Galvanize Climate Solutions Co-Founder Tom Steyer discusses the renewable energy and the outlook for energy in 2025 under President-elect Donald Trump. Steyer spoke with Bloomberg's Scarlet Fu.
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The current administration, the Biden White House is setting an ambitious pledge to cut greenhouse gas emissions over sixty percent by twenty thirty five. Now whether that's feasible is obviously in question. With Donald Trump said to dissolve US climate regulations. Tom Sire of Galvani's Climate Solutions writes, twenty twenty five is not about climate, It's about energy demand. Renewables should be at the center of new energy built, no matter your political persuasion, Tom, I'm pleased to say joins us now you're excited about the year ahead because of that idea. I'm curious, have you talked to anyone in the incoming Trump administration or of that party's persuasion that convinces you that they see things similarly.
Well, I haven't talked to anybody directly in the administration. I've talked to a bunch of Republicans in Congress and Republicans who are advising the administration. I would say what I'm seeing is what's driving energy is markets, costs, international competitiveness, national security, and those are things. There's going to be a lot of political talk. There is a lot of political talk, the words drill, baby, driller, you know, renewed part of the American conversation. But what we're really seeing is the differential in costs. So if you look at renewables are cheaper. Now, if you're following where natural gas is, and we're talking a lot about the more demand for electricity in the United States and around the world, renewables are cheaper. What we're seeing is they're continuing to get much cheaper at the same time that natural gas in the United States. I don't know how closely you guys follow it. It was three dollars in eighty six cents and mcf this morning. That's almost double where it was. And in fact, in Europe natural gas is twelve dollars in eighty six cents in mcf. So when we talk about exporting liquefied natural gas to Europe, it's because we want to sell something that we can sell at three dollars and eighty six cents for twelve dollars in eighty six cents across the pond. Obviously, that's going to push the cost of American natural gas up. So when we really look at international competitiveness for the United States of America in electricity. When we look at it in terms of cars, what we can see is the markets, business economics are driving us to clean energy. That's where we're going. There's nothing political talk can do about it. That's what the costs say. That's international competitives. That's how we're going to win.
Okay, So the cost structure that you believe will make the argument for us, which industries are going to make that case to the White House, the incoming White House, because they're looking at the energy industry, the oil production and gas companies, and they're saying, you know, we're going to move forward. We're going to go explore and look for oil in all these different places, the Arctic wherever.
For all the industries, including AI that are demanding electricity, they're going to want the cheapest electricity because that's what it's a huge driver of how they compete internationally. And the cheapest electricity is going to be renewable. That's true here and it's true around the world. So when we talk about the idea about moving back to fossil fuels, the implication is somehow fossil fuels are cheaper. They're not cheaper, they're already more expensive. In twenty twenty three, eighty six percent of new electricity generation in the whole world was renewable. They weren't doing it to be nice. It's all about international competitiveness and national security. The sun is going to keep shining, the wind is going to keep blowing, regardless of what political people do. So this is something that's going to be driven by business decisions, and honestly, I think the Trump administration will get behind it because that's what's going to drive American competitiveness.
When I talk to Republicans, they say that they just want the market to decide and they're above all in for all energy across the spectrum. Do you think deregulation that this Income administration talks about will help renewables as well as much as it's going to help the fossils.
There's no doubt about it. There is no doubt why.
Moving Biden didn't lean into that, and the deregulation.
Well, I think he did lean into it. But I think that this is a difficult problem because it's a political problem, and it includes people on the left who want to make sure that everything we do in terms of sighting and permitting is done perfectly. I think that the Trump administration, because they really want to permit new oil and gas drilling, are going to be pushing for faster permits and lower oversight. And I think that if that goes, including to renewables, what we're going to see is an explosion of low cost, abundant renewable energy. That's what we're going to see.
You say the US is short energy next year.
How how is that true?
Yeah, We're the biggest crude producer in the entire world. We have an abundance. We're an exporterer.
So if you look at so let's talk about crude for a second. We produce thirteen and a half million barrels of oil every single day. We're the biggest producer of oil in the world. We're the biggest producer of oil in the history of the world. If we do everything that the Trump administration wants to do in terms of Alaska opening up those lines, in more than five years from now, we'll go from thirteen and a half million barrels a day to fourteen Give me a break, that's the big revolution. Thirteen and a half to fourteen and five years. Mental points. No, it's hardly any change and in the context of a world that uses one hundred and two million barrels a day. So when you really look at what's going on in this world, we're going to have to produce a lot more electricity, and that's something which is going to come from renewables. If you look at oil demand, the developed world has already peaked its oil demand. China is going to be peaking its fossil fuel demand in twenty twenty seven. That is not something where demand is going to be growing. Electricity demand is growing dramatically. Gasoline usage is either flat or going down.
They're three mile.
Yes, tech companies are now going after their own electricity electricity. I do think there's more for nuclear.
Look, the question in nuclear is simple. There's the question about toxicity, nuclear waste. There's a question about making sure you don't have a true disaster, which is what Free Mile Island is normally associated with. And there's cost. And there are two kinds of nuclear. But we're talking now about fission, which is the kind of nuclear energy that we've been using for decades and that France uses so much of, and then we still use a lot of the question with fission has been every time that people have tried to bring fishing on in the United States, it hasn't been cheap. If you look at the last nuclear plant to be brought up, it was brought up in Georgia, and I honestly think it was something at least four x the original cost, very very expensive energy. In fact, that's energy that is very expensive versus renewables that are very cheap. It's a little more. It's more complicated that because you have to talk about base load energy. But I'm just saying, if you look at nuclear energy, the promise has been there for a long time that it would be abundant and cheap, but they've never gotten it to be cheap.
So can these big tech companies get the energy they need from renewable energy? I mean, is there enough of that right now? Or there's no.
Question there's enough. The question about electricity, and particularly electricity for AI, is it has to be available twenty four to seven, three sixty five with absolute certainty, no interruptions, no brain So the real issue here is how much base load energy, stuff that you can definitely call on at any time, do you need and where's that going to come from? Can it come from batteries, Can it come from hydro, can it come from nuclear, Can it come from fossil fuels? And can it come from enhanced geo thermal. There are a lot of different questions, There are a lot of pull with different answers, and you know, everybody's trying and everybody wants to get baseload energy that's really cheap, and you know, we have some I have some opinions about that, but the proof of the pudding is going to be in the eating. Who can really produce it? How much can they produce and can it be completely reliable?
All right, Tom stars setting us up for a discussion that we'll be having for the years to come. Tom, appreciate your joining us today. Tom's great time to be here with galvanized Energy.