Shale Magazine Editor-in-Chief - Robert Rapier

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the nationally syndicated Energy Mix Radio Show, produced
by the Energy Network Media Group. The Energy Mix Radio
Show will give you an inside look at the energy
industry and how it affects you by talking with industry leaders, experts,
and government officials on the Energy Mix Radio Show.

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Welcome to another exciting episode of the Energy Mix Radio Show.
I'm your host, Kim Balato, and today we have a
special guest joining us, Robert Raebier, the editor in chief
of Shell Magazine. Robert, it's a pleasure to have you
with us again.

Speaker 3 (00:31):
Thanks Kim.

Speaker 2 (00:33):
Now, we've had some exciting couple of weeks to the
build up of the inauguration of President Trump, which just happened.
So in today's show, I want to do a deep
dive into the administration's position on energy dominance and also
discuss his executive orders that he has signed, people that

(00:55):
he has put in place or have been nominated, and
the overall strategy. Robert, that you feel with these very
ambitious goals, one thing is for sure, you definitely see
a difference between the Biden administration's position on energy and
President Trump's position on energy, and I want to try

(01:17):
to cover that as well. And more importantly, not if
it's good, bad, or ugly, it's just more what do
you think this means for the energy industry in the
way of stability, growth, And of course that big word
that he says a lot about energy dominance and try
to drill down what do we think that means to
the Trump administration. So, first of all, Robert, give us

(01:41):
an overview of what you think the Trump administration's energy
dominance strategy and its key objectives.

Speaker 3 (01:49):
So I'd say, right up front, we're already energy dominant.
I mean, we are the largest bull producer producing record
amounts of oil. We're the largest natural gas producer producing
record amounts with the largest LG exporter. Our exports overall
are at a record So overall we are dominant. I mean,

(02:09):
we are the dominant energy producer in the world. So
sometimes I think that that's lost on people. So if
I look at one of the things, So one of
the things President Trump did, he declared an energy emergency,
and so I'd say, what is the objective here? I mean,

(02:31):
what is the purpose of an oil company? An oil
company the purpose is to make money, that's what they
want to do. And whether they produce a little oil
or a lot of oil. At the end of the day,
they want to make the most money they can make.
And so if you are declaring a national energy emergency,
there's things definitely they want to see. There's less regulation

(02:52):
they'd like to see. They would like to see more
areas open expiration, and those things have been done. But
to the extent that the National Energy Emergency says prices
are too high and they must come down. Well, aill
prices are hovering in the seven to eighty dollars range.
That's pretty pretty sweet spot for oil producers. Gasoline prices

(03:13):
national average is just over three dollars a gallon. You know,
for most of Trump's first term they were too something
a gallon. I'm sure oil producers refiners like oil. I
like gas prices about three dollars a gallon. So if
you say you know the objective here, I think, really

(03:33):
this there's cross purposes here, and President Trump number one,
he has to tell people, hey, I'm looking out for
you and I'm going to try to get these energy
prices lower. Meanwhile, Chevron ex On Mulbre going, hey, we
don't want you to crash oil prices. We don't want
you know, oil. You know, I Trump this morning was
talking opex and you've got to bring prices down. I

(03:55):
guarantee you Chevron doesn't want to see prices come way
down out So what's the objective here. Well, so there
were several executive orders issued that are going to to
further deregulate the industry. Now most of those I think
the oil industry would be pretty happy about. There was

(04:16):
an executive order that reinstates the ability to export LNG
the licenses. You know, Biden put a moratorium on that.
I thought that was the wrong move because you know,
around the world, if we can replace US natural gas
with Chinese cold consumption, that's a good thing. You know,

(04:37):
if we can send our energy to China and they
can shut down some coal plants and put natural gas
in there, that's a good thing. And so when we say, oh,
we're not going to export anymore LNG or we're gonna
we're gonna put it put top the brakes, and I
don't think that's a good idea.

Speaker 2 (04:53):
So in a sense, it's kind of reversing that one
that the Biden administration to put the pause on it
the more and now that's going to resus them again,
which that was a big eat. So okay, let's get
going now.

