Exclusive: Tom Steyer says Trump won't derail energy transition
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President Trump isn't an existential threat to the energy transition and climate change, investor and climate activist Tom Steyer said Tuesday at an Axios House event during Climate Week NYC.
Why it matters: Steyer's free-market views offer an upbeat contrast to the Trump administration's focus on fossil fuels and nuclear over other clean-energy technologies.
Zoom in: "The energy transition is in full swing," said Steyer, a 2020 presidential aspirant who co-founded and is co-executive chair of investment firm Galvanize.
- Steyer said this year has been Galvanize's best by far: "Profits scale. We want to change the world. We need to do scale."
- Steyer called the importance of the investment tax credits for solar and wind "overrated," in response to a segment asking him to rate actions as overrated, properly rated or underrated.
Steyer also downplayed Trump's threat to global climate change, noting the U.S. is responsible for just 11% of emissions.
- China's use of fossil fuels has peaked, pointed out Steyer: "If China's peaked, the world's peaked."
Yes, but: Steyer acknowledged that regardless of Trump, "we're in a lot of trouble about climate." He expressed hope that young people can lead the way toward solutions.
- "What I see from young people is they are so accustomed to failure. They are so inured to government lack of success that if I say anything negative, they completely turn off. Like 'I know this, I'm already depressed,'" he said.
- "If I talk about solutions, the things I know will work, the way for us to change the future to actually give them a bright future and us a bright future, they turn on like an electric bulb."
What they said: Steyer was more nuanced on his views of specific Trump actions.
- He called the importance of the Trump administration seeking to abandon the endangerment finding underpinning EPA climate regulations as "underrated."
- "The idea that polluting is something that you're not allowed to take into consideration, that really matters," said Steyer. "A true level playing field includes all the costs of production of energy."
- On climate solutions, Steyer called direct air capture "overrated," but that natural methods for carbon removal are "underrated."
Zoom out: While the energy transition economy is in full swing, climate advocates are struggling with "the attention economy," an approach that treats human attention as a scarce commodity.
- Steyer advocates removing intellectual and theoretical arguments for climate, and tying conversations to things that change people's lives like affordable electricity and transportation, clean air, and leading globally.
