Biden’s Oil Future Reimagined?

You reap what you sow. 

Few words but these came to mind a couple of nights ago when President Biden delivered his State of the Union address this past week. 

Over the two decades that I’ve been writing on the energy sector, the one thing I can say for sure is that you won't find more absurdity than in the intersection of politics and energy. 

You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy than in Washington, D.C.

But it’s not their fault, mind you.

Not really.

The divisive nature of “my team is the only path forward” tends to lead to one failed policy after another. Moreover, the ascendancy of one political party can doom an entire industry for the next four–eight years. 

Yet nowhere else will you find people so willing to take so much credit for doing so little.

That’s why President Obama was able to both take credit for the greatest oil boom in American history and stop critical projects from going forward while castigating the U.S. oil and gas industry the entire time. 

It’s why President Trump can claim so much success on wind and solar generation in the United States between 2016 and 2020 despite his vitriolic attacks on renewable energy. 

Whether you love or hate him, our net generation of solar power nearly doubled during his fiery tenure.

Granted, the same thing can be said of his predecessor too!

Between these two former presidents, during which terms do you think U.S. domestic oil production grew the most? 

If you considered the fact that both Trump and Obama were diametrically opposed in their stances on the U.S oil industry, you’d think that Trump’s administration saw the biggest growth, right?

Think again. 

Under President Obama, U.S. field production of crude oil jumped 66%, while it grew just 21% during President Trump’s reign. 

But let’s be serious for a minute… Are we really shocked? Taking credit and passing off blame are just part of the game around the D.C. Beltway. 

It’s what they do. 

However, something intrigued me on Tuesday night as President Biden delivered his speech. 

Sure, there was the expected derision of big bad oil, when he said:

You may have noticed that Big Oil just reported record profits? Last year, they made $200 billion in the midst of a global energy crisis. It's outrageous. Why? They invested too little of that profit to increase domestic production.

Usually, I don’t pay much attention to words like these. On the surface, they're just another jab at big oil companies, which we’ve heard ad nauseam all our lives. 

I expected this kind of admonishment from the president, especially since we’re talking about a poliitician who tweeted the following just as the COVID pandemic was about to slam into the global economy:

Here’s the intriguing part…

For the first time in a while, we heard a little weakness in the anti-oil stance that President Biden has embraced throughout his term.

Just after chastising Big Oil for making too much money, he said, “We are going to need oil for at least another decade. And beyond that. We are going to need it.”

Even though he immediately tied that sentiment back into a narrative of greedy corporations, it was a softer tone than most people realize. 

Slowly but surely, people are starting to understand (once again) that the transition away from fossil fuels isn’t going to happen overnight. 

And when they catch up to that fact, they’ll finally realize how much they missed. 

Let me show you firsthand right here.

Until next time,

Keith Kohl

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A true insider in the technology and energy markets, Keith’s research has helped everyday investors capitalize from the rapid adoption of new technology trends and energy transitions. Keith connects with hundreds of thousands of readers as the Managing Editor of Energy & Capital, as well as the investment director of Angel Publishing’s Energy Investor and Technology and Opportunity.

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