Speaker 3 (05:04):
A friend asked me this week, doesn't that mean that
natural gas prices are going to go up? So how
does that jibe with need and get energy prices lower?
And I think this is the kind of delicate balance
you're trying to balance here. Natural gas prices last year
were too low. They were too low for producers for sure,
and that will not incentivize additional production. And so yes,

(05:29):
more lergy exports will lift the price of natural gas
which is really low. You know, you've got to have
a price that's that's high enough that producers will produce
and that is not overly burdensome to consumers. And it's
that balance. I think, if I can, if I can
say what I think Chevron Xonmobile, those guys want more

(05:50):
than anything. They want stability, and they don't want every
four years a massive overhaul in energy policy. They would
like to know, Okay, this is what the energy policies
look like, and now I can forecast energy prices and
I'm going to do projects based on those energy prices,
and that's what they want, you know. I think I

(06:14):
think some of that National Energy Emergency was sort of symbolic,
We'll have to wait and see what follows in the
way of legislation. But I think exall Molben probably in
Chevron and all those guys are looking at that going okay, now,
now it's one thing to roll back regulations, but if
you are going to try to force us to produce

(06:35):
more oil, yeah, we don't want that. We want to
be able to make those decisions ourselves. We want to
be able to say, our economics say that we should
be drilling this much and we should be producing this much,
and that's what we want, and we don't want to
we don't want our economics showing an upheaval constantly where
we can't plan long term projects.

Speaker 2 (06:55):
So, Robert, as as I've been covering energy, especially here
on the show for the last nine years, a lot
of times the topic has come up as far as
energy reform, it appears, and you mentioned earlier that these
energy companies would like to see a more stable energy policy,

(07:17):
and it's not you know, the pendulum swinging all the
way to the left or all the way to the
right with different administrations, and so there's always been the
discussion of the need for energy reform. So it's a
little bit more stable and not so vulnerable to different administrations,
but an overall great energy policy that works for the

(07:39):
United States of America. There has been no mention, but again,
President Trump has just arrived on the scene. Do you
think potentially that this may be something that he may
want to look at to stabilize for the future in
his administration and his tenor well, how important would it
be too to achieve this.

Speaker 3 (07:58):
Yeah, that's the problem. I mean, the problem is you
can always have another administration come in and completely tear
up what you're trying to do. We saw that with
the Keystone Excel pipeline. I mean we saw Obama throw
roadblocks down, then we saw Trump rite executive orders to
speed it up, and then we saw again Biden throw

(08:20):
down roadblocks. And the Keystone Excel was something that was
going to take a long time to fitinish and they
finally just threw up their hands and said, forget it.
This is too I mean that that's the problem. The
problem is a lot of energy projects take five to
ten years to complete, and a presidential term is four years.
And this has been the problem going back forever in

(08:43):
the energy sector. And I know from working in the
energy sector to great social frustration. You know, not just presidents,
but you know governors and you know state legislatatures who
will change energy policy right in the middle of a
project and completely be in the economics.

Speaker 2 (09:02):
Right right, And how can you do business in that climate?
And I don't know if you read when we covered
and Shell magazine. The cover was the Willow Project, which
was the project that was Conico Phillips I believe was
the operator on that project, and it just really screened
again the problem with you can start a twenty year project,

(09:24):
you do, as Conico Phillip, do everything you're supposed to do,
apply for the permits and the contracts, and bid the
jobs and do everything, and here comes an administration just
basically gets the project or as we saw in the administration,
a halt on federal land leases. There was a lot
that we keep seeing just go up and down. It's
just not practical if you want to try to run

(09:46):
a business, especially in energy, if you don't have that
stability to see it through on those long term projects.
That's why hence the importance to some form of energy
reform to allow these long term projects to as they
get underway, they are safe and solid to see that project.

Speaker 3 (10:05):
Let me let me speak to that because I worked
for Conicle Phillips and when I worked for Chronicle Phillips,
Sarah Palin was governor of Alaska, and Conical Phillips tried
to negotiate long term tax structure with her, and she refused.
She wouldn't commit to something long term, and that kept

(10:28):
us from being able to do our project economics because
we said, look, we can't go in and invest several
billion dollars here only to have you change the tax
structure when you like the money that's coming out. That's
the way you go. Chubb has operated in Venezuela. You've
got to have something long term in writing, and you've
got to know what your project economics are. And the

(10:50):
problem is nobody wants to operate that way, and so
it really keeps us from producing as much energy as
we could produce that constant undercertainty. You know, oil companies
always have to factor that, and they have to factor
in the economics. But then they have to look at
the politics and say, what is the what is the probability,
what is a chance that you know, in four years

(11:11):
somebody comes in and completely upends this and you know, besides,
you know, we're not paying enough taxes and now suddenly
our project economics look completely different.

