Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2: US Energy Secretary Chris Wright speaking with Bloomberg Television anchor
Speaker 2: and Marie Hordern at the Bloomberg Energy Security Executive Briefing.
Speaker 2: Let's take a listen right now, blowing off nuclear bombs
Speaker 2: right now, let's just forget about it and move on.
Speaker 2: But he wasn't willing to do that. He was he said,
Speaker 2: we have to solve that problem. I'm not going to
Speaker 2: hand my credit my successor a nuclear armed to Ron.
Speaker 2: And so there's dialogue back. Of course, you know they
Speaker 2: for forty seven years, they are wedded to being to
Speaker 2: becoming nuclear armed and for whatever crazy reason, to export
Speaker 2: their Islamic revolution and change the whole world. Everyone converted
Speaker 2: or dead. It's an ideology that doesn't work well with
Speaker 2: other nations, with other people, and of course disastrous for
Speaker 2: the ninety million Iranians that live under that regime. So
Speaker 2: that's sort of the broader backdrop.
Speaker 1: I guess it's just hard to understand if is this
Speaker 1: a real inflection point, only because the President has said
Speaker 1: about forty times then since this conflict started that we
Speaker 1: were close to a peace deal, and then a peace
Speaker 1: deal never happened.
Speaker 2: Iran says things that they'll agree to, things that work
Speaker 2: for us, and then they don't, you know. And of course, look,
Speaker 2: the regime is fragmented, there's different power sources there, so
Speaker 2: it's a complex situation. And he's a negotiator too, right,
Speaker 2: So you've got to understand the communications share information, they
Speaker 2: also share messaging. But the one piece of leverage, the
Speaker 2: only piece of meaningful leverage Iran has had, has been
Speaker 2: to interrupt the flows of energy flowing out of the
Speaker 2: Persian Gulf. Right we had twenty million barrels a day
Speaker 2: round numbers flowing out before the conflict started through the
Speaker 2: East West Pipeline and the UAE pipeline. Close to five
Speaker 2: million barrels of that has been diverted. We've got increased production.
Speaker 2: It was pretty easy to do a few other places.
Speaker 2: I think in round numbers you had maybe a fourteen
Speaker 2: million barrel a day flow gap, which is a big
Speaker 2: flow gap of oil going out of the going out
Speaker 2: of the gulf. At the start of this conflict or
Speaker 2: early on in this conflict. We have a military effort
Speaker 2: that we've not talked a lot about that started more
Speaker 2: recently to get cargoes out, you know, because we President
Speaker 2: Trump said at the beginning, they're not going to have
Speaker 2: a newcre weapon, and we'll restore energy flows in the
Speaker 2: United States whither or without Iran. He always prefers the
Speaker 2: diplomatic arm and he works tirelessly on that. But we
Speaker 2: also have the we have the most powerful military in
Speaker 2: the world. We've destroyed most but not all, of their
Speaker 2: military capabilities, and we're just going to restore flows ourself.
Speaker 2: It flows today a close approaching half of the gap,
Speaker 2: and their rising. Ultimately, we will restore flows with or
Speaker 2: without them.
Speaker 3: So seven million bars a day are getting out right now.
Speaker 2: That's a rough estimate, rough average of where we are
Speaker 2: right now, and it's rising.
Speaker 3: So what kind is this oil?
Speaker 2: Is it products makes the tube?
Speaker 3: And it's being done with the US military?
Speaker 2: Correct?
Speaker 1: So are ships turning off their transponders or is the
Speaker 1: military escorting them?
Speaker 3: Is it by how air? Is it by suh?
Speaker 2: Most of them? It's hard to transport crude by air well,
Speaker 2: but I mean protective. But but yes, the military protection
Speaker 2: is there. It's actually it's actually going remarkably well. And
Speaker 2: of course this is just the US innovation, US military
Speaker 2: power solving a problem and h and we'll continue to
Speaker 2: solve that problem. So think of that impact that has
Speaker 2: on the dynamics if I'm in Iran, And of course
Speaker 2: what are they They're not concerned about Iranian people, right
Speaker 2: They're concerned about their regime and their selves personally, so
Speaker 2: they have a little bit of a narrower focus on
Speaker 2: what they care about. But they've thought they have this
Speaker 2: great leverage over the United States of America. Of course
Speaker 2: there isn't really leverage over US. It's leverage over the
Speaker 2: world economy. But they're losing that leverage right now. They
Speaker 2: are rapidly and will continue to lose that leverage. So
Speaker 2: you would think that their urgency to do a deal
Speaker 2: is rising, and it is rising they realize, you know,
Speaker 2: the jig is going to be up before too long.
