Donald Trump’s looming return to the White House has market analysts and environmentalists preparing for a major rift with the current administration’s energy policy. Sputnik asked veteran financial analyst Tom Luongo to weigh in on what’s in store for US energy, and what impact the potential changes will have on the global economy and geopolitics.
Business media and market analysts are watching closely for any news on Donald Trump’s Department of Energy, Interior and Environmental Protection Agency picks after his promises on the campaign trail to fundamentally revamp US energy policy and move away from the Biden White House’s signature multi-trillion dollar ‘green’ agenda.
“I’d end the electric mandate on cars day one. You should have electric, but you got to have gasoline. You gotta have everything. That’ll come off on day one,” Trump told Tucker Carlson in a down-to-the-wire pre-election event in Arizona last week.
“Germany tried to go all green, and they almost destroyed their country,” Trump said. “The problem with the electric cars – and I think they’re great in a smaller application – they don’t go far, they cost too much, and they’re going to be made in China. Three minor problems, okay?”
“But if you listen to this government, they want to make army tanks electric. Because they want to invade countries with their army tanks in a very friendly way from the pollution standpoint,” Trump said. “These people are crazy. No, they want trucks to be all-electric. The problem is they don’t go far…The truckers came in to see me. They say, ‘sir, they want us to go all-electric, and it’ll destroy the industry.’ Why? Because a truck is two-and-a-half times heavier if it’s run by a battery.”
European Union and Chinese flags are pictured during an annual EU-China summit in Brussels, Belgium – Sputnik International, 1920, 30.10.2024
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Along with EV subsidies and mandates and restrictions on traditional hydrocarbons, Trump is widely expected by analysts to resume oil and gas drilling.
Trump and the Politicization of Energy
“Trump is absolutely going to do away with a lot of the restrictions” the US currently has on drilling, and with it the “oil politics” driving the false green energy narrative, veteran market analyst and geopolitical observer Tom Luongo told Sputnik.
“Understand that Trump represents something fundamentally different within the American political circles. I’ve long held the belief that the Biden administration, the Obama administration has been in cahoots with European globalists to affect what we all like to know is Agenda 2030 and this idea that we’re going to destroy oil and gas production and all the rest of that and climate change and all of it. Trump is not down with any of that,” Luongo said.
Trump’s promise to “rebuild America” and the oil drilling policies related to this are in effect saying “look, why don’t we stop with the oil politics? There’s no reason for that. There’s plenty of oil in the world…And there’s an embedded message in that to our partners over in Europe who don’t have any oil. I’ve long made this point that this is part of why they’re so afraid of him. If you look at their agenda, if you look at the whole climate change agenda and the push for EVs and quote unquote ‘renewables’ and all of this stuff, you realize that it’s coming mostly from the people who don’t have any oil and have to buy it on the open market. And that’s mostly Europe,” Luongo said.
Trump vs. Musk on EVs?
Asked how Trump’s EV-related policies may affect his relationship with Elon Musk, the owner of Tesla Motors, with whom he has established a very close relationship, Luongo said he expects no impact, if the federal government opens the door to competition and doesn’t favor or disadvantage one technology or another.
“Musk is okay with electric vehicles competing on the open market. I’m sure he believes that he can compete with internal combustion engines,” Luongo said.
“The problem for everyone is that at this moment in time, the regulations against internal combustion engines in the United States are so onerous that we can barely afford to buy cars. And it’s been done on purpose to shift people towards EVs, which we can’t really run America on because America is too big for that…So, again, this is the distinctly European policy that’s been foisted on us to make us less competitive, so that Europe can continue to be uncompetitive. That’s the big story, and Trump and Musk are, I think, are on the same page about this,” he added.
Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk speaks as Donald Trump listens at a campaign event at the Butler Farm Show, Saturday, Oct. 5, 2024. – Sputnik International, 1920, 09.11.2024
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“Let’s open up oil and gas. Let’s free the car makers to make whatever cars people want and let the free market decide. And that would end 75 to 80 years’ worth of strategic foreign policy as well and have downstream effects on foreign policy as well because there would be no need to be running around the world trying to ‘secure’ everybody else’s oil. The world has enough oil. That’s not the issue,” the observer stressed.
In the energy sector generally, Luongo says, whether its EVs, hybrids, PEM fuel cells, or even small modular nuclear reactors, “the technology is now caught up in many ways to allow all of these things to flourish,” so people should be able to decide what they want with their wallets instead of trying to preserve one particular oligarch’s advantage, and purposely stifling innovation.
Trump’s Energy Trump Card
Asked how Trump’s likely energy policy will impact international relations, including Washington’s particularly rocky relationship with Moscow, including US sanctions on Russian energy, Luongo believes Trump’s going to make the latter issue a “negotiating point.”
“In the long run, I don’t think he really cares. He’s willing to use sanctions, he’s willing to use tariffs. He proved that in his last administration. I think what Trump’s priorities are going to be domestic. He’s made it abundantly clear that he wants to overhaul the tax code. And he wants to overhaul the way money flows into and out of the United States. And he wants it to flow in, not out,” the observer said.
“So in the long run, Trump and Putin will come to an understanding, and Trump will use energy policy as a negotiating tactic with Putin. That makes sense, and he’s going to use every asset at his disposal. Don’t take it personally. That’s what I tell the world, like, ‘these are negotiating tactics, and Trump is crude’. He likes to over ask. It’s just a negotiating tactic. At the end of the day, he will employ whatever leverage he can to do what he wants to do, which is ultimately rebuild America…And that means in the long run that he’s not going to be a pushover in these negotiations, but he also doesn’t have a great hand,” Luongo summed up.
A child gold miner holds a bowl of earth on his head on May 5, 2014 while looking for gold in a traditional mine in the village of Gam, where gold mining in the main business activity of the region – Sputnik International, 1920, 17.12.2023
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