Fake News: President Biden and Energy
Introduction
Recent postings by Americans on Facebook and Twitter are accusing President Joe Biden of setting back America’s “Energy Independent Progress” (January 2020). President Biden within his first 10 days of being president had rolled back a fossil fuel policies that would restrict the use of fossil fuels such as crude oil. This was presumably due to reducing the carbon footprint America is leaving on Earth. The claim is that President Biden had set back 50 years (going back to 1957) of progress towards America’s energy independence within the first 10 days of Biden becoming president.
Research Findings
The United States of America’s net energy imports have been on a downward trend for the past 14 years. This means it dates back to the Obama administration with Former President Barack Obama contributing to the downward trend of energy imports. With the energy imports lowering, it must mean that either the U.S is losing energy on a year basis and is more efficient or that the U.S is becoming more self-sufficient requiring less imports; the latter would be correct. According to the Energy Information Administration, the total net energy imports was beyond zero, going into the negatives, meaning the U.S is exporting more energy than it imports which would mean that its sufficient overall to sustain the nation.
However, that is only our net energy imports that are positive since 2017 mind you. More up to date information we have are 12-Month averages of U.S Net Imports of Oil and Oil Products which reflect that the U.S has only recently broke even on the net imports for oil and oil products. Following these trends, we would have to rule out that oil and oil related products would not be responsible for the alleged energy independence setback.
When searching for “Joe Biden responsibility for energy independence setback” using the Google Search Engine (date accessed 3/11/22), we see results that are skewed against President Biden and his policies involving energy. Currently the media is going through a witch-hunt for Joe Biden for his actions with hundreds of thousands of Americans upset with his policy enactments. More findings involve President Biden’s policy changes was the revoking of the federal permit for the continued construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline which works against the oil refinery, which leads to working against the gasoline production in America, which also leads towards making the cost of living of energy expenses for lower-wage Americans to be an extremely demanding debt. Furthermore, President Biden had revoked more of Former President Trump’s directives and policies that were targeted for making jobs, and for aiding the production of refined oil.
If you’re being practical about it all however, the net imports of energy have really only been affected by the global markets, with President Biden having little to nothing to do with the international matters at hand. It would be inefficient for President Biden to allocate resources towards a matter that is so broad and multifaceted that doesn’t have a single point of solution. To address the primary claim in this article, President Biden has not set back the U.S oil independence by fifty years and furthermore, no president has the powers to do that without doing something catastrophic (even then it’s extremely unfeasible). The international market for oil and fossil fuels have been on a decline and there is no root cause for it aside from the global pandemic that impacts businesses and their logistics of setting up supply lines to and from nations and managing the transportation, etc.
Works Cited
“U.S. Natural Gas Imports by Country.” U.S. Natural Gas Imports by Country, https://www.eia.gov/dnav/ng/ng_move_impc_s1_m.htm.
“U.S. Natural Gas Exports and Re-Exports by Country.” U.S. Natural Gas Exports by Country, https://www.eia.gov/dnav/ng/ng_move_expc_s1_a.htm.
Rapier, Robert. “Surprise! the U.S. Is Still Energy Independent.” Forbes, Forbes Magazine, 10 Mar. 2022, https://www.forbes.com/sites/rrapier/2022/03/08/surprise-the-us-is-still-energy-independent/?sh=78c9357230b6.
Mills, Alex. “Biden Orders Reversal of Trump’s ‘Energy Independence’ Policies.” Times Record News, Wichita Falls Times Record News, 30 Jan. 2021, https://www.timesrecordnews.com/story/opinion/columnists/2021/01/30/biden-orders-reversal-trumps-energy-independence-policies-mills/4297063001/.