Energy
Biden Throws Up One More Last-Minute Roadblock For Trump’s Energy Dominance Agenda
From the Daily Caller News Foundation
By Nick Pope
The Biden administration issued its long-awaited assessment on liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports on Tuesday, with its findings potentially complicating President-elect Donald Trump’s plans to unleash America’s energy industry.
The Department of Energy (DOE) published the study nearly a year after the administration announced in January it would pause approvals for new export capacity to non-free trade agreement countries to conduct a fresh assessment of whether additional exports are in the public interest. While the report stopped short of calling for a complete ban on new export approvals, it suggests that increasing exports will drive up domestic prices, jack up emissions and possibly help China, conclusions that will potentially open up projects approved by the incoming Trump team to legal vulnerability, according to Bloomberg News.
“The main takeaway is that a business-as-usual approach is neither sustainable nor advisable,” Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm told reporters on Tuesday. “American consumers and communities and our climate would pay the price.”
Trump has pledged to end the freeze on export approvals immediately upon assuming office in January 2025 as part of a wider “energy dominance” agenda, a plan to unshackle U.S. energy producers to drive down domestic prices and reinforce American economic might on the global stage. It could take the Trump administration up to a year to issue its own analysis, and Bloomberg News reported Tuesday that “findings showing additional exports cause more harm than good could make new approvals issued by Trump’s administration vulnerable to legal challenges.”
Republican Washington Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers slammed the study as “a clear attempt to cement Joe Biden’s rush-to-green agenda” in a Tuesday statement and asserted that the entire LNG pause was a political choice meant to appease hardline environmentalist interests.
Notably, S&P Global released its own analysis of the LNG market on Tuesday and found that increasing U.S. LNG exports is unlikely to have any “major impact” on domestic natural gas prices, contradicting a key assertion of the DOE’s brand new study. Members of the Biden administration were reportedly influenced by a Cornell University professor’s questionable 2023 study claiming that natural gas exports are worse for the environment than domestically-mined coal, and officials also reportedly met with a 25-year old TikTok influencer leading an online campaign against LNG exports before announcing the pause in January 2024.
“It’s time to lift the pause on new LNG export permits and restore American energy leadership around the world,” Mike Sommers, president and CEO of the American Petroleum Institute, said of the new DOE report. “After nearly a year of a politically motivated pause that has only weakened global energy security, it’s never been clearer that U.S. LNG is critical for meeting growing demand for affordable, reliable energy while supporting our allies overseas.”
Anne Bradbury, CEO of the American Exploration and Production Council, also addressed the DOE’s report in a statement, advising the public to be skeptical of Biden administration efforts to play politics with natural gas exports.
“There is strong bipartisan support for U.S. LNG exports because study after study shows that they strengthen the American economy, shore up global security, and advance collective emissions reductions goals – all while US natural gas prices remain affordable and stable from an abundant domestic supply of natural gas,” said Bradbury. “U.S. LNG exports have been a cornerstone of global energy security, providing reliable supplies to allies and reducing emissions by replacing higher-carbon fuels abroad, and it is critical that any study or policy impacting this vital sector should reflect thorough analysis and active collaboration with all stakeholders. Further attempts by this administration to politicize or distort the impact of U.S. LNG exports should be met with skepticism.”
From Resource Now
Alberta renews call for West Coast oil pipeline amid shifting federal, geopolitical dynamics.
Just six months ago, talk of resurrecting some version of the Northern Gateway pipeline would have been unthinkable. But with the election of Donald Trump in the U.S. and Mark Carney in Canada, it’s now thinkable.
In fact, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith seems to be making Northern Gateway 2.0 a top priority and a condition for Alberta staying within the Canadian confederation and supporting Mark Carney’s vision of making Canada an Energy superpower. Thanks to Donald Trump threatening Canadian sovereignty and its economy, there has been a noticeable zeitgeist shift in Canada. There is growing support for the idea of leveraging Canada’s natural resources and diversifying export markets to make it less vulnerable to an unpredictable southern neighbour.
