from Republicans on climate change.
• Green energy stocks sink as Trump wins election.
• Blue voters protect access to the blue flame of gas in Berkeley & Washington.
• Trump’s day 1 climate plans: in his own words.

The issue: Republican Donald J. Trump won the presidency early Wednesday morning with a resounding performance. But American energy also should declare victory. The roughly 60 million American voters who prioritize energy affordability turned out for those candidates who champion cost-effective energy policies.

Why it matters: American voters wanted a clear energy policy and Trump provided that. Democrat Vice President Kamala Harris, conversely, did not. She flip-flopped repeatedly on fracking and it likely cost her a key battleground state in Pennsylvania. Harris chose to dodge the energy issue and she never presented a coherent policy, other than to talk about extending her Green New Deal agenda. That proved to be a fatal strategy.

Trump and running mate J.D. Vance had a vastly different message — and one that obviously resonated with American families.

The next four years will be a golden era for American energy. As a result, the economy will boom and households will have more money at the end of the month, making inflation a distant memory.

Consider:

• Vance pledged an energy policy is to increase production and manufacturing in the U.S. “because we’re the cleanest economy in the entire world.”
• They wisely connected the cost of energy to the cost of all other goods, from gasoline to groceries.
• Increasing oil and gas production and adding pipelines to deliver it lowers all costs.
• More natural gas plants need to be built to accommodate the data center expansion and growing Artificial Intelligence needs facing our nation.

Most working American families who have been hurt by the Biden-Harris administration desperately wanted a change. They got it and showed it with their votes.

Now it’s up to Trump to deliver on his frequent promise of “Drill, baby, drill” and an energy policy that unleashes “the liquid gold beneath our feet.”

Under Trump and a GOP-controlled Senate this will take place. Republicans seized control of the Senate after picking up three seats with Jim Justice in West Virginia, Tim Sheehy in Montana and Bernie Moreno in Ohio.

Moreno drove home the point during his acceptance speech: “We’re going to make this country an energy dominant nation, so that my kids don’t grow up in a country where we ever rely on a foreign nation for energy, ever, ever again … That means coal, that means natural gas, it means oil, it means nuclear. And in terms of EV mandates, they need to be gone first thing in January.”

Bottom line: Energy was on the ballot, and Americans chose the common sense path over 4 more years of nonsense. Donald Trump’s victory marks the beginning of a great comeback – both for him and for U.S. energy producers.

The issue: Just like that, the Democrats’ plans for passing another big climate bill in the next Congress are no more after losing the Senate and the White House.

Why it matters: One energy expert summed it up best. Daniel Turner, founder and executive director for Power the Future, a nonprofit “dedicated to fighting for American energy workers,” said the election outcome signaled that “our long national nightmare with the Green New Deal is finally over.”

With Kamala Harris soundly defeated and other climate extremists in Congress beaten or neutralized, policy makers now can focus on bringing down the cost of energy.

Consider: Even if Democrats can retake control of the House — an outcome that may not be known for days or weeks — their gains on energy and the environment over the last four years of the Biden-Harris administration are now in major peril.

• Republicans have promised, if given the chance, to use the budget reconciliation process to push through conservative tax priorities — paid for by gutting portions of the Democrats’ 2022 climate law like the tax credits for electric vehicles.
• Trump contended that an aggressive EV push would threaten traditional auto industry jobs and primarily benefit China by increasing reliance on imported EV materials.
• Trump has promised to reverse outgoing President Joe Biden’s executive orders and burdensome climate rules and to expand more domestic natural gas and oil drilling.

Heather Reams, president of the center-right Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions, said that voters sent “a message that when America produces more energy, global emissions go down.”

This echoes what TEA has said for five years. The facts are the U.S. has lowered emissions since 2005 thanks in large part to more natural gas being used for electricity generation.

Bottom line:The green-at-all-costs movement is officially dead. Americans want a clean environment. But we don’t want overreaching energy mandates, unaffordable utility bills, or a guilt trip from elites about our carbon footprint.

With another term for President Trump on the horizon, we may have to rename this section of our newsletter. Lower gas prices are likely on the way, but if they don’t arrive you can believe we’ll hold the Trump admin accountable just like we did for President Biden. This week, the national average for a gallon of gasoline decreased 3 cents, now at $3.09. If the average falls below $3, it will be the first time since Biden’s war on American energy began in 2021.

FERC’s Federal-State Current Issues Collaborative: On Tuesday, November 12, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission will host the first meeting of the Federal-State Current Issues Collaborative, to explore issues relevant to FERC and state utility commissions.

“We have more liquid gold, oil and gas. We have more liquid gold than any country in the world. More than Saudi Arabia. We have more than Russia.”

 — President Donald Trump in his victory speech.