President Trump upended decades of U.S. policy that started with Richard Nixon when he declared that the goal of the U.S. was no longer “energy independence” but rather “American energy dominance.” This wasn’t Trumpian hyperbole. latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/…
/2 Few policies have been pursued by the administration with more cohesiveness, zeal, and success — or with more potential to yield great and lasting harm. Trump has unleashed a massive, untethered expansion of oil, natural gas and coal production.
/3 Trump's "American Energy Dominance" policy seeks to make the U.S. the world’s foremost fossil fuel powerhouse. Its origins are in the radical writings of 2 Trump campaign advisers who call fossil fuels "The Master Resource,"as I wrote in @RollingStone rollingstone.com/politics/polit…
/4 Hartnett-White was so radical, Trump could not get her confirmed as Chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality and he had to eventually withdraw her name from consideration. But her policy ideas continued on within the administration, now seeing great success.
/5 Expansive orders and rule changes across agencies have resulted in a virtually frozen regulatory process, with nearly 300 federal regulations specifically related to energy production and environmental protection rescinded, withdrawn, or otherwise stalled by June 2017.
/6 On #coal, the Interior Department lifted a moratorium on new leases on federal lands, and by the end of 2017, six straight years of decline in U.S. coal production was reversed.
/7 The number of oil and natural gas wells on lands administered by the Interior Department increased by an astounding 85% from 2016 to 2017. Six times the amount of public land is now available to oil and natural gas leasing compared to just two years ago.
/8 But the rule changes only sped up since I wrote the OpEd. On Thursday, the administration moved to open up at least 9 million more acres by changing wildlife protections for the Sage Grouse (some experts estimate tens of millions more acres). nytimes.com/2018/12/06/cli…
/9 The administration is poised to roll back a significant climate change regulation on coal-fired power plants, making it easier to build new coal plants in the United States. nytimes.com/2018/12/04/cli…
10/ The Environmental Protection Agency is expected to unveil its proposed rewrite of a major 2015 Obama rule that extended federal protections to thousands of waterways and wetlands, among other rule changes not mentioned in my Op Ed. apnews.com/b313482683f144…
/12 The U.S., Russia & Saudi Arabia are united in the desire to save fossil fuels. It is a dangerous agenda which moves against all necessary action to protect life and health. It makes the push for global climate action and a #GreenNewDeal all the more urgent.
