WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Chris Wright, President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to head the U.S. Energy Department, will tell U.S. senators in his confirmation hearing on Wednesday his first priority is expanding domestic energy production including liquefied natural gas and nuclear power.
Wright, 59, believes fossil fuels are the key to ending world poverty, which is a greater problem than climate change’s “distant” threat, according to a report he wrote as CEO of oilfield services company Liberty Energy.
Wright supports some fossil fuel alternatives, such as small nuclear power reactors, which are not yet commercially available, and geothermal power. But he has criticized solar and wind power as insufficient.
“Previous administrations have viewed energy as a liability instead of the immense national asset that it is,” Wright will tell the Senate energy committee, according to prepared remarks reviewed by Reuters.
“To compete globally, we must expand energy production, including commercial nuclear and liquefied natural gas, and cut the cost of energy.”
U.S. exports of liquefied natural gas, a super-chilled exportable form of natural gas, hit a record in 2023 thanks to the shale boom. The U.S. now produces more oil and gas than any other country ever has.
Wright, is expected to win a majority in the 100-member Senate, now controlled by Republicans, and will step down from Liberty once confirmed. Wright would replace Jennifer Granholm, who urged caution on the issuance of new permits to export LNG, saying unfettered exports will boost emissions of gases blamed for climate change and risk raising fuel prices for manufacturers and home owners.
The top Democrat on the committee, Senator Martin Heinrich, from fossil fuel-producing New Mexico, said after meeting Wright last week the two agreed that the Energy Department “must help speed the expansion of interregional transmission infrastructure to meet our nation’s skyrocketing demand for clean power.”
Heinrich said he told Wright his concerns about the Trump team’s plan to “claw back programs in order to undo our progress in building a cleaner, healthier and more affordable energy future, and the many jobs that go with it.”
Wright is expected to work on a new energy council with Doug Burgum, Trump’s nominee for interior secretary.
Wright will also say that the U.S. must remove barriers to progress on energy. Trump, a Republican who takes office on Jan. 20, may declare a national energy emergency, allowing him to fast-track permits for new power infrastructure and other energy projects.
The move would fit into Trump’s agenda to expand energy output as U.S. power demand begins to surge for the first time in decades and to reverse President Joe Biden’s pause on approvals of LNG exports.
Biden passed a signature climate change law with billions of dollars to support alternative energy projects. But Congress has failed so far to pass a permitting bill for the transmission infrastructure needed to move huge amounts of power from high-tech projects like renewables and planned new nuclear reactors.
(Reporting by Timothy Gardner; Editing by Christian Schmollinger)
