US President Donald Trump Wednesday night broadly outlined his
administration's energy policy in a speech that touched on oil
pipelines, ethanol production and the Paris climate accord.
The speech, at a rally in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, also included a number
of false and misleading statements on the administration's policy
positions and their impact on energy markets.
Here's a fact-check of some of Trump's energy-related quotes:
TRUMP: "We've eliminated restrictions on the production of
American energy."
VERDICT: Mostly false.
The Trump administration has prioritized the repeal of numerous
Obama-era regulations on oil, natural gas and coal production,
including limits on methane emissions from
oil and
gas operations and new regulations for hydraulic fracturing on
federal lands. But the regulations the administration has worked to
roll back were not even in effect and some were only proposed rules.
For example, the administration plans to repeal the Clean Power
Plan, a key piece of former President Barack Obama's regulatory
effort to combat climate change, but that plan was not even set to
enter into effect until 2022. Trump's Interior Department also
recently announced it was rescinding a 2015 fracking rule, but that
rule would have only impacted about 5% of US oil production and had
already been overturned by a US District Court in June.
Analysts claim that even if the rules were in place they would
likely have only marginal impact on US supply, which mainly responds
to price and other market fundamentals.
TRUMP: "Under our feet we have great wealth. Not only in the
form of your kind of wealth, which is beautiful, fertile soil, but
also in other locations in the form of energy. They wanted to take
that power and that wealth away from us."
VERDICT: Likely false.
The question is who is Trump referring to here? Some OPEC ministers
wanted US oil producers to lose market share amid the shale boom and
numerous environmental groups had pushed the Obama administration to
dramatically curtail fossil production and focus on renewable energy
sources, a position some in the previous administration likely
viewed favorably.
But the Obama administration never seriously pushed a plan to curb
US production. In fact, the opposite occurred. US oil production,
for example, averaged 5.35 million b/d in 2009, Obama's first year
in office, and climbed to a peak of over 9.4 million b/d in 2015,
according to the Energy Information Administration. US as production
climbed from a low of nearly 64 Bcf/d in September 2008 to a peak of
92 Bcf/d in February 2016, according to EIA.
Related:
Find more content about Trump's administration in our news and
analysis feature.
TRUMP: "And 33,000 mining jobs have been added since my
inauguration."
VERDICT: False.
There were 51,402
coal mining jobs in the fourth quarter of 2016 and 52,282 coal
mining jobs in the first quarter of 2018, an increase of 880 jobs,
according to the Department of Labor's Mine Safety and Health
Administration. The number of US coal mining jobs increased by 1,300
from December to the end of May, according to the US Bureau of Labor
Statistics.
TRUMP: "In fact, you read about it, last week a brand, new
coal mine just opened in the state of Pennsylvania, first time in
decades, decades."
VERDICT: False.
It hasn't even been a decade, let alone decades, even if only
considering mines in Pennsylvania. The Harvey mine, a thermal mine
in Sycamore, about 50 miles southwest of Pittsburgh, was opened by
Consol Energy in 2009. The 4 West mine, located about 60 miles south
of Pittsburgh and near the West Virginia border, opened in 2005.
TRUMP: "We've approved, first day, the Keystone XL Pipeline
and the Dakota Access Pipeline. First thing. Day one."
VERDICT: False.
Trump's first day in office was January 20. On January 24, Trump
signed executive memos aimed at speeding the approvals of the
stalled Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines, but these memos
were not formal approvals. The State Department did not approve a
long-awaited permit allowing TransCanada's Keystone XL oil pipeline
to cross the US-Canada border until March 24. TransCanada's approval
process for the pipeline's proposed path is still ongoing. Dakota
Access received its final permit to complete construction on
February 8 and commercial service began this month.
TRUMP: "And again, we're going to have all forms of energy.
But coal is something we have a tremendous advantage at."
VERDICT: False.
Shifting market fundamentals no longer support US coal production, a
reality the Trump administration frequently ignores. US coal
production totaled 1 billion short tons in 2014, but has declined in
the last two and half years as a glut of domestically-produced
natural gas has lowered prices for the fuel, which had led to a
significant decline in the use of coal for power generation.
Production this year is projected to total roughly 785 million st.
TRUMP: "But I put a little clause, handwritten. It said,
anybody builds a pipeline in the United States will use American
steel and fabricate in America."
VERDICT: Misleading.
On January 24, Trump signed a memo aimed at encouraging the use of
US
steel in pipeline projects. But, as he did Wednesday night in
Iowa, Trump has repeatedly referred to this memo as a new, legal
requirement for US pipeline builders. The memo merely calls for a
federal study of such a "Buy American" requirement and, even if
ultimately enacted, the provision is expected to draw severe
opposition from US trading partners. The White House has said
Keystone XL is exempt from a Trump executive memorandum encouraging
the use of US steel in pipeline projects because the project is
already under way. TransCanada has already sourced the pipe, with
half of it coming from US steel mills and the rest from mills in
Canada (24%), Italy (16%) and India (10%).
TRUMP: [On his decision to leave the Paris climate
agreement] "And they all say it's nonbinding. Like hell it's
nonbinding. When we get sued by everybody because we thought it was
nonbinding, then you can tell me it was nonbinding."
VERDICT: False.
The 2015 Paris Agreement on climate aims to curb global greenhouse
gas emissions and prevent a further increase in the global average
temperature. The agreement calls on countries to make Intended
Nationally Determined Contributions for how they will curb carbon
emissions. These contributions are non-binding, a point even Trump
made when he announced he was withdrawing the US from the deal
earlier this month. "Thus, as of today, the United States will cease
all implementation of the non-binding Paris Accord and the draconian
financial and economic burdens the agreement imposes on our
country," Trump said in a Rose Garden speech on June 1.
TRUMP: "And by the way, we're saving your ethanol industries
in the state of Iowa, just like I promised I would do in my
campaign. And believe me, they are under siege, folks. I don't know
if you know it, but they are under siege."
VERDICT: Likely false.
It remains to be seen if Trump was referring to a potential shift in
policy on ethanol, but it is unclear in what way ethanol is or was
under siege. About 15.33 billion gallons of fuel ethanol was
produced in the US in 2016, up 2 million gallons from 2013,
according to the Renewable Fuels Association, an ethanol industry
group. Over the past decade, annual US fuel ethanol production has
more than tripled, according to the trade group.
The Trump administration has been facing pressure from the oil
industry to lower the ethanol mandate in the Renewable Fuel
Standard, but this has been the case since Congress created the
program over a decade ago. The EPA is expected to publish its
proposed Renewable Volume Obligations for the RFS program next week,
according to industry sources.
--Brian Scheid,
brian.scheid@spglobal.com
--Andrew Moore,
andrew.moore@spglobal.com
--Edited by Richard Rubin,
richard.rubin@spglobal.com
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