Trump to declare 'national energy emergency' to open up resource extraction

President-elect Donald Trump on Monday plans to declare a “national energy emergency” that would give him authority to increase U.S. energy production, including opening up drilling in Alaska. 

Incoming White House officials said that given the “resounding mandate” he received in the November election, Trump would seek to reorient U.S. energy production away from “parochial interests” of the past — an apparent reference to backing renewable resources — and toward “putting the American people first.” 

The officials said the emergency declaration would enable Trump to “unlock a variety of different authorities” that would allow the U.S. to build up natural resources, including drilling in the Arctic ocean, something outgoing President Joe Biden had sought to block. 

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In addition to lowering energy costs, the executive order was also designed to improve national security, especially the development of advanced artificial intelligence — the computing for which requires enormous amounts of electricity.

The emergency declaration comes as the U.S. remains near historic heights of energy production, so much so that the country has been a net exporter of energy in recent years.

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The U.S. has been pumping a record amount of oil over the past year, breaking the previous record set in 2019, according to data from the Energy Information Administration. Gas prices have been steadily declining since April and last month were down slightly from where they were a year ago to an average of $3.14 a gallon, according to the Energy Information Administration. Prior to the pandemic, a gallon of gas was around $2.60. 

Trump has argued on the campaign trail that lowering energy costs would help drive down prices across the economy by reducing the cost of fuel for shipping and electricity used for producing goods. 

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But an increase in oil production in the U.S. might not translate into lower oil prices overall. Since oil is traded on a global market, other oil-producing countries could cut their own production to curtail supply and keep prices from falling too low.

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More production may also not lead to significantly more jobs in the oil industry, which has been replacing workers with technology, like advanced robotics and artificial intelligence, according to a report by EY, which projects the oil and gas workforce could shrink by up to 30% over the next two decades.

During his final days in office, President Joe Biden put measures in place to reduce offshore drilling along much of the East Coast, Gulf of Mexico and Pacific Northwest coastlines, saying that the environmental and economic risks and harms from offshore drilling outweighed their benefits. 

Those actions and others taken by Biden can now be undone by the incoming Trump administration, though they could face legal challenges by environmental groups similar to ones seen during Trump’s first term.