Speaker 2: What can they get?
Speaker 1: How much Iranian crued is getting out right now?
Speaker 2: Zero?
Speaker 3: No Irunnan crew is able to escape.
Speaker 1: So this deal were to happen, would the United States
Speaker 1: let Iranian crewed go through the straight up FROMOS.
Speaker 2: Well, it depends on the deal, but of course that
Speaker 2: is a that is a give. We would certainly be
Speaker 2: willing to do absolutely, you know, if Ron gets rid
Speaker 2: of their nuclear program achieves what we want us to do. Yeah,
Speaker 2: their creud would be allowed to flow again, absolutely, so that.
Speaker 3: Of sanctions basically on Ronnie and oil.
Speaker 2: Their crude was flowing before, you know, during sanctions. Unfortunately,
Speaker 2: the same thing in Venezuela. You know, the world puts
Speaker 2: sanctions on then the world doesn't enforce the sanctions because
Speaker 2: it's hard to enforce sanctions. But if you really believe
Speaker 2: in the sanctions, you need to enforce them. So you
Speaker 2: could see partial lifting of sanctions on Iran would likely
Speaker 2: be on the give side for the United States.
Speaker 1: According to Iranian press, the deal says within thirty days,
Speaker 1: the street would open, the blockade would be lifted. Is
Speaker 1: that your understanding? And if it is true, what does
Speaker 1: it look like then in thirty days, if we're already
Speaker 1: getting seven million barrels through, how much higher could you
Speaker 1: see the flow rate?
Speaker 2: I mean, the flowage would return to whatever's commercially you
Speaker 2: know makes sense there. So, but you know that you're
Speaker 2: clearly going to see after this conflict people to say
Speaker 2: Iran can never play that card again. You'll probably see
Speaker 2: some new pipeline infrastructure built. You'll certainly see continue to
Speaker 2: innovates in military technology from the United States to defang
Speaker 2: more easily and more quickly Iran's ability to interrupt the
Speaker 2: flows as they've done there. But yeah, before too. Certainly,
Speaker 2: after an agreement is reached, you'll see free flow of
Speaker 2: traffic of all products out of the golf or whatever.
Speaker 2: You'll see that either way. If there is no deal
Speaker 2: with Iran, eventually we would restore that militarily full flow
Speaker 2: as well.
Speaker 1: Prices have been relatively depressed given the intensity of the conflict.
Speaker 1: I believe we're down twenty percent on Brent since April.
Speaker 1: Prices this morning we're in the eighties. What is the
Speaker 1: driving force behind this?
Speaker 2: It's amazing the difference in attitude and positioning of a president.
Speaker 2: President Trump came into office and said, I want lower
Speaker 2: energy prices, I want more energy production. I want to
Speaker 2: embrace American allies around the world and the Persian golf
Speaker 2: energy producers. I should never call it person golf, the
Speaker 2: Arabian golf. I slipped up there. But the Biden administration,
Speaker 2: you know, you know, scorned them, said We're going to
Speaker 2: end the hydrocarbon industry. You know, just that rhetoric, that
Speaker 2: chilling rhetoric, that shunning of our allies. When Russia invaded Ukraine,
Speaker 2: there was almost no interruption of flow of Russian cruit.
Speaker 2: There was natural gas via pipeline into Europe, but there
Speaker 2: was not a meaningful reduction of Russian oil or oil
Speaker 2: product exports. And we had gasoline prices a dollar a
Speaker 2: gallon higher than than we have today with this large
Speaker 2: interruption of flows. I think that's President Trump's leadership in
Speaker 2: saying we care about energizing the world, and we're going
Speaker 2: to do whatever it takes to supply the world. You know,
Speaker 2: obviously we were released, not just in the United States
Speaker 2: but around the world stocks from strategic petroleum reserves fed
Speaker 2: two extensions of the Jonzac Waiver to allow crude supply
Speaker 2: from the Gulf Coast where it's coming from your region.
