The energy industry is second only to states in use of federal funds these days — but while the rest of the country spiraled with confusion, they were downright giddy about the Trump administration freeze on federal dollars.
Where the states, nonprofits and welfare advocates see disaster, they see an opportunity.
“We’re in pretty damn good shape. I feel pretty good about what’s happening,” said Patrick Gruber, the CEO of a sustainable aviation fuels company that signed a conditional commitment for a $1.46 billion loan from the Biden administration’s Department of Energy in October.
The company is scheduled to finalize and close that loan in the middle of 2025 — assuming the new Trump administration pursues what the Biden White House started.
Trending
Gruber repeatedly called Trump’s actions “awesome” in a call with NOTUS.
“What I find is astounding as to the backlash and confusion. This is normal,” he said. “That letter was real specific about things that undermine the agenda.”
Nearly every company that has received a massive federal grant or loan in the last year operates in the energy, environment or climate spaces, based on a NOTUS review of the largest federal obligations over the last year.
So why the optimism at a time when so many groups and states around the country are scrambling to figure out what this federal aid freeze directive from Trump’s administration could mean? (The order was temporarily put on pause by a federal judge on Tuesday.)
Companies in the Republican-approved alternative energy sectors of biofuels, nuclear, geothermal and carbon capture just don’t think Trump’s administration is actually going to come after them. Furthermore, they think that Trump will unravel many of the regulations the Biden administration put in place to set wages, ensure greenhouse gas reductions and create community commitments.
“We could see the funding moving quicker to some projects now that they’ve eliminated some of the application and contractual requirements that were unrelated to technological or economic success of a project,” said Luke Bolar, a leader at the right-of-center energy innovation group ClearPath. Alex Fitzsimmons, a former senior director at ClearPath, was just named as the chief of staff to the incoming secretary of energy, Chris Wright.
The Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of the Interior and the Department of Energy all told NOTUS that they were reviewing their programs for compliance with Trump’s executive orders to undo the Biden-era agenda.
Among his many Day One orders, Trump erased Biden’s “whole-of-government” approach to climate change issues. Because of the way that the Biden administration embedded climate change and energy justice into every agency’s funding programs, Trump’s executive order could affect almost every grant and loan funding program set up during Biden’s term.
The EPA awarded the entirety of the $27 billion in the IRA’s Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund during Biden’s term and nearly all of the $5 billion available for climate pollution reduction grants, leaving open the question of how much grant money is still in government coffers that can be frozen.
“The agency has paused all funding actions related to the Inflation Reduction Act and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act at this time. EPA is continuing to work with OMB as they review processes, policies and programs,” an EPA spokesperson said to NOTUS.
But unlike the EPA’s grants, about 85% of the hundreds of billions of dollars that the DOE’s loan office can issue still remain on the table. And that’s the money that energy companies are feeling optimistic about now.
“I don’t think anybody is concerned that this administration is taking a pause on some things,” said Frank Maisano, an expert at the consulting firm Bracewell that represents energy companies. “Every administration, when they step into the office, takes a pause and assesses what the previous administration was doing.”
Maisano said that he ranks the average concern level as a 4 out of 10.
And that was just because projects themselves are so large and important, not because of concerns that they will not move forward.
—
Anna Kramer is a reporter at NOTUS.
Author
