The U.S. president wasn’t the only force shifting the narrative in Houston, as energy transition acolytes got a reality check well before Trump’s election.
The surge in energy prices in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and post-pandemic inflation led companies and governments to roll back climate targets and investments in renewables and shift their focus to cheap, reliable sources of energy.
The ongoing surge in U.S. LNG production also underpins Trump's energy dominance agenda by supporting investment in domestic industry and giving other nations an opportunity to boost their purchases of U.S. fuel, thereby reducing any trade deficits with the United States, another major bugbear for Trump.
But, again, abundant energy means growing competition and lower prices – good for the Trump agenda, but not necessarily for U.S producers.
Other deep-running trends discussed at the conference further complicate the energy matrix, including China’s peaking oil demand and U.S. production nearing a plateau.
Enthusiasm over the future of the sector has also been tempered by increasingly harsh realities on the ground. Turmoil in global markets fuelled by Trump's tariff zigzagging has weighed on oil prices and sowed tremendous uncertainty, two factors that impinge on new investments in the sector.
"Swaying from one experience to another is not the right policy approach. We need consistent and durable policy," Chevron CEO Mike Wirth said.
So the energy industry may have basked in Trump’s sun over the past week, but executives should grow increasingly concerned about the contradictions in many of the administration’s key policies.