Speaker 3: Well, you do another extension. Actually, that's an audience question.
Speaker 2: It's we'll do whatever it takes to keep energy prices
Speaker 2: as low as possible for the American people. California has
Speaker 2: chosen to impose on their people wildly high gasoline, diesel
Speaker 2: and electricity prices just crazy, and so a lot of
Speaker 2: people would say, well, we shouldn't care. That's a blue state.
Speaker 2: We're here for three hundred and forty million Americans in
Speaker 2: every state across the country. So the Jone Jack Waiver
Speaker 2: has been enormously helpful for California in the West Coast,
Speaker 2: the northeast coast of the United States as well. So
Speaker 2: it's allowing the free flow of that traffic that we
Speaker 2: turn back on a platform producing fifty thousand barrels a
Speaker 2: day offshore California wells are already there, infrastructure is already there.
Speaker 2: It grew California oil production by twenty percent. That's a
Speaker 2: big deal. That's a meaningful amount of flows, and it
Speaker 2: sends a message that this administration is going to help
Speaker 2: the flow of energy around the world. People are surprised
Speaker 2: they're oil prices throughout all this have not gone to
Speaker 2: the extreme levels many expected.
Speaker 1: Isn't also because China is cutting some of their imports.
Speaker 3: Was there a conversation.
Speaker 1: Between the Chinese and the White House about this?
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a lot of conversations between the White House
Speaker 2: and the Chinese, and I won't talk about that. But
Speaker 2: you saw at the start of the conflict, China was
Speaker 2: a massive They actually stepped up their purchases of crude oil,
Speaker 2: and as you see now they're in a very different
Speaker 2: position where they've stopped building their spr they've turned down
Speaker 2: some refineris. China has been a meaningful part of the
Speaker 2: of the balancing force in this crisis.
Speaker 1: There was a recent Washington Post article actually was yesterday
Speaker 1: about oil executives telling the White House and warning them
Speaker 1: that potentially prices are going to go higher soon, or
Speaker 1: living on inventories.
Speaker 3: Where do you see the inventories right now? How low
Speaker 3: are we?
Speaker 2: You know, it's different in different places. It's different in
Speaker 2: oil inventories in the last few weeks in a arising
Speaker 2: and so in the United States we have stepped in
Speaker 2: to fill this void. We've seen incredible response from American
Speaker 2: oil and gas companies, not just raising production but raising
Speaker 2: refinery throughput to a significant scale. In fact, if you
Speaker 2: look at the May data, the United States was by
Speaker 2: far the world's largest export of crude oil five point
Speaker 2: four million barrels a day, Russia a little over four million,
Speaker 2: study Arabia a little under four million. But United States
Speaker 2: producers have stepped up and from our reserves and from
Speaker 2: other stores to try to supply not just America but
Speaker 2: the world. But we've also had the benefit of you know,
Speaker 2: average gasoline prices in the US a little over four
Speaker 2: dollars a gallon. It's a little under ten dollars a
Speaker 2: gallon in Europe and in Asia. So we've been much
Speaker 2: We have not been completely isolated from the impacts of this,
Speaker 2: but we have been much more isolated than everyone else
Speaker 2: that's leaning in and being pro energy. That's Trump administration
Speaker 2: energy policy.
Speaker 1: Has there been an ask or pressure in the White
Speaker 1: House on the industry to produce more.
Speaker 2: Pressure is the wrong word, but but of course we
Speaker 2: dialogue with industry across all sectors in this economy. We're
Speaker 2: not they're pursuing some crazy agenda, as unfortunately the Biden
Speaker 2: administration was. We're there to engage with American businesses and
Speaker 2: help them grow their businesses, whether they're building artificial intelligence
Speaker 2: factories or new manufacturing plants, or oil and gas or
Speaker 2: coal or electricity of any kinds. We want to see
Speaker 2: America thrive. We want to see energy production increase. We
Speaker 2: want to see prices that consumers go down. We want
Speaker 2: to see competitiveness to do business in the United States grow,
Speaker 2: higher wages, lower costs.
