January 21, 2025
🌮 It's been a busy 24 hours, folks. Hang in there for some more thoughts on Trump's first-day executive orders.
🎶 Today's last song comes from Rep. Mark Amodei: "Daniel" by Elton John.
1 big thing: Hill's energy order to-do list
President Trump's slate of executive orders piles onto Hill Republicans' to-do list, Nick writes.
Why it matters: Beginning the rollback of Biden regulations and pausing IRA spending are a big deal. But beyond that, a lot of what Trump seeks to do will hinge on Congress.
Here are four big issues for the Hill …
💵 DPA dollars: The energy emergency order directs agencies to recommend ways to speed up energy production and generation under the Defense Production Act.
- The DPA's toothiest provision allows them to offer up loans and federal purchases to bolster domestic industry — with an appropriation from Congress.
- Democrats threw $500 million at the DPA in the IRA. Republicans called that an overreach, but funding their own DPA efforts could help fast-track fossil fuel and nuclear plants over the backlog of wind, solar and battery projects.
🛢️ Possible drilling drama: Trump's move to reverse the Biden ban offshore drilling ban and "initiate additional leasing" in ANWR could complicate GOP plans to expand oil and gas production as a pay-for in reconciliation.
- The Interior Department still needs to fill in the details, but that could potentially change the budget baseline for leasing expansion provisions in reconciliation.
- If the expansion can be done simply by EO, "then it is an executive action that would generate receipts and therefore would not be available (scoreable) to Congress to use in reconciliation," Bill Hoagland, a budget expert at the Bipartisan Policy Center, said in an email.
- We expect this to remain a huge issue for reconciliation.
📝 NEPA flip-flops: Trump is trying to expedite permitting, mostly for fossil fuels. But he'll need legislative help.
- The "energy dominance" order rescinds the Carter-era EO that forms the basis for CEQ's NEPA implementing regulations. It starts a process to once again rewrite them after they flipped back and forth during the first Trump and Biden administrations.
- The White House will also be drawing up recommendations to Congress to "facilitate the permitting and construction of interstate energy transportation and other critical energy infrastructure."
- But ironically, Trump also cites "inadequate" NEPA reviews as a reason to halt federal offshore wind leasing.
- It's clear that lawmakers will need to step in if they expect any kind of long-term consistency on permitting laws.
💨 Wind addendum: The offshore wind industry will need Congress to get out of Trump's crosshairs.
- Federal law requires five-year leasing plans for oil and gas, and the Biden administration had moved forward with one for wind.
- The Manchin-Barrasso permitting bill would have required Interior to hold at least one offshore wind lease sale per year from 2025 to 2029 and establish a 30 GW national goal for generation.
- That bill's now dead — but expect that proposed provision to loom large over the Hill permitting debate.
2. Scoop: Wright on the record
Energy Secretary nominee Chris Wright promised senators a "full review" of Biden-era requirements for federal funding that he said may be discriminatory, Nick, Daniel and Axios' Ben Geman write.
Why it matters: Wright's written responses to congressional questions, obtained by Axios, provide more color following his mostly friendly Senate confirmation hearing last week.
Driving the news: Wright's response to Energy and Natural Resources Chair Mike Lee focused on the Biden requirement that applicants to grant programs file plans with the agency that spell out workforce and environmental benefits for communities.
- Lee suggested those plans "could require discrimination and other actions of dubious legality."
- Wright said he plans to "direct a full review of DOE requirements imposed in recent years for DOE issued awards to ensure the federal government is not funding or requiring actions that could result in discrimination."
- He also vowed last week to "immediately" assess ethics allegations within the DOE loan program that caused the agency IG to demand a halt to new loans.
Zoom in: Wright also said he sees "no reason" to continue the DOE's LNG pause, which Trump already rolled back shortly after his inauguration. He signaled that more LNG approvals lie ahead.
- "The first thing that needs to happen is to support the very capable program staff to actually do their jobs, and DOE's decisions on the export applications will soon follow."
The big picture: Wright punted on questions related to Biden-era programs.
- To one question from Sen. Ron Wyden about the Loan Programs Office, he replied, "I look forward to learning more about DOE's Loan Guarantee Program and other DOE programs directed by Congress."
- He also didn't directly answer questions about whether he'd keep the direct air capture and hydrogen hubs, or other programs in the DOE's Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations portfolio, saying he would "evaluate OCED's awarded projects."
What's next: ENR has scheduled a Thursday vote on Wright's nomination.
3. Catch me up: More on confirmations
🗣️ 1. Burgum action: In addition to Wright, ENR will mark up Interior pick Doug Burgum's nomination Thursday morning.
👀 2. Don't forget Lee Zeldin: Also Thursday morning, Senate Environment and Public will vote on the EPA nominee.
🌲 3. Fix our floor: Rep. Bruce Westerman's Fix our Forests Act is likely to get a floor vote this week, with a Rules Committee meeting on the bill scheduled this afternoon.
✅ Thank you for reading Axios Pro Policy, and thanks to editors Chuck McCutcheon and David Nather and copy editor Brad Bonhall.
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