The dissident author of best-selling works on international politics, Noam Chomsky, has described Donald Trump’s Republican Party as “…the most dangerous organisation in all of human history.” The noted academic accuses the right-wing US political party of racing humanity towards a precipice by actively pursuing energy policies that will accelerate climate change. Let’s take a look at some of President Trump’s proposals.

Abolition of the Clean Power Plan

President Obama’s Clean Power Plan proposed to reduce CO₂ emissions from power stations by 32% over 25 years. President Trump signed an executive order to defund the Clean Power Plan claiming to be protecting jobs in the coal industry. The US coal industry employed 76, 572 people in 2014 (the most recent available figures) – the Washington Post pointed out that this was a similar figure to those employed in the skiing industry. If a president was really concerned about jobs, you might think that heavy investment in cleaner burning natural gas power plants and renewable sources of energy would be a good way forward.  

Dakota Access Pipeline

Trump issued a memorandum intended to speed up the completion of the controversial Dakota Access pipeline. Campaigners claim that the pipe will impact on water supplies and wildlife. A test run last week led to a minor spill of 84 gallons of crude oil. Trump has been an investor in Energy Transfer Partners (the company who will be operating the Dakota Access pipeline). Their CEO, Kelcy Warren donated $103,000 to Trump’s election campaign.

Untapped Shale, Oil and Natural Gas Reserves

The White House website has a page trumpeting President Trump’s energy plan. An America First Energy Plan explains how the president plans to free the United States from dependence on foreign oil by exploiting shale oil and gas located on federal lands – this is suggestive of a reversal of the fracking restrictions imposed on these lands by President Obama. It is estimated that opening up environmentally sensitive lands to further drilling will take 5-7 years to show an impact on domestic oil prices. That’s a long time in politics.

Theoretical Taxation

There are rumours that President Trump is planning a 20% border tax on oil imports. Trump’s spokesperson Sean Spicer described the plans for the tax as “theoretical”. However, it is hard to tell with Trump whether the things he says are just an offhand comment or whether they are genuinely going to be put into policy.

The main energy priorities for the Republican Party’s tenure in office seem to be ensuring profitability of the domestic fossil fuel industry and achieving independence from what they describe as the “OPEC cartel”. Climate change is notably ignored.

We like to keep an eye on energy policies of different nations, but the truth of the matter is that there are global market forces at play that even an economy the size of the United States can’t control. The modern world is reliant on a stable energy supply and the skills of the people that build and operate the power-generating facilities. If you are one of those people, we would like to hear from you. Send your CV to cvs@peoplewithenergy.co.uk.

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