Speaker 1: But there is a concern that potentially if we're running
Speaker 1: low on inventories and say we don't get a piece
Speaker 1: deal this weekend, and we're back to potentially strikes or
Speaker 1: this linger. The President in a recent interview said it
Speaker 1: could be closed until September. Then what happens if we
Speaker 1: get higher gasoline prices.
Speaker 3: In America closer to five dollars a gallon.
Speaker 2: Look, we've done everything we can since the day it
Speaker 2: started to both fix the existential problem. A nuclear armed
Speaker 2: Iran becomes a much larger threat to energy supplies, to peace,
Speaker 2: to commerce that people just don't appreciate how critical that
Speaker 2: issue is. So to solve that fundamental problem, it's coming
Speaker 2: at disruptions, it's coming at some costs. I think the
Speaker 2: Trump administration has managed them fabulously well. I think we'll
Speaker 2: continue to do that. We may use different levers going forward,
Speaker 2: but we will do everything we can to get through
Speaker 2: to achieve the fundamental objective that we will not fail on.
Speaker 1: So what kind of levers? There's rumors months ago about
Speaker 1: an export ban. I know you said that's not happening.
Speaker 1: That will never happen.
Speaker 2: No export bans, No export bans. A couple of reasons
Speaker 2: number what we produce more than we consume. So what
Speaker 2: do we get shut in our wells and reduce our
Speaker 2: production down. That number two is a large part of
Speaker 2: the Trump administration diplomacy is to make America an energy superpower,
Speaker 2: which means to be a reliable supplier to our friends
Speaker 2: and allies abroad of oil, of natural gas, of coal,
Speaker 2: of next generation nuclear power plants, of fusion energy technology.
Speaker 2: We want to develop energy resources in this country to
Speaker 2: benefit Americans and to benefit our trade balance abroad, and
Speaker 2: support our allies so they don't have to depend upon
Speaker 2: an unstable hostiles.
Speaker 1: There was a recent Reuter's pull that showed eighty percent
Speaker 1: of Americans say the current gas prices are straining their
Speaker 1: household budget. Is the administration still pushing congres look at
Speaker 1: a gas tax holiday, especially over the summer.
Speaker 2: Trade offs in all of these issues, but the overriding
Speaker 2: objective is lower energy costs for Americans across the board.
Speaker 2: Is that a s I mean?
Speaker 3: Is it still one of the tools in the toolbox.
Speaker 2: It's possible. It's possible.
Speaker 3: Do you think Congress has the votes? You probably have
Speaker 3: to do it before the midterms.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Look, my bigger effort, my bigger effort right now
Speaker 2: in Congress is permitting reform. We want to leave behind
Speaker 2: as much permanent change as we can, so we won't
Speaker 2: go back to the energy foolishness we suffered under the
Speaker 2: Biden administration and it began under the Obama administration. We
Speaker 2: just got to stop this mindset that's somehow making energy
Speaker 2: expensive in the United States and exporting our industries is
Speaker 2: somehow going to save the world from climate change. I've
Speaker 2: been looking at data and studying climate change for twenty years.
Speaker 2: It's just amazing how that issue, a real issue, but
Speaker 2: sort of a slow moving, actually not that big deal
Speaker 2: of a problem, has just become so politically dominant among
Speaker 2: the left in the United States and of course across
Speaker 2: the board in Europe. I think we are moving that
Speaker 2: tie back. Just got to get back to focusing. It
Speaker 2: is human big thing.
Speaker 1: You hear a lot of Democrats now, especially ahead of
Speaker 1: the midterms, especially out of twenty twenty eight, saying we
Speaker 1: should focus energy more about using an all of energy
Speaker 1: approach because they want to talk about affordability, less so
Speaker 1: about climate change. When it comes though to policies that
Speaker 1: the United States could do besides the Jones Waiver Act,
Speaker 1: anything else that you think could be pretty short term
Speaker 1: on the horizon for this summer.
Speaker 2: Things we're talking about, but not We look through ideas
Speaker 2: and decide if they're viable, and we'll come out and
Speaker 2: engage in that. But of course it is a constant
Speaker 2: dialogue with energy producers here. How can we be helpful
Speaker 2: like the you know EPA, we change the regulations for
Speaker 2: blending for gasoline this summer. That's going to meaningfully increase
Speaker 2: America's ability to produce gasoline with our existing refinery capacity.
