WHAT’S HAPPENING TODAY: Good afternoon and happy Friday! We are starting off Daily on Energy with a look at Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s plan to meet with President Donald Trump next week to discuss the state’s efforts to begin a natural gas project alongside Asian investors.
In other news, the White House announced that Trump has pardoned Trevor Milton, the founder of the electric truck company, Nikola.
Welcome to Daily on Energy, written by Washington Examiner energy and environment writers Callie Patteson (@CalliePatteson) and Maydeen Merino (@MaydeenMerino). Email cpatteson@washingtonexaminer dot com or mmerino@washingtonexaminer dot com for tips, suggestions, calendar items, and anything else. If a friend sent this to you and you’d like to sign up, click here. If signing up doesn’t work, shoot us an email, and we’ll add you to our list.
QUOTE OF THE WEEK: This week, Callie sat down with Interstate Natural Gas Association of America president and CEO Amy Andryszak and board chair Mike McMahon and discussed how vital meaningful permitting reform is to the pipeline industry. They explained the administration is on a tight deadline to sign reforms into law if they want to see new projects completed before President Donald Trump leaves office.
“If they truly want the build out that they’ve talked about, we need it by the end of the year, early next year…If they really want to be able to start building, say, in the spring of ‘27, permitting reform’s got to be done before then because we’re going to need those permits in mid-26,” McMahon said. “That’s kind of just the given flow of the projects…Everybody who’s working on projects right now has the date January 20, [2029] circled because we know we’re getting a new administration. We don’t know what that administration is going to look like, but we know it’s going to be due and so trying to get as much done before that date is really important.”
TRUMP TO BE BRIEFED ON ALASKA-ASIA ENERGY RELATIONS NEXT WEEK: Alaskan Gov. Mike Dunleavy revealed today that he plans to brief Trump and his administration next week on the relationship between his state and several Asian nations regarding natural gas projects.
The details: This week, Dunleavy traveled throughout Taiwan, Thailand, South Korea, and Japan to discuss with government officials Asia’s involvement primarily in a $44 billion liquefied natural gas export project in Alaska.
Dunleavy and his team have been seeking Asian investors to support the project, which would transport LNG along a 800-mile pipeline from Alaska’s Northern Slope to the southern part of the state. The governor has said the project could be operational by 2030 or 2031. It is projected to have a production capacity of around 20 million tons a year.
When wrapping up his travel in Japan today, Dunleavy told Reuters he would like to speak with the president about the status of possible agreements.
“Buying gas and then investing in America helps with the discussions that are happening at the federal level and at the national level,” he told the outlet. “I would like to talk with the president, but at least I’ll be talking with some of the secretaries that are intimately focused on this project.”
NIKOLA CEO PARDONED BY TRUMP: Today, President Donald Trump pardoned former Nikola CEO Trevor Milton, who was convicted of misleading investors.
In December 2023, Milton was sentenced to four years in prison for defrauding investors about Nikola’s success to increase share value.
When asked about pardoning Milton, Trump said in the Oval Office today that “They say the thing that he did wrong was he was one of the first people that supported a gentleman named Donald Trump, a president. He supported Trump. He liked Trump. I didn’t know him, but he liked him.”
“You don’t realize this is a vicious group of people that were in this office before us. This is a vicious group. They’re violent, what they were, what they were doing to people,” Trump added.
Milton wrote on X that he was issued a full and unconditional pardon by the president, adding that Trump directly called him to tell him about the pardon.
“This pardon is not just about me—it’s about every American who has been railroaded by the government, and unfortunately, that’s a lot of people,” Milton said. “It is no wonder why trust and confidence in the Justice Department has eroded to nothing… I saw firsthand the tactics they use to guarantee convictions.”
Nikola has recently faced financial difficulties, filing for bankruptcy last month. The company is aiming to produce battery-powered and hydrogen fuel cell commercial trucks.
SEC WILL NO LONGER DEFEND ITS CLIMATE DISCLOSURE RULE: The Securities and Exchange Commission yesterday announced it will withdraw from defending the agency’s climate disclosure rules implemented during the Biden administration.
The SEC last year finalized a climate disclosure rule requiring certain publicly traded companies to disclose their direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions. Former SEC Chairman Gary Gensler argued the rule would provide transparency to investors on companies’ climate-risks before deciding to invest.
The regulations sparked litigation brought by Republican-led states and industry groups, arguing that the SEC did not have the statutory authority to implement climate-related rules. The lawsuits were then consolidated in the Eighth Circuit and the regulation’s effective date was paused.
The Republican-led SEC said the agency has sent a letter to the court that it will no longer defend its climate disclosure rule.
“The goal of today’s Commission action and notification to the court is to cease the Commission’s involvement in the defense of the costly and unnecessarily intrusive climate change disclosure rules,” SEC Acting Chairman Mark Uyeda said.
JUDGE RULES AGAINST BIDEN-ERA GULF LEASE SALE: A federal district court judge ruled against a 2023 Biden administration lease sale for oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, citing insufficient consideration of environmental concerns.
