If Wyoming’s energy industry thinks President Joe Biden was tough on coal, natural gas and oil, Vice President Kamala Harris, now the leading candidate for the Democratic nomination since Biden abandoned his reelection bid, could be even tougher.
Environmental groups view Harris as even more of an ally than Biden. She has a record taking action against climate change, prosecuting polluters while she was California’s attorney general, and sponsoring the Green New Deal as a U.S. senator.
Harris has the support of many environmental activists like Jeff Ordower of 350 Action, an environmental political activist network.
After Biden dropped out of the presidential race, Ordower said he hoped the lame-duck president’s administration might act more boldly and “do everything” in its power to make a temporary pause in liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports a permanent one.
That would be a hit on the chin to Wyoming’s oil and gas industry.
In January, the Petroleum Association of Wyoming signed on with other energy interests to protest Biden’s indefinite moratorium on licensing new LNG exports. The group argued that it was yet another market being squeezed in which Wyoming’s energy players wanted to participate.
Earlier this month, a federal judge lifted the moratorium on LNG permits, dealing a setback to the Biden administration's climate agenda.
The Department of Energy has stated that it is evaluating whether to appeal the decision.
“We would expect to see more of the same failed energy policies that have become a hallmark of the Biden administration under a Kamala Harris presidency,” said Ryan McConnaughey, the Petroleum Association of Wyoming’s vice president and director of communications.
“Harris has a well-documented history of advocating for radical environmental regulations and policies. During her tenure as Attorney General of California, Harris consistently pursued aggressive legal actions against oil and natural gas companies, aiming to curb their operations and impose hefty fines,” McConnaughey said.
He also said that Harris has supported numerous pieces of legislation aimed at reducing the nation's use of fossil fuels.
U.S. Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., ranking member of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, also has chimed in on opposition to the LNG ban in the Biden-Harris administration.
This week, Barrasso and U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, I-West Virginia, voiced support for bipartisan energy permitting reform legislation.
Among other things, their proposed law would secure future access to oil and natural gas resources on federal lands and in coastal offshore waters and end Biden’s ban on new LNG exports.
“For far too long, Washington’s disastrous permitting system has shackled American energy production and punished families in Wyoming and across our country,” Barrasso said. “We permanently end President Biden’s reckless ban on natural gas exports. This legislation is an urgent and important first step towards improving our nation’s broken permitting process.
Harris has a history of standing up to Big Oil.
Chasing Pollution
As attorney general of California, she sued multiple major oil and gas companies for pollution.
This is one of her hallmarks.
Harris has brought lawsuits against fossil fuel companies, prosecuted a pipeline company over an oil leak and investigated Exxon Mobil Corp. for misleading the public about climate change.
A potential Harris presidency is viewed as being more aggressive than Biden in confronting oil companies on pollution and addressing environmental justice.
And, of course, she’d likely stay the course on Biden’s environmental policies that have impacted Wyoming and have prompted Gov. Mark Gordon to dig in his heels and threaten potential litigation.
Gordon has hired law firms to combat the administration over Biden’s plans to end coal leasing on public lands with the Bureau of Land Management by 2041, and the Environmental Protection Agency’s rules and regulations that impede the state’s ability to mine coal and sell the valuable commodity to utilities to fuel power plants.
Generally, Wyoming is upset with the current administration’s push to limit coal exports and its effort to retire coal-fired power plants in the state.
These federal efforts have partially led to 21% lower coal production in the state’s Powder River Basin in northeastern Wyoming during the first three months of 2024 versus the same period a year ago.
Lower coal production could translate into lower revenue collected by the state’s general fund from coal sales — impacting everything from school construction to roadbuilding.
Disastrous Policies
“I would fully expect her energy policies would be as disastrous to Wyoming and America as President Biden’s,” said Travis Deti, executive director of the Wyoming Mining Association, in a statement issued to Cowboy State Daily.
Harris is particularly attuned to the offshore world of oil and gas leasing.
In California, she has been critical of offshore oil development, seeking to limit new drilling off the California coast. As the state’s attorney general, Harris went to court to challenge the federal government’s permitting of fracking in the Pacific Ocean.
In 2019, Harris called for a ban on fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, but Biden never supported the move.
Fracking involves fracturing formations in bedrock with a pressurized liquid to tap natural gas and oil deposits deep below the earth’s surface.
In the Senate, Harris co-sponsored legislation advancing the Green New Deal, which called for a 10-year effort to transition to emission-free power and overhaul the nation’s transportation systems.
Green New Deal
The Inflation Reduction Act enacted under Biden is the nation’s most sweeping climate law. Wyoming has the law to thank for the boom in wind turbines and solar farms operating in the state.
However, the law does not go as far as the Green New Deal in transforming America’s energy use. Besides Harris, the proposed raft of environmental enactments are popular with Democratic progressives like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
As California’s attorney general, Harris policed environmental missteps and joined other states in defending Obama-era climate policies.
She participated in a multi-state investigation nearly a decade ago into whether Exxon misled the public about climate change. By its own admission, Exxon’s scientists recognized greenhouse gas emissions as a risk to the planet.
Harris has filed numerous lawsuits targeting utilities and oil companies for pollution, including a 2016 case against Southern California Gas Co., over a methane leak from a storage site in a northern suburb of Los Angeles.
In 2016, her office secured a $14 million settlement with British oil giant BP over allegations that the company failed to stop underground storage tanks from leaking gasoline at nearly 800 fuel stations across California.
Under Harris, California previously obtained other big-dollar settlements with Phillips 66, ConocoPhillips, Chevron USA and Chevron Stations Inc. to resolve similar allegations related to leaking underground gasoline tanks.
Pipeline companies – something that Wyoming has a lot of – will not be overlooked by a Harris administration.
Billionaire Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway Energy business has an interest in the natural gas distribution hub in Wamsutter, Wyo. — not in owning the hub, but in a broader effort by Tulsa-based Williams Cos. Inc. to invest $300 million to expand the distribution system’s reach to places starved for natural gas such as California or Las Vegas.
Overall, Williams owns more than 4,581 miles of pipeline in Wyoming.
After a pipeline ruptured and spilled 140,000 gallons of oil in a Santa Barbara, Calif., in 2015, Harris brought criminal indictments against Houston-based Plains All-American Pipeline LP, according to a statement from the California Attorney General’s Office issued in May 2016.
“Her advocacy for the Green New Deal and other similar initiatives underscores her vision for a energy future that jeopardizes electricity reliability, jobs and economic stability in Wyoming,” McConnaughey said.
Spokespersons with conservationist group Wyoming Outdoor Council in Lander, and the Powder River Basin Resource Council, a Sheridan group concerned about the impact of strip mining on communities in northeastern Wyoming, could not be reached for comment.
Pat Maio can be reached at pat@cowboystatedaily.com.