Speaker 2: That's going to be helpful.
Speaker 1: There's also the drawdown the spr Do you have plans
Speaker 1: to refill it?
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's another I would say start contrast, the previous
Speaker 2: administration sold two hundred million barrels of oil without an
Speaker 2: interruption of flow around the world, trying to push down
Speaker 2: prices for a midterm election. We've not sold a single
Speaker 2: barrel of oil. Every barrel of oil we have released
Speaker 2: has been a trade. It's been an exchange for a
Speaker 2: barrel coming back. And the exchanges we completed so far
Speaker 2: this is not the current ones that are going on
Speaker 2: right now. I don't have the data on them, but
Speaker 2: today every barrel we've released, we've gotten one point two
Speaker 2: eight barrels coming back. So that's thirty five to forty
Speaker 2: million barrels of additional crew that'll be in the SPR
Speaker 2: at no cost to American taxpayers.
Speaker 1: Where do you think the SPR will be at the
Speaker 1: end of Trump's term?
Speaker 2: Much fuller than it was before we arrived. I would
Speaker 2: like it to be completely full. That's what it's there
Speaker 2: for the first price.
Speaker 1: Level that you would want to go out and fill
Speaker 1: it up more.
Speaker 2: If there was I certainly wouldn't share it. But but
Speaker 2: but also it's not as simple as that. You know,
Speaker 2: you've got to get money from Congress to fill the
Speaker 2: SPR and that's very challenging. There's not a great political
Speaker 2: constituency that wants to spend money today, you know, to
Speaker 2: prepare us for a problem way down the road, which
Speaker 2: is exactly why no previous president would take a RAN
Speaker 2: head on, like in the short term. It's disruptive fixing
Speaker 2: long term problems. That's tough to do in politics. That's
Speaker 2: a unique thing about President Trump. He has the courage
Speaker 2: to take on this Iranian issue where all the news
Speaker 2: is short term. He's terrible, Iran's winning and all that's
Speaker 2: all it's all wrong, it's all nonsense. We are living
Speaker 2: with higher energy prices. He takes all the negative, but
Speaker 2: people don't, certainly in the media in general, don't think
Speaker 2: about these long term issues. He's engaging in a long
Speaker 2: term strategic issue that's going to better not just the
Speaker 2: Middle East but the world for generations to come. And
Speaker 2: he's taken whatever the heat comes, you know, through a
Speaker 2: higher prices. But I think he's managed that quite well.
Speaker 2: So there's impacts are real, but again less impact on
Speaker 2: prices than just the foolish policies and rhetoric of the
Speaker 2: Biden administration.
Speaker 1: Do you think the psychology has changed? It used to
Speaker 1: be that OPAQ, Saudi Arabia, now the UAE has left,
Speaker 1: was the swing producer, the central bank of oil.
Speaker 3: Why wouldn't it be the United States?
Speaker 2: Well, we produce far, far more than Saudi would be.
Speaker 2: In fact, you know the way people report one hundred
Speaker 2: million to one hundred and five million barrels of demand,
Speaker 2: that's liquid fuels. KRUDEL is the biggest component of that,
Speaker 2: but it's just one piece of that. If you look
Speaker 2: at total liquid fuels, the United States is twenty four
Speaker 2: million barrels a day of production in a world of
Speaker 2: about one hundred and five hundred and six million of demand.
Speaker 2: So yeah, we are the big dog in energy production,
Speaker 2: but it's all by businesses here. We don't decide at
Speaker 2: a government level our production levels, so we never play
Speaker 2: a role as a short term swing producer. We do
Speaker 2: lean in as we are right now. But I think
Speaker 2: Saudi Arabia's role in the oil markets likely will continue
Speaker 2: as it has. They have been willing and with a
Speaker 2: few partners, but mostly Saudi Arabia, they have played a
Speaker 2: sort of central bank role of oil. I think the
Speaker 2: net impact of that overall has been positive.
Speaker 1: But do you think their hand has been weakened with
Speaker 1: the amoradis leaving the group?
