#MetalMatters: Energy Policy
“In all affairs it’s a healthy thing now and then to hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted.” – philosopher, social critic, mathematician, and historian Bertrand Russell
In the United States, we are deep into hurricane season. My thoughts are with the families and companies who are desperately trying to recover from Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton. So many people lost homes and businesses and it is utterly disorienting to be without cell phone service, clean water, and power.
As a first world country, we take charging our phones and computers, ice cold refrigerators, and functioning stoplights for granted. But I’m with Bertrand Russell: it’s time to hang a question mark on this thing, energy, that we expect to be there no matter what. So, for my fourth and final column of 2024, I’d like to contemplate energy policy.
After all, keeping the lights on is what business is all about. (Side note: If you missed my three prior election year columns, they are here, here, and here. Each provides an overview of where MSCI stands on major issues and asks MSCI members to respectfully debate these matters, even if we disagree, before heading out to vote.)
The Metals Service Center Institute’s (MSCI) Take On Energy Policy
As an organization, MSCI is energy agnostic. That doesn’t mean we do not care about energy policy — we do, deeply. Energy agnosticism means we recognize that while the United States must reduce its carbon footprint, we cannot do so overnight by eliminating certain energy sources from the mix. To provide sustainable, affordable, and reliable energy to homes and businesses, policymakers must foster the development of nuclear, oil and gas, solar, and other renewable sources.
As proud stewards of our natural resources, our members mills and service centers are committed to reducing their carbon footprint. MSCI supports policies that both protect our environment and provide a stable energy supply. Today’s innovative technologies offer the latitude to produce energy from all sources in an increasingly environmentally friendly way.
Unsure about the veracity of that statement? As we reported in Connecting the Dots, a recent study by the bipartisan nonprofit organization Third Way determined that streamlining the federal permitting process for both clean energy and fossil fuel infrastructure projects would lead to a “significant” drop in global greenhouse gas emissions.
Read the report at this link.
As such, MSCI supports an all-of-the-above energy strategy that protects the country’s energy security by expanding domestic energy production to efficiently and affordably deliver power to our nation’s industrial metals industry. We believe prosperity breeds the creation of new, cleaner, and less wasteful technologies and strengthens the demand for them. Policies that fuel growth, rather than reactionary and impractical regulations and taxes, are the path to a cleaner, safer environment.
How The Two Parties Differ On Energy Policy
Before examining each presidential candidates’ plan for energy policy, please remember MSCI does not endorse candidates. I am providing this information so members can reflect on it, debate it, and ask questions about the policies candidates are discussing.
When Vice President Kamala Harris was selected as the Democratic presidential candidate just a couple of months ago, her stance on an all-of-the-above energy policy was not clear.
She resolved those questions somewhat in her September debate with former President Donald Trump. Harris, who previously had called for a ban on hydraulic fracturing, made it clear fossil fuels are not going anywhere. When campaigning for the Democratic nomination in 2020, her positions were very progressive, but this year her policies are more centrist. As Politico reported, Harris now touts the fact that the country had reached record oil and gas production under the Biden administration. Politico said, “While President Joe Biden has largely avoided that kind of ‘all-of-the-above’ rhetoric … Harris wielded it to counter Donald Trump’s accusations that she would ban fracking.”
Politico also has reported there are signs Harris may be open to increasing oil production on public lands. Specifically, “Harris has twice boasted that her tie-breaking vote on Democrats’ massive climate law opened new leasing for fossil fuels.” Harris also has said the country needs to “invest in diverse sources of energy.”
Former President Trump also supports energy development from multiple sources, though his policy would come with a greater emphasis on fossil fuels.
According to experts at the Brookings Institution who are tracking the candidates’ policies, Trump’s specific proposals include increasing domestic oil and gas production, refilling the strategic petroleum reserve, ending the Biden administration’s delays of federal drilling permits and leases on federal lands, and speeding up the approval of natural gas pipelines.
At the same time, Trump “has expressed strong opposition to several renewable energy initiatives, claiming that renewable energy is unreliable and costly,” the Brookings scholars write. Specifically, the former president has promised to halt offshore wind development.
One place where the two candidates agree? Nuclear power. According to Brookings, “Trump’s position on nuclear power is similar to that of the Biden administration; he supports keeping existing nuclear reactors operating and continuing the development of small modular reactors.”
When it comes to energy production, Thomas Edison, the person who first conjured electric light in 1879, once said, “I’d put my money on the sun and solar energy. What a source of power! I hope we don’t have to wait until oil and coal run out before we tackle that. I wish I had more years left.”
Sadly, Edison cannot help the country’s leaders marshal the next energy revolution, but MSCI is proud to take those words to heart and to advocate for an all-of-the-above energy policy.