Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic nominee, would threaten U.S. energy security with his proposal to end fossil fuel drilling on federal lands, former Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke said.
“It’s nuts,” he said of Biden’s pledge to ban drilling on public lands.
The Obama administration had placed a moratorium on coal mining on federal lands in 2016, a policy Zinke quickly reversed in one of his first acts as interior secretary.
Biden’s climate plan would go further, banning new oil and gas drilling on federal lands and waters. Energy analysts say the policy likely wouldn’t significantly decrease greenhouse gas emissions, because most drilling occurs on private land. But environmentalists say the move would be significant, both to address emissions from public lands and to send a signal a Biden administration is serious about addressing climate change.
Zinke told the Washington Examiner in a recent interview that Biden would be “placating” far-left environmentalists with the proposal.
“For Senator Biden to even suggest that we’re not going to have a federal land component of our energy policy or that component will only include hundreds and hundreds and thousands of miles of solar cells or windmills in every backyard is inappropriate,” he added.
Zinke is now a year and a half out of his tenure as President Trump’s first interior secretary. The former Montana congressman resigned his post in December 2018, under pressure from facing at least six probes into allegations of ethical misconduct and other violations.
The former secretary has denied any wrongdoing, and he told the Washington Examiner he feels he was unfairly targeted for political reasons. He currently is doing consulting work, working with oil and gas companies and mining firms, and tackling a wide range of projects, including renewable energy and plastics in the ocean, he said.
Zinke said the coronavirus has exposed risks in the U.S. supply chain, from energy to medical equipment, that Congress and Trump must address post-pandemic.
He said the United States is better positioned on energy, given the country’s growing energy production, especially of oil and natural gas.
The shale industry has taken a massive hit amid the pandemic, as an oil price war and cratering demand for fuel caused prices to go negative last month for the first time ever.
But Zinke said Trump has been able to deliver some stability in the oil and gas markets. The U.S. energy prowess afforded Trump leverage in negotiations between the Saudis and the Russians, he said.
More broadly, though, “I don’t think anybody fully realized the exposure we had when it came to routine medical gowns, masks, [personal protective equipment],” Zinke said. China controlled the “valves” of the supply chain, and it was disrupted, causing “enormous uncertainty” in the U.S., he added.
Zinke said once the U.S. is out of the woods of the pandemic, the White House and Congress must take steps to secure the country’s supply chain. He thinks it’s an effort that could win bipartisan support in Congress.
“Stockpiling, I believe, is an appropriate policy, but the best policy is to make sure that we can manufacture and surge in crisis,” Zinke said. “That’s making sure we have the core capability.”
Zinke said Trump could use trade authorities at his disposal, such as tariffs, but he also suggested Congress should provide incentives for companies to manufacture products in the U.S. Tweaks to regulations, such as speeding environmental reviews and permitting for activities such as mining critical minerals, are also essential, he said.
“The administration has a lot of power to do that,” Zinke said. “And Congress has a lot of power to make sure there’s a review process that is not politicized, [to determine] what is in the basket of critical supply chain [and] what is out of the basket.”
The White House in January proposed changes to the National Environmental Policy Act that seeks to limit environmental reviews to two years. The proposal would also make it more difficult for environmentalists and others to challenge projects in court.
Environmentalists and Democrats say the Trump proposal would also allow agencies to move forward without adequately considering how projects could exacerbate climate change.
As for economic recovery, Zinke said maintenance at U.S. national parks and restoring infrastructure can be a critical component. He touted a plan he proposed as the interior secretary to create a Public Lands Infrastructure Fund of $18 billion over 10 years, to be used for maintaining and improving national parks, wildlife refuges, and Bureau of Indian Education schools.
Zinke said the plan would be the “largest infrastructure investment in the history of the Park Service.”
In recent weeks, lawmakers in both parties and hundreds of environmental and conservation groups have ramped up calls that bipartisan legislation setting up a similar funding mechanism for deferred national park maintenance be included as part of the coronavirus economic recovery. The bipartisan bill, known as the Great American Outdoors Act, would also fully and permanently fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund.
Zinke expressed general support for the idea but suggested some tweaks should be made to the LWCF to diversify its revenue sources.
Currently, the LWCF, established in 1964, is funded by earnings from offshore oil and gas lease sales. Zinke said that should be expanded to include renewable energy sources, as well.
The bipartisan bill pending in the Senate doesn’t make structural changes to the LWCF, but the separate fund it establishes for deferred park maintenance would deposit an amount equal to half of all federal revenues from oil, gas, coal, or renewable energy development on federal lands and waters each year for five years.
“I always thought that fixing our park system and our fisheries and the infrastructure, it does, it provides a lot of economic assistance,” Zinke said.