Speaker 2: Sure? Sure, sure, less less oil will be controlled in
Speaker 2: that Opek fashion. UAE is a major oil producer, super
Speaker 2: successful economy in that country, and they're investing and growing
Speaker 2: their productive capacity. Kuwait is leaning in and growing their
Speaker 2: productive capacity. People are just getting out of this silly mindset,
Speaker 2: like the goal was to hit peak demand for oil,
Speaker 2: right and then we're all, that's seven billion people that
Speaker 2: don't live like us, Sorry about them. You know, It's
Speaker 2: just crazy how much how far off a human focused
Speaker 2: and a a focused dialogue we're in I'm thrilled that
Speaker 2: the world is swinging back to common sense. It's thinking
Speaker 2: long term. We need massively more oil in the world,
Speaker 2: massively more natural gas, massively more energy to continue to
Speaker 2: grow our economy, to reindustrialize our industry, and to lift
Speaker 2: everyone's standard of living up around the world.
Speaker 3: An audience question. Also thing I'm curious to.
Speaker 1: Get your take on, is American investment regarding Venezuela.
Speaker 3: I was there in krocacy.
Speaker 1: You were the first secretary to go to Venezuela since
Speaker 1: the capturing of Nicholas Maduro.
Speaker 3: What is the status now?
Speaker 1: When was the last time you spoke to Delsea Rodriguez?
Speaker 1: Do you expect more American companies to go produce?
Speaker 2: There lots of American companies going down there, a lot
Speaker 2: of business we are working. My team and including myself
Speaker 2: is in regular communication with Delcea. You know, twenty five
Speaker 2: years go in the wrong direction. You know that that's
Speaker 2: it is. As another case, amazing how low it's sunk,
Speaker 2: eight million people leaving, millions leaving Venezuela to go to
Speaker 2: poorer countries. So you know, is it Norway today? It's
Speaker 2: not Norway yet, But the pivot that change into the
Speaker 2: improvement in the conditions in Venezuela is going quite well
Speaker 2: right now. A lot of work to be done there,
Speaker 2: but oil exports out of Venezuela have more than doubled
Speaker 2: since January second of this year, so that's also helpful.
Speaker 2: And of course, when most of the American refineries were
Speaker 2: built in the sixties and seventies, Venezuela was the largest
Speaker 2: export of oil in the world, third largest producer, biggest
Speaker 2: oil exporter, so a lot of our refineries were built
Speaker 2: to handle those lower cost, high viscosity cruds. So it's
Speaker 2: great news to see that production growing. I think you
Speaker 2: will see tremendous growth in Venezuelan production in the coming years.
Speaker 1: Another question from the audience is about the surge and
Speaker 1: power demand for data centers.
Speaker 3: Why is the Trump administration.
Speaker 1: Not embracing all sources of power, including renewables.
Speaker 2: Well, embrace beds. You view the word embrace. The wind
Speaker 2: subsidies went on for already.
Speaker 3: President Trump doesn't like windmills.
Speaker 2: No, he doesn't like windmills, but he doesn't look a
Speaker 2: lot of people don't like windmills. You know, the public
Speaker 2: pushback across the heartland of America, and certainly in the
Speaker 2: coastline of America against wind power has been enormous. And
Speaker 2: the other thing put in context wind power, think of
Speaker 2: how much money has been spent on that. It's one
Speaker 2: point five percent of global energy and everywhere it's got
Speaker 2: deep penetration. You know, Germany, Denmark, nowed came to the
Speaker 2: most expensive electricity prices in the world. Does President Trump
Speaker 2: want to have the most expensive electricity prices in the world.
Speaker 2: Absolutely not, absolutely not. And the people look at this
Speaker 2: stuff wrong. They think of electricity like gasoline or oil,
Speaker 2: where you can store it and sort of use it.
Speaker 2: Because it doesn't work that way. So we look at
Speaker 2: the data. Oh my gosh, if you add up wind
Speaker 2: and solar last year, you know they were sixteen or
Speaker 2: seventeen percent of electricity. They're meaningful for American electrons. Why
Speaker 2: don't we get more of those electrons on the grid.
Speaker 2: That's not the way to think about electricity. Electricity is
Speaker 2: all about what's the most efficient way to deliver at
Speaker 2: peak demand time. When we had that cold winter storm
Speaker 2: Fern that came down the end of January, probably the
Speaker 2: greatest test we've seen of the East Coast electricity grid
Speaker 2: at peak demand time on January twenty seventh in New England.