Speaker 2 (11:21):
Robert, we were covering energy dominance the strategy from the
Trump administration. I want to kind of move back that
because we talked a little bit about executive orders, which
we're going to get into that deeper detail a little
bit later on in the show. But let's go back
to energy dominance strategy. So what are some other key
things that we will see President Trump his strategies to

(11:43):
continue to promote energy dominance outside of executive orders? But
there are any long term strategies coming into mind or
are being are they visible currently right now that he
has said that are completely different than the Biden administration
and uh and what the energy sector has been enduring

(12:05):
for the last through the last administration. But Robert, we
do have to take a quick break. When we return,
I want to give you an opportunity to answer the
question on energy dominance strategy from the Trump administration. You're
listening to the Energy Mixed Radio show. We'll be right back.

Speaker 1 (12:23):
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Speaker 2 (13:02):
And we're back. You're listening to the Energy Mix radio show.
My guest today is Robert Rapier, the editor in chief
of Shell Magazine. Robert, there's a lot of changes that
are happening from the Trump administration in every possible way.
It's it's amazing how much work he gets done, and
sometimes I wonder if he even has time to sleep.

(13:25):
But obviously he's been saying through his you know, when
he was running for president, he basically told a lot
to the American people about how important energy was to
him and his platform. So let's get back on energy
dominance and the strategy that is emerging. Some key points
that you're picking up of some of the things that

(13:48):
President Trump is discussing are going to be game changers
in the you know, energy dominant strategy, right.

Speaker 3 (13:57):
So I think practically speaking, the thing he can do
is to try to streamline and approval for projects, and
I think that's where you know, the National Energy Emergency
might have practical use and being able to get projects
approved and underway faster. When when you think about what

(14:21):
a president Canon can't do, what would what would cause
us to produce a lot of oil high oil prices,
and what does Trump want to do. He wants to
lower oil prices, So those are working across purposes to
each other. But getting projects streamlined faster that would help

(14:43):
the oil companies, and certain deregulation will help the oil companies.
So that I think is the single biggest thing is
in regulation and opening up new areas to expiration. That's another,
but that's going to be a long time of before
we see dividends pay on that in the short term.

(15:04):
There's really not a lot that will happen in the
short term. I mean, you know, the old companies just
can't go out and turn a spigot. They look down
down the road and they forecast prices and they do
projects and so you know, right now we're producing thirteen
and a half million barrels a day of oil. We've
had a massive, massive expansion since about two thousand and

(15:27):
eight when the shale boom really started to pay dividends.
And during Trump's first three years in his first term,
all production went up I think about three million barrels
a day before COVID crashed the production. I don't think
we're going to see that again. I don't think there's
anything that can happen that will cause us to move
up from thirteen and a half to sixteen and a

(15:48):
half million barrels over the next three years. I'd be
shocked if that happens. You know, aill prices were relatively
high over the past year and production was pretty flat.
We didn't see see the same sharp move up that
we saw, you know, the past couple of years, or
in the first three years of the Trump administration. We
didn't see that sharp move up. And I've been reading

(16:11):
a lot of people are forecasting that, you know, shale
production is starting to peak. And I read and somebody
said the other day they thought last year would be
the peak. So regardless of what happens, there's gonna come
a time that you know, regardless of what happens outside
of oil price is going to two hundred dollars a barrel,
that the shale production is just going to start to

(16:33):
go down because the fields are depleted, all the sweet
spots have been drilled. Now are we there yet? It's
hard to say. We may set a new production record
again this year, but I'm not as confident about that
as I was a year ago when production was still
increasing rapidly. You know, we've seen it pretty flat over
the last you know, six to eight months, So I

(16:56):
don't know where we go from here, but I would
be shocked if we see a massive expansion from the
record rates we're producing right now.

Speaker 2 (17:05):
And Robert, you are a chemical engineer, and you've worked
in the energy industry years and years and years, but
you also have experience in investing. And some of the
articles in the past that you have wrote for Forbes
discussed how how the energy companies under the Biden administration

(17:27):
made record profits. And what do you see happening in
the Trump administration with is the Trump administration attempting to
try to lower prices for the consumer at the maybe
the the loss of an energy company by trying to
tinkle with those numbers. And you know, we've had record

(17:48):
numbers for the last two years here in Texas on
production and taxes and royalties and the Rainy Day Fund
coming into the Texas Coffers, which has been great under
the Biden administry. I just kind of want our listeners
to understand when we start he's anti, He's not anti

(18:08):
oil and gas. Trump is really very pro But the
economics of this what starts happening when we start looking
at that in a different way. Why did oil companies
make record profits and the Biden administration and will they
make the same in the Trump administration.

