(Oil & Gas 360) – Energy policy is likely to be among the topics debated on Tuesday, September 10, between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump in their competition to become the next President of the United States. A few topics clearly show a divergence between the two candidates.
While the Harris for President campaign site does not offer specific energy policy positions, her work as Vice President for President Joe Biden includes casting the tie-breaking vote for the Inflation Reduction Act, which provided unprecedented subsidies for green tech. She also supported The Green New Deal (GND), which calls for 100% of the country’s electricity and transportation sourced from renewables by 2030.
The (non-binding) GND also calls for the country to decarbonize by 2050 completely.
Harris’s previous three and a half years as Vice President also saw her speak forcefully for policies addressing climate change, which she calls “an existential threat.”
In her first run for President in 2020, she proposed the creation of an Office of Climate and Environmental Justice Accountability, contending that poor communities were bearing an undue burden imperiling their health from the location of industrial oil and gas operations.
She has also proposed an international summit to formulate a strategy to end fossil fuel subsidies and steer the energy transition away from the global fossil fuels industry.
She has also proposed outlawing offshore drilling and hydraulic fracturing, which have reversed the country’s domestic energy fortunes through the unconventional revolution.
As California’s State Attorney General, she sued the Obama administration over the practice of oil and gas companies to push them for quicker, deeper reductions of greenhouse gas emissions.
Energy policies posted on Donald Trump’s campaign website mirror those implemented by his administration when he was President from 2016 to 2020.
By Jim Felton for oil&gas360.com
