Is the U.S. ‘more energy independent today’?
The claim: In a conversation after the second Republican presidential debate, conservative Fox News host Sean Hannity and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, squabbled over a comment by Mike Pence. The former vice president said that during his tenure, when Donald Trump was president, “We achieved energy independence. We became a net exporter of energy for the first time in 75 years.”
Newsom claimed the trend is the opposite, saying, “We are more energy independent today” under President Joe Biden.
PolitiFact ruling: Half true. Gains in U.S. energy independence in recent years are measurable. But experts say it isn’t true energy independence because the U.S. still depends on international crude oil for key elements of its energy needs.
Newsom is correct that Biden hasn’t squandered whatever degree of energy independence the U.S. gained under Trump. The data shows that several key metrics have grown even stronger under Biden.
Discussion
Although the U.S. has moved toward energy independence in some ways, it still depends on international crude oil for key elements of its energy needs, making the country’s energy market sensitive to overseas developments in energy, trade and foreign policy.
However, Newsom does have a point that whatever degree of independence the U.S. gained under Trump has continued to grow under Biden’s leadership. In several key ways, the data shows energy independence has strengthened under Biden.
PolitiFact contacted Newsom for comment but were referred to his campaign and did not receive a reply before our deadline.
Here’s a breakdown, edited for clarity, of what Hannity and Newsom said after the debate:
Hannity: “(Trump) made the country energy independent for the first time in 75 years.”
Newsom: “We are more energy independent today. Look that up. It’s a fact.”
Hannity: “That’s false. (President) Joe Biden has unilaterally disarmed.”
Newsom: “I would encourage the people watching: Look this up: 5.94 quads. We are more energy independent today under Biden. Pence doesn’t know that. Your audience doesn’t know that. More domestic oil production than any time in history, we’re on pace for this year. That’s a fact. You guys keep making that up.”
The truth is more complicated than it sounds.
In recent years, the United States has provided for more of its own energy needs. Experts credit the growth in shale oil and shale gas production, increases in renewable energies such as solar and wind and improvements in efficiency.
This has led some politicians to describe the United States as having achieved “energy independence.” But there is no single definition of what that means.
One statistic to consider is whether the U.S. exports more energy than it imports, said Hugh Daigle, a University of Texas at Austin associate professor of petroleum and geosystems engineering.
The Energy Information Administration, a federal office that tracks energy statistics, found that in 2019 — during Trump’s and Pence’s tenure — the United States became a net exporter of energy for the first time since 1952. “Energy” in this context includes all types, from heating oil to gasoline to sources used to generate electricity such as coal, natural gas and renewables.
Meanwhile, in 2020, the U.S. became a net exporter of petroleum for the first time since at least 1949.
And in 2019 and 2020, when Trump was president, the U.S. made more energy than it consumed.
By all three of these measures — net energy exports, net petroleum exports and greater domestic production than domestic consumption — the U.S. achieved a degree of energy independence during the Trump years. But because of the way the energy economies of the U.S. and the world work, experts say the United States has never managed true energy independence.
For crude oil, imports outpaced exports in each of the four years Trump was president, and in Biden’s first two years in office. Although the U.S. produces enough crude oil to satisfy its consumption, the U.S. cannot refine all of the crude oil it produces, experts say.
In both 2021 and 2022, Biden’s first two years in office, the U.S. remained a net exporter of overall energy and a net exporter of petroleum. And energy production continued to outpace consumption in both of those years. For each of these three statistics, this favorable gap increased in scale between 2021 and 2022.
Newsom is also right that the U.S. is “on pace this year” to produce more oil domestically “than any time in history.”
And Newsom is correct that the U.S. recently reached “the highest margin of net energy export in American history, under the Biden administration,” by what he called “5.94 quads.”
“Quads” refers to quadrillion British thermal units, which is the standard measurement for this type of statistic. One BTU is the energy released by burning a match.
In 2022, the U.S.’ energy exports exceeded its energy imports by 5.94 quadrillion British thermal units. In recent decades, there have been only four years during which U.S. exports exceeded imports — 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022 — and the 5.94 quad difference in 2022 was the largest ever.