Vance changed his tune on climate change. Oil cash flowed.

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Jul 16, 2024 View in browser
 
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By Nicole Norman

Presented by Chevron

J.D. Vance smiles from the crowd on the floor of the Republican National Convention.

Republican vice presidential candidate Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) arrives on the floor of the Republican National Convention on Monday in Milwaukee. | Carolyn Kaster/AP

The oil and gas industry’s investment in Sen. J.D. Vance seems to be paying off.

Vance has championed fracking and railed against clean energy since joining the Senate in 2023, after a campaign partly bankrolled by fossil fuel companies, write Heather Richards, Mike Soraghan and Brian Dabbs. Now, the Ohio Republican is a vice presidential candidate, joining Donald Trump in his calls to “drill, baby, drill.”

Trump’s selection of Vance as his running mate could help the former president’s prospects in Pennsylvania, a swing state that is one of the country’s largest energy producers. His home state of Ohio has similarly gained economically from the fracking boom, benefiting the oil and petrochemical industries.

Vance is "somebody who understands kind of what we do and how we do it,” Ohio Oil and Gas Association spokesperson Mike Chadsey told POLITICO’s E&E News.

“He's gonna continue to be an advocate for the industry, and energy investment, helping make sure that those issues stay at the forefront,” Chadsey said.

But Vance wasn’t always a stalwart supporter of oil and gas — or Trump. Vance once used words like “Hilter” and “idiot” to describe Trump. And as recently as 2020, he spoke at Ohio State University about society’s “climate problem” and said using natural gas as a power source “isn’t exactly the sort of thing that’s gonna take us to a clean energy future."

Vance’s climate and energy views took a 180 once he was running for the Senate. The oil and gas industry spent more than $283,000 on Vance’s 2022 campaign — more than they gave to all but 18 other members of Congress, according to the campaign finance watchdog OpenSecrets.

In the years since, Vance has said that he doesn’t think there is a climate crisis and questioned how much human activity contributes to global warming.

His legislative record reflects his shift to fossil fuel ally. He sponsored a bill that would require the president to seek congressional approval before delaying oil and gas leasing, and his Drive America Act would swap the climate law’s electric vehicle tax credits with ones for gasoline- and diesel-powered cars.

Say no, take the dough?

Vance has said that he would like to get rid of much of the Inflation Reduction Act. But President Joe Biden’s landmark 2022 climate law has benefited Vance’s home state — and even companies that he holds a stake in, write Scott Waldman and Corbin Hiar.

The law, for example, provided $500 million to repower a steel plant with cleaner energy in Middletown, Ohio — Vance’s hometown, whose economic challenges he chronicles in his book “Hillbilly Elegy.” And the private equity firm Vance co-founded backs a nuclear engineering startup, X-energy, that received millions of dollars from a subsidy program expanded in the Inflation Reduction Act.

Vance also has multiple green investments in his portfolio, despite once calling environmental, social and governance investing a “massive racket to enrich Wall Street.”

His broad range of holdings includes not only up to $100,000 in an oil-focused mutual fund and $250,000 in an energy-intensive cryptocurrency, but also investments in an energy storage developer, an EV-charging service provider and a gardening company.

 

It's Tuesday — thank you for tuning in to POLITICO's Power Switch. I'm your host, Nicole Norman. Power Switch is brought to you by the journalists behind E&E News and POLITICO Energy. Send your tips, comments, questions to jkirkland@eenews.net.

 

A message from Chevron:

Energy demand is projected to reach record highs and continue to rise in the future. Chevron is responding to that growing need while innovating to help do so responsibly. All to help us provide energy that’s affordable, reliable, and ever-cleaner.

 
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Today in POLITICO Energy’s podcast: Zack Colman breaks down how environmental leaders plan to defend climate and clean energy if Trump retakes the White House.