Speaker 2: In the evening, two percent of New England's electricity came
Speaker 2: from wind, solar, and batteries combined. Three percent of New
Speaker 2: England electricity came from burning trash and wood. Right, that's
Speaker 2: if you're there in the middle of the day when
Speaker 2: we don't really need you, all you're doing is saying
Speaker 2: some other producing source certificate it's a natural gas power
Speaker 2: plant has to turn down. You know, you're not adding
Speaker 2: to the capacity of the grid unless you're reliably there
Speaker 2: at peak demand time. And we as Democrats, have pushed
Speaker 2: a little bit more heating to electric electrification, which is
Speaker 2: a horribly bad idea. It's a guaranteed way to make
Speaker 2: heating much more expensive, and we can't put nearly as
Speaker 2: much energy through our electricity grid as we can through
Speaker 2: our natural gas pipeline network. But in case, those policies
Speaker 2: are happening, so peak demand times are more and more
Speaker 2: going to the winter. You know, think of in New
Speaker 2: England and New York States. Solar's irrelevant in the winter.
Speaker 2: And when you get a large cold front that comes in,
Speaker 2: it's a high pressure air mass that just sits there. Well,
Speaker 2: wind goes away too. So all that stuff you built,
Speaker 2: all those associated transmission lines, they don't add anything to
Speaker 2: the productive capacity of the grid. They produce electricity some
Speaker 2: of the time, but that's not what matters. You have
Speaker 2: to be there at peak demand time. We're going to
Speaker 2: put on new AI data centers and reshore manufacturing. We
Speaker 2: have to increase our capacity to reliably supply at peak
Speaker 2: demand time. We want to do that as economically efficiently
Speaker 2: and as quickly as we can. We're doing everything we
Speaker 2: can to get nuclear going. That's coming. We have reactors
Speaker 2: already go critical. But in the short term, in the
Speaker 2: next few years, it's going to be natural gas. It's
Speaker 2: going to be expansion of existing capacity. We're restarting three
Speaker 2: large nuclear power plants. We're uprating a number of power plants.
Speaker 2: We're changing some foolish regulations. The only reason we didn't
Speaker 2: have to close the schools in Florida during that cold
Speaker 2: front is we said, all that massive amount of backup generators,
Speaker 2: turn them on, don't wait till the lights go out
Speaker 2: we have a blackout, and then turn them on just
Speaker 2: for your store. Turn them on, and that's added capacity
Speaker 2: to the grid. So we're having to do some creative
Speaker 2: things so that we can enable reshoring of manufacturing here,
Speaker 2: meet this rising demand for AI, and ultimately just change
Speaker 2: the way decisions are made at FURK and hopefully ultimately
Speaker 2: cross state utility commissions. We changed mandate from affordable reliable
Speaker 2: electricity for Americans in American industry, and we just got
Speaker 2: off track and the country just went crazy, as Europe did,
Speaker 2: thinking somehow tweaking the American electricity grid was going to
Speaker 2: change global emissions. Just a colossal mistake.
Speaker 3: This is a more sophisticated answer. So the President saying,
Speaker 3: the windmills are not.
Speaker 1: Good for the birds, So I appreciate that.
Speaker 3: I just my final questions.
Speaker 1: I think I was the first reporter to ask you
Speaker 1: if you were going to go to Venezuela, and you
Speaker 1: said yes, and then you went Would you be the
Speaker 1: first secretary to maybe, I don't know, go to Aman
Speaker 1: and see vessels come through, or even maybe go to Iran?
Speaker 3: At some point.
Speaker 2: It's funny or early on in this crisis, that the President,
Speaker 2: who has underappreciated great sense of humor, we were all
Speaker 2: right dinner, I don't remember we were, and he said,
Speaker 2: have you told Lizia going to Iran yet? He did
Speaker 2: say that. He did say that, so you know who
Speaker 2: knows again. The goal is to drive progress. The goal
Speaker 2: is to drive improvement if we get a reasonable resolution,
Speaker 2: and we're impluenting something certainly possibility.
Speaker 3: So come on that trip with your secretary, right. Thank
Speaker 3: you so much for joining us.