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Policy Watch

Trump’s Energy Direction: 5 Early Takeaways

And more on this week’s top policy and energy news.

Trump and wind.
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Trump’s energy direction – We’re far enough into the Trump 2.0 transition that I can offer a few specific insights having covered him the first go-around.

  1. Trump’s pick for Interior Secretary Doug Burgum indicates any form of energy or resource extraction prevalent in his state of North Dakota could be safe from the wrath of political meddling in permitting. That includes onshore wind and battery metals.
  2. Trump’s selection for Energy Secretary – gas CEO Chris Wright – indicates even more reason for optimism about mining given the heavy overlap between companies in historic fracking development and U.S. lithium industry growth.
  3. Trump’s EPA pick Lee Zeldin previously backed legislation to ease permitting for renewable energy, though I anticipate from his lack of agency leadership experience that he’ll be more deferential to political directions than a former governor or CEO.
  4. Cantor Fitzgerald CEO Howard Lutnick was chosen for the Commerce Department, which will dictate tariff proposals. Although Cantor Fitzgerald itself supports the “megatrend” that is the energy transition, I expect China hawkishness to prevail above fear of short-term impact on American renewables projects.
  5. Even with all this, you should expect the deputy picks to matter for solar and wind. Trump 1.0 began with figurehead agency leaders (Ryan Zinke at Interior, Scott Pruitt at EPA) and an empowered assistant administrator, who was usually a former lobbyist or ideologue. I’m anticipating the same here.

New hydrogen hub backing – The Energy Department has announced more than $2.2 billion in cost-sharing agreements with two more hydrogen hubs in the Midwest and Gulf Coast.

  • Both hubs appear to rely on both renewable energy and natural gas to get their jobs done. Given the uncertainty surrounding Trump’s views on hydrogen, it’s likely this move is intended to get out ahead of any effort to claw back funds from the infrastructure law and Inflation Reduction Act.

Here’s what else I’m watching…

A Virginia Circuit Court has struck down Governor Glenn Youngkin’s attempt to withdraw the state from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative.

Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey signed new legislation creating new tax breaks and financing for offshore wind as she defiantly insists the industry will continue to grow during the Trump 2.0 era.

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Spotlight

The Blast Radius of Interior’s Anti-Renewables Order Could Be Huge

Solar and wind projects will take the most heat, but the document leaves open the possibility for damage to spread far and wide.

Wetlands, Donald Trump, and solar panels.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

It’s still too soon to know just how damaging the Interior Department’s political review process for renewables permits will be. But my reporting shows there’s no scenario where the blast radius doesn’t hit dozens of projects at least — and it could take down countless more.

Last week, Interior released a memo that I was first to report would stymie permits for renewable energy projects on and off of federal lands by grinding to a halt everything from all rights-of-way decisions to wildlife permits and tribal consultations. At minimum, those actions will need to be vetted on a project-by-project basis by Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and the office of the Interior deputy secretary — a new, still largely undefined process that could tie up final agency actions in red tape and delay.

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Hotspots

Idaho’s Lava Ridge Wind Farm Faces a New Fight in Congress

We’re looking at battles brewing in New York and Ohio, plus there’s a bit of good news in Virginia.

The United States.
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1. Idaho — The LS Power Lava Ridge wind farm is now facing a fresh assault, this time from Congress — and the Trump team now seems to want a nuclear plant there instead.

  • House Republicans this week advanced an Interior Department appropriations bill that would indefinitely halt federal funding for any permits related to the proposed wind facility “unless and until” the president reviews all of its permits issued under the Biden administration. Biden had completed permitting right before Trump took office.
  • Trump had already ordered a stop to construction on the project as part of a Day 1 flurry of executive orders. But if this policy rider becomes law, it could effectively handcuff any future president after Trump from allowing Lava Ridge to move forward.
  • While Democrats tend to view riders like these unfavorably and attempt to get rid of them, government funding packages require 60 votes in the Senate to break a filibuster, which often means partisan policies from funding bills passed by previous Congresses are challenging to get rid of and can stick around for long stretches of time.
  • By that same logic, one would assume that the need to hit that 60 number now requires Democrats, so wouldn’t they need them and want to ditch this rider? Except one thing: it is exceedingly likely given past congressional fights that the party’s right flank in the House requests fresh concessions. Policy riders like these become chits in that negotiation – and I do expect this one to be an easy sop for this flank given the executive order is already in place.
  • There’s also the whole matter of whether LS Power will try to proceed with this project under a future president amidst increasing pressure on the company. That’s likely why Sawtooth Energy, an energy developer interested in building new small modular nuclear reactors, is now eyeing the project site.

2. Suffolk County, New York — A massive fish market co-op in the Bronx is now joining the lawsuit to stop Equinor’s offshore Empire Wind project, providing anti-wind activists a powerful new ally in the public square.

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Q&A

How to Fight Back Against Anti-Renewable Activists

Getting local with Matthew Eisenson of Columbia Law School’s Sabin Center for Climate Change Law.

The Fight Q&A subject.
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This week’s conversation is with Matthew Eisenson at Columbia Law School’s Sabin Center for Climate Change Law. Eisenson is a legal expert and pioneer in the field of renewable energy community engagement whose work on litigating in support of solar and wind actually contributed to my interest in diving headlong into this subject after we both were panelists at the Society of Environmental Journalists’ annual conference last year. His team at the Sabin Center recently released a report outlining updates to their national project tracker, which looks at various facility-level conflicts at the local level.

On the eve of that report’s release earlier this month, Eisenson talked to me about what he believes are the best practices that could get more renewable projects over the finish line in municipal permitting fights. Oh — and we talked about Ohio.

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