Speaker 3 (18:28):
So that's a good question, and it's it's these cross
purposes that politicians work at. I mean, for the consumer.
Presidents like low energy prices. Low energy prices are not
good for oil companies, so why did they make record profits.
They made record profits under Biden because energy price is
shot up so much. So Biden got a lot of

(18:50):
flack full high gas prices, high oil prices, But the
energy companies made a lot of money. So I mean
that doesn't get you reelected. I mean, high energy prices
will not get you reelected. But it was very good
for the energy companies, you know, And that's the politics

(19:12):
versus the economics. You know. The politics says you would
love to have low energy prices, but also you'd like
for it to be a good environment for the oil companies.
And I think the way Trump is trying to balance
this is with the deregulation opening up new areas for expiration, saying, okay,
I want to I want you to be able to

(19:33):
make more money by selling more barrels at a lower cost.
I think that's the I think that's the calculus here.

Speaker 2 (19:43):
So under that mindset, is Texas going to have record
profits again in twenty twenty five with production levels and
the amount of money that is given to the state
from all the drilling and activity coming from the energy sector.
Under President Trump's policies and how he sees things, is

(20:05):
that going to affect Texas at all?

Speaker 3 (20:07):
So, you know, I don't like to sugarcoat things. I
just call them like I see them the way it
is right now. I think Texas would have another very
very good year. But you know there's a Trump today
was telling Opek bring prices down. If Opek succeeded in
I mean, the way Opek brings prices down is by

(20:27):
producing more. If you produce more and energy prices go down,
it's not good for Texas oil producers. So you know,
there's that there's that balancing.

Speaker 2 (20:38):
Act, right and it's not easy because you have independence
and you have majors, and they all have different needs.
It's a very hard thing to balance between both. We're
going to take a quick break, but when we come back,
I want to start talking. I want to move to
topic a little bit further out to the executive orders
that have been signed pertaining to promoting energy dominance. Then

(20:59):
a little bit later on in the show, I want
to cover the nominees that President Trump has tapped to
focus on energy policy, and a whole lot more pertaining
to stabilization energy prices and market volatility. You're listening to
the Energy Mix Radio show. And we'll be right back,

(21:22):
and we're back. You're listening to the Energy Mix Radio Show.
I'm your guest Kimbalado, and today my guest is Robert Rapier,
the editor in chief of Shell Magazine and a senior
contributor with Forbes. Robert, we talked the last two segments
about what does energy dominance probably mean in some ways
to the Trump administration. While we don't know everything, thank

(21:45):
you for trying to give us a little bit of
an indicator about what you think. Let's move on to
executive orders that impact the oil, gas, and coal industry
in the United States. And while he signed a lot
of orders, talk about the ones that are specific to
the energy sector. Tell me which ones caught your attention

(22:06):
and why. So.

Speaker 3 (22:07):
The biggest one was the National Energy Emergency and that
does a few things, but it allows the government to
use special powers like the Defense Production Act to speed
up production distribution of energy. I wonder whether you know
Exonomobile would say yes, we need that because I think
they would say, hey, we know how to produce and
get energy out there now to the extent that it

(22:30):
allows them to speed up approval for projects. And we
haven't mentioned nuclear power, but if it can speed up
the approval process for nuclear power plants, that would be
a very, very big deal because no matter how you
look at it, you know, with the burgeoning electricity demand.

(22:53):
We saw electricity demand shoot up last year because of
all these data centers here are being built. We're going
to need nuclear power. I mean it's good, We're gonna
need more natural gas power. We're gonna need nuclear power.
And to the extent that the National Emergency can clear
out some of the red tape and allow us to
get some of these projects approved and construction underway, that'll

(23:15):
be a very good thing. But to the extent that
it's like tell an Exxon mobile pump more oil, they
don't want that. They want to be left alone. They
want to say, Okay, just deregulate us and leave us alone.
We know what we're doing. Just you know, I think
that's what they would say. You know, there's a lot
of rollback or environmental regulations we've had. You know, all

(23:39):
these incentives and mandates for electric vehicles and efficiency standards,
those are being rolled back. You know, the lifting the
more torium on the new licenses for LNG, that's a
big one. And that's one that all the natural gas
producers wanted to see. Natural gas price are too low

(24:00):
and they would like to be able to export more.
And you know, we are already the dominant LNG exporter,
and to think about that fifteen years ago is just unreal.
I mean, nobody in the world would have predicted that
the US would be the number one LNG export fifteen
years ago and here we are, so you know, to

(24:21):
allow us to continue to do that, I think is
a very good thing. There was an executive order about
Alaska opening up new areas for exploration, and there's probably
a lot of oil that can be developed out of Alaska,
and I think all companies are appreciative of being able
to go out and you know, do more exploration there.