 

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Photo collage of Motiva refinery and regulation text from EPA

EPA predicted big air pollution cuts when it tightened oil refinery regulations in 2015. But while emissions at the bulk of refineries have since dropped, they've climbed at dozens of others, according to the most recent available data. | Illustration by Claudine Hellmuth/POLITICO (source images via AP, EPA)

Refinery pollution remains a tough nut
Oil refinery regulations meant to slash hazardous air pollutants have had uneven results since the Environmental Protection Agency started enforcing new standards nearly a decade ago, Sean Reilly reports.

An analysis by POLITICO's E&E News found that air emissions have dropped at the bulk of roughly 130 refineries covered by the 2015 standards, but they’ve gone up at dozens of others. The analysis raises questions about the long-term effectiveness of efforts to cut pollution in industrial corridors such as “Cancer Alley” in Louisiana.

At Motiva’s complex in Port Arthur, Texas, for example, releases skyrocketed by more than 150 percent from 2015 to 2022, the last year for which data reported to EPA’s Toxics Release Inventory is available. More than half the nearby residents are people of color and more than one-third are low-income.

EPA spokesperson Tim Carroll said the agency expected emissions of most pollutants to have dropped or remained stable since 2015. The one exception, Carroll said, was hydrogen cyanide, a compound tied to neurological damage. He also noted that fence-line monitoring rules for concentrations of benzene, a particularly pernicious carcinogen, started after 2015.

Farm bill in limbo
Congress might be better off leaving an already overdue five-year farm bill unfinished in 2024 if it can't pass legislation with significant policy changes, Arkansas Republican Sen. John Boozman said Tuesday at a forum sponsored by POLITICO at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee. The senator is the top Republican on the Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee, Marc Heller writes.

Hanging in the balance is about $15 billion for conservation aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions, already provided for under the Inflation Reduction Act. Democrats want to move that money into the farm bill with the climate-related focus. Republicans are pushing to reassign that funding for general conservation.

Post-Chevron maneuvers
More than a dozen GOP senators are forming an official “working group” to make recommendations for legislating after the Supreme Court's decision to overturn the so-called Chevron doctrine, Emma Dumain writes.

That decades-old doctrine gave agencies deference when interpreting ambiguous laws. While Democrats say Chevron’s fall will give judges more power to overrule agency experts, Republicans say it will return policymaking responsibilities to Capitol Hill.

The Senate Republicans in the group will include Sens. Eric Schmitt of Missouri, Kevin Cramer of North Dakota and Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming, chair of the Senate Western Caucus. The three main contenders to succeed Sen. Mitch McConnell as the GOP leader will be part of the working group: Sens. Rick Scott of Florida, John Cornyn of Texas and John Thune of South Dakota.

“For far too long, the deck has been stacked against citizens while these all-powerful alphabet soup agencies run roughshod,” Schmitt said.

 

Understand 2024’s big impacts with Pro’s extensive Campaign Races Dashboard, exclusive insights, and key coverage of federal- and state-level debates. Focus on policy. Learn more.

 
 
In Other News

Disappearing trees: Indonesia is cutting down forests as it builds out vast nickel-processing plants to supply the world's electric vehicle industry.

Pocketbook impacts: Climate change is already having negative and broad impacts on household finances, including through higher insurance rates, inflated food prices and lost earnings.

 

A message from Chevron:

Oil and gas are still an important part of the global energy system. To help responsibly address growing needs, Chevron is stepping up. Our Gulf of Mexico facilities are some of the world’s lowest carbon intensity operations, and our technological advances enable us to reach previously unviable oil and gas reserves there. In the Permian Basin, we’re harnessing new drilling and completion technologies to increase the amount of oil we recover. We expect to reach 1 million barrels of oil-equivalent there per day by 2025. Providing energy that’s affordable, reliable, and ever-cleaner. That’s energy in progress.

 
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Vehicles are stranded near downtown Houston after Beryl came ashore in Texas as a hurricane and dumped heavy rains downtown. | Maria Lysaker/AP

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That's it for today, folks! Thanks for reading.

 

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