“I think the world has changed dramatically since Donald Trump got elected in November,” Smith said at a keynote address Wednesday at the Global Energy Show Canada in Calgary. “I think that’s changed the national conversation.” Smith said she has been encouraged by the tack Carney has taken since being elected Prime Minister, and hopes to see real action from Ottawa in the coming months to address what Smith said is serious encumbrances to Alberta’s oil sector, including Bill C-69, an oil and gas emissions cap and a West Coast tanker oil ban. “I’m going to give him some time to work with us and I’m going to be optimistic,” Smith said. Removing the West Coast moratorium on oil tankers would be the first step needed to building a new oil pipeline line from Alberta to Prince Rupert. “We cannot build a pipeline to the west coast if there is a tanker ban,” Smith said. The next step would be getting First Nations on board. “Indigenous peoples have been shut out of the energy economy for generations, and we are now putting them at the heart of it,” Smith said.
Alberta currently produces about 4.3 million barrels of oil per day. Had the Northern Gateway, Keystone XL and Energy East pipelines been built, Alberta could now be producing and exporting an additional 2.5 million barrels of oil per day. The original Northern Gateway Pipeline — killed outright by the Justin Trudeau government — would have terminated in Kitimat. Smith is now talking about a pipeline that would terminate in Prince Rupert. This may obviate some of the concerns that Kitimat posed with oil tankers negotiating Douglas Channel, and their potential impacts on the marine environment.
One of the biggest hurdles to a pipeline to Prince Rupert may be B.C. Premier David Eby. The B.C. NDP government has a history of opposing oil pipelines with tooth and nail. Asked in a fireside chat by Peter Mansbridge how she would get around the B.C. problem, Smith confidently said: “I’ll convince David Eby.”
“I’m sensitive to the issues that were raised before,” she added. One of those concerns was emissions. But the Alberta government and oil industry has struck a grand bargain with Ottawa: pipelines for emissions abatement through carbon capture and storage.
The industry and government propose multi-billion investments in CCUS. The Pathways Alliance project alone represents an investment of $10 to $20 billion. Smith noted that there is no economic value in pumping CO2 underground. It only becomes economically viable if the tradeoff is greater production and export capacity for Alberta oil. “If you couple it with a million-barrel-per-day pipeline, well that allows you $20 billion worth of revenue year after year,” she said. “All of a sudden a $20 billion cost to have to decarbonize, it looks a lot more attractive when you have a new source of revenue.” When asked about the Prince Rupert pipeline proposal, Eby has responded that there is currently no proponent, and that it is therefore a bridge to cross when there is actually a proposal. “I think what I’ve heard Premier Eby say is that there is no project and no proponent,” Smith said. “Well, that’s my job. There will be soon. “We’re working very hard on being able to get industry players to realize this time may be different.” “We’re working on getting a proponent and route.”
At a number of sessions during the conference, Mansbridge has repeatedly asked speakers about the Alberta secession movement, and whether it might scare off investment capital. Alberta has been using the threat of secession as a threat if Ottawa does not address some of the province’s long-standing grievances. Smith said she hopes Carney takes it seriously. “I hope the prime minister doesn’t want to test it,” Smith said during a scrum with reporters. “I take it seriously. I have never seen separatist sentiment be as high as it is now. “I’ve also seen it dissipate when Ottawa addresses the concerns Alberta has.” She added that, if Carney wants a true nation-building project to fast-track, she can’t think of a better one than a new West Coast pipeline. “I can’t imagine that there will be another project on the national list that will generate as much revenue, as much GDP, as many high paying jobs as a bitumen pipeline to the coast.”
Alberta
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith Discusses Moving Energy Forward at the Global Energy Show in Calgary
From Energy Now
At the energy conference in Calgary, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith pressed the case for building infrastructure to move provincial products to international markets, via a transportation and energy corridor to British Columbia.
“The anchor tenant for this corridor must be a 42-inch pipeline, moving one million incremental barrels of oil to those global markets. And we can’t stop there,” she told the audience.
The premier reiterated her support for new pipelines north to Grays Bay in Nunavut, east to Churchill, Man., and potentially a new version of Energy East.
The discussion comes as Prime Minister Mark Carney and his government are assembling a list of major projects of national interest to fast-track for approval.
Carney has also pledged to establish a major project review office that would issue decisions within two years, instead of five.
Anti-Trump protests planned across the country on Saturday as LA violence continues
Telegram founder Pavel Durov exposes crackdown on digital privacy in Tucker Carlson interview
Audit report reveals Canada’s controversial COVID travel app violated multiple rules