The details: Judge Amit Mehta in Washington, D.C., accused the previous administration, specifically the Department of Interior, of violating the National Environmental Policy Act when it held the auction, according to Bloomberg. Mehta ruled that the agency failed to consider possible energy market changes caused by new oil and gas leases in the region – which Trump has since renamed the Gulf of America. The judge also said the Democratic administration did not include sufficient assessments of the impact of the endangered Rice’s whale and its habitat.
The lease sale, held in March 2023, was mandated to take place under the Inflation Reduction Act. It offered up around 13,600 blocks in the total 73 million acres available under the law. Dozens of companies participated in the auction, which generated more than $263 million for 313 tracts across 1.6 million acres.
What’s next: In the ruling yesterday, Mehta did not explicitly detail what should happen to the two-year-old lease sale. The decision comes as the Trump administration is expected to ramp up the number of similar lease sales and auctions held in the region and other federal waters to boost domestic energy production. The government could move forward with invalidating all leases sold during the auction in question, though that course of action is unlikely given the current administration. The companies involved may also be forced to revise their current contracts to address concerns detailed in the ruling, according to Bloomberg.
Something related: Yesterday the Department of Interior, headed up by Trump appointee Doug Burgum, revealed that it had generated over $39 million in total receipts from oil and gas lease sales held in the first quarter of 2025. During the first part of the year, the Bureau of Land Management leased 34 parcels of land totaling around 25,038 acres in Montana, North Dakota, New Mexico, Wyoming and Nevada.
While the total receipts are far below the amount generated in the single 2023 lease sale, it is well above the amount generated in all of fiscal year 2021. Data made public by the Bureau of Land Management shows the department held eight competitive oil and gas lease sales from October 2020 to September 2021. In this time frame, the sales generated just over $31 million in total receipts.
INDIA WEIGHS LIFTING IMPORT TAX ON US LNG: Indian officials are reportedly considering removing existing tariffs on imports of liquefied natural gas from the United States, as the country looks to increase purchases of U.S. energy.
The details: Several government and industry sources confirmed the plans to Reuters this week. The Indian government is specifically weighing a proposal that would exempt the U.S. from the 2.5% basic customs tariff and additional 0.25% social welfare tax on LNG. Currently, only the United Arab Emirates and Australia are exempt from the duties.
One government source told the outlet that removing the import tax on LNG would make the U.S.-produced fuel more price competitive as well as cut down the nation’s trade surplus with the U.S., which hit roughly $45.4 billion in 2024.
Boosting trade: India has long been one of the leading importers of LNG, and was the 4th largest importer worldwide in 2023. India imports the fuel from a number of different countries, with the U.S. being its second largest source of supply. In FY 2025 so far, one source told Reuters, India is set to import an average of around 27-28 million tons of LNG. The U.S. is expected to make up upwards of 25% of that total. India expressed interest in ramping up purchases from the U.S., increasing their total energy purchases from the U.S. to around $25 billion a year.
LATEST ON SOUTH KOREA WILDFIRE: South Korea continues to battle the largest wildfire in the country’s history, one that has killed at least 28 people and burned more than 111,000 acres.
Today, Korea Forest Service chief Lim Sang-seop announced that all main fires have been fully contained and now they are focusing on small fires, AP News wrote.
“As we’ve completed works to contain main fires, we’re turning into a system to deal with small fires,” Lim said. “There are still dangers of breakouts of another wildfires so we won’t loosen our vigilance and will make all-out efforts to prevent them.”
Multiple wildfires sparked on March 21 in the country’s southeast region, being fueled by dry conditions and strong winds. The Associated Press said that wildfire has caused nearly 37,800 people to flee their homes and thousands of structures have been destroyed. The outlet added that some of those killed by the wildfire included a pilot who crashed when trying to contain the fire and four firefighters.
Take a look at some photos of the blazes by Reuters from earlier this week.
ICYMI – NOAA MOVES CLIMATE PREDICTION CENTER UNDER LARGER GROUP: As the Trump administration has set its sights on climate-related language and programs across agencies in its cost-cutting efforts, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration took matters into its own hands to prevent major cuts to the Climate Prediction Center.
Some background: First established in the 1980s as the Climate Analysis Center, the CPC has worked for decades to provide real-time monitoring, produce seasonal outlooks, and track the El Niño and La Niña cycles. It does not monitor climate change, but officials fear that it may be subject to cuts from the Trump team because of its name, Axios reports.
The details: Officials within NOAA are now merging the CPC branch with the agency’s broader Weather Prediction Center, according to an email reviewed by Axios. Amid the merger period, CPC will still be viewed as an independent center. The current director of WPC, however, will also be considered the director of the climate branch, according to the email. NOAA sources told the outlet that the move was partly driven by the Trump administration’s targeting of climate-related projects. It also seems to have been motivated by staffing cuts.
People familiar with the matter told Bloomberg that NOAA Director Ken Graham encouraged employees to take early retirements during an all-hands meeting yesterday. The agency is bracing for cuts of more than 1,000 employees as several branches – like CPC and WPC – are consolidated. The losses are expected to be made up of firings, retirements, and voluntary separation.
“Those are big numbers that we’re looking at,” Tom Fahy, legislative director for the union representing agency workers, told Bloomberg. “We don’t know what people are going to decide in the next few weeks. There’s still a great deal of fear.”
RUNDOWN
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