American Petroleum Institute chief pumped about prospects
Appears hopeful that Trump, Congress will reverse Obama plans
“For all of the innovation, investment and talent within this and other industry, policy clearly matters.” Jack Gerard
For Jack Gerard, the outlook for U.S. energy security has never been brighter, with domestic supplies of oil and natural gas increasing, dependence on foreign supplies declining and a new Republican president and Congress keen on promoting fossil fuels.
“In this new year and at the start of this new Congress, we have an opportunity to change the national conversation when it comes to energy policy,” the president of the American Petroleum Institute said recently in his annual “State of American Energy” speech in Washington, D.C.
“We have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to find solutions for many of today’s most pressing issues, including creating middleclass jobs, tackling income inequality, ensuring sustained affordable energy for consumers and enhancing our national security. And for all of these goals, and others, the 21st American energy renaissance offers a solution.”
The renaissance that Gerard referred to, of course, is a resurgence in U.S. oil and natural gas production resulting from advances in drilling technologies in shale formations across the country. The shale boom has re-established the U.S. as a leader in oil
and gas development. This rise in oil and gas output has also driven down the costs of gasoline and other fuels for consumers as well as the price of natural gas and other feedstocks for the petrochemical industry, which is building new manufacturing facilities at a pace not seen in years.
Moreover, the U.S. is now in position to become a significant exporter of crude oil for the first time in decades and of liquefied natural gas for the first time ever.
All of this comes, Gerard noted, as the U.S. records some favorable statistics regarding pollution, including data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration that show U.S. carbon emissions from electricity generation in the first six months of 2016 were at their lowest level in 25 years, even as electricity demand rose.
For that achievement, much of the thanks goes to natural gas, which in 2016 surpassed coal as the leading fuel for generating electricity.
With President-elect Donald Trump preparing to take office in a matter of days and the latest GOP-led Congress already in session, Gerard and API appear optimistic Obama administration measures aimed at oil and gas production will be reversed.
Among the targets are bans on drilling in portions of the Arctic and Atlantic oceans as well as rules requiring further reductions in methane emissions from oil and gas operations. Of the latter, Gerard said companies are already curbing methane emissions and are incentivized to do more, because gas captured is gas that can be sold.
All in all, Gerard maintained that recent developments show that increased energy production and consumption aren’t necessarily inconsistent with a cleaner environment, though his critics would argue that current emission trends are still well short of the changes ultimately necessary to avert a climate disaster.
From that perspective, we need to rely more and more on carbon-free forms of energy.
And while Gerard credited industry for investing billions of dollars in clean-air technologies and cleaner-burning fuels, he also acknowledged that companies “don’t act in a vacuum.”
“The government at the federal, state and local levels, as they should, set the regulatory parameters in which we operate,” he said. “For all of the innovation, investment and talent within this and other industry, policy clearly matters.”
So, what should that policy be when it comes to climate change, a term that didn’t come up in Gerard’s prepared remarks?
The oil and gas leader deferred when asked about the 2015 Paris climate agreement, which the Obama administration and nearly 200 other governments signed in a bid to keep global temperatures from rising 2 degrees Celsius, a point at which scientists say catastrophic environmental damage would occur.
“What they decide to do with the Paris agreement, we’ll leave that up to them,” Gerard said, apparently referring to the Trump administration and Congress.
As for avoiding the term “climate change,” Gerard suggested that he did so “to take a step forward and get off the simplistic who believes, who denies” that global warming is occurring and that humans are largely responsible for it.
“Let’s focus on demonstrated solutions to the challenges,” he said.
Without a doubt, his point of view will find a more receptive audience in Washington now.