Critics rip Trump’s idea to export fuels from military bases
Trump administration officials are mulling allowing coal exports from military bases and other federal properties along the U.S. West Coast, an idea that drew swift condemnation from political leaders in the region.
“This reckless, harebrained proposal undermines national security instead of increasing it, and it undermines states’ rights to enforce necessary health, safety and environmental protections in their communities,” Washington state’s Democratic governor, Jay Inslee, said in an emailed statement. “The men and women who serve at our military bases are there to keep our country safe, not to service an export facility for private fossil fuel companies.”
The idea is one of several being considered by administration officials as they seek to make good on President Donald Trump’s promise to propel a “new era of American energy dominance.” The Trump administration also has sought to use a United Nations climate fund to promote the construction of coal-fired power plants in other countries, which could help foster demand for U.S. supplies of the fossil fuel.
In an interview with the Associated Press, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke stressed that U.S. national security interests are served when foreign allies have access to affordable energy — and accomplishing that may require the use of “some of our naval facilities” and “some of our federal facilities on the West Coast.”
Zinke didn’t say what government properties could serve as export terminals for coal, according to the Associated Press, though he invoked the former Naval Air Facility Adak in Alaska as a possible launching pad for the state’s bounty of natural gas. State officials and oil companies extracting crude on the North Slope have for years sought to find ways to commercialize Alaska’s abundant natural gas. Now, they may be closer than ever, as federal regulators analyze Alaska Gasline Development Corp.’s plans to build a facility that could liquefy Alaskan gas and export it to China.
A Commerce Department representative said the agency is working closely with the Interior and Energy departments on a number of fronts to advance the administration’s export agenda — and this is one such effort. The department’s role in the discussions is somewhat limited because it does not control or permit the facilities that would be involved.
The effort could allow the Trump administration to circumvent political opposition in the Pacific Northwest, where several private efforts to build coal export facilities have been stymied by concerns about encouraging climate change.