(24:43):
We withdrew from the Paris Agreement. You know, that did
kind of constrain us somewhat because when you look at
where global carbon emissions are coming from, they're largely coming
from China. The growth is all out of Asia, and
so the Paris Climate Agreement kind of tied our hand
there and punished us while giving China Indy a free pass.

(25:04):
So we're pulling out of that. The weird one to
me was a withdrawal of offshore wind leasing. You know,
I'm kind of a mind that if a company wants
to lease and build an offshore wind farm, just like
if a company wants to lease and police offshore oil,
you know, the government ought to be in the business

(25:25):
of trying to say, okay, yeah, we'll take your money
for that lease and we and knock yourself out but
we've an executive order was issued withdrawing all areas of
the out of continal shelf from offshore wind leasing. To me,
this is like Biden, you know, taking areas off off
the plate for oil exploration. You know, you got private

(25:47):
companies out there wanting to explore. Let them explore. If
they want to build a wind farm, they want to
lease it from the government out there, you know, I'd
let them do it. That's that's my view.

Speaker 2 (25:58):
So there have been a lot of subsidies that the
government has paid. Yeah, I have that specific area.

Speaker 3 (26:05):
But so let's say let's say instead you pull the
subsidies and then nobody wants to lease. Okay, But to
say you can't lease that that, I wouldn't have done that.
I mean, I would say, okay, you're not getting any subsidies.
But if you still think it's a good business decision
and you want to go out and you want to
lease this area for a wind farm, okay, as the

(26:27):
US government, we will take your money and you can
go out and you can build that wind farm.

Speaker 2 (26:32):
Well, it's definitely a lot of executive orders, and we're
going to take a quick break when we come back.
I want to get on. I want to stay on
that topic because I want to thrill down into electric
vehicles and the executive order Tesla our Elon Musk is
obviously a part of his strategy team, and I want

(26:55):
to try to get your opinion on what does this mean.
And then also all these energy comesmpanies that were retooling
their factories and everything to do this. And there's these
contracts again that are in place and money that has
been given and contracted. How does that work? And then
I want to talk about the SBR too, But we
got to take a quick break. You're listening to the

(27:16):
Energy Mixed Radio Show, and we'll be right back. And
we're back here listening to the Energy Mixed Radio Show.
I'm your host, Kimbalatto, and joining me today is Robert Raybier,
the editor in chief of Shell Magazine senior contributor at
Forbes Magazine. Robert, thank you for joining me today. It's
an exciting time. We've spent a lot we've spent the

(27:38):
last four years with the Bio administration, and we have
seen a lot of changes in that administration pertaining to
his energy policy and his administration and their goals. It
seems as though President Trump being elected, has now flipped
the switch. He is for energy dominance, and I think
a lot of people in the energy sector are relieved,

(27:58):
even though they we may not quite know how this
affects us all the way around. So let's get back
on executive orders and the topic of what President Trump
is doing right now. Then I'm going to get into
towards the end these nominees that he has that he
wants to put in place that will cover energy policy
for his administration in the United States. But first let's

(28:20):
go back because one of the executive orders that he
signed was electric vehicles. We talked about electric vehicles. How
does this work? What does it mean? All the large
auto dealers, I think retooled a lot of their factories
to continue to produce electric vehicles, but there was a
lot of subsidies that was given to these companies. And

(28:44):
then we also have a team member that is on
the Trump administration, which is Elon Musk. He obviously owns
Tesla that's an electric vehicle. He has plans for you know,
self driving ubers in the future. What does this mean
for all of this industry. How is that going to
be affected?

Speaker 3 (29:03):
Yeah, So let me take that last point first, because
you talked about the self driving ubers. I'm in Chandler,
Arizona here and this was a testing ground for that
technology for Weimo, which was was spun out of Google.
And every day I see cars driving down the road
with absolutely nobody else for him.

Speaker 2 (29:23):
To me, it seems very I don't think I would
get into a car didn't have a driver.

Speaker 3 (29:26):
I've taken pictures of a car pulling up next to
me at a light, no passengers, no driver, nobody in
the car at all. The car is just driving around.
So you know the technology is there. But okay, so
electric vehicles. I've been really critical not of electric vehicles,
but of the projections that they were going to really

(29:48):
disrupt the oil industry on a short time scale. And
I think a lot of government you know, I think
Biden got ahead of themselves. I think a lot of
state governments, a lot of national governments get ahead of
themselves in thinking that a fast rollout of electric vehicles
is going to have a big take a big bite

(30:10):
out of oil demand. And again and again, I use
Norway as an example. Norway had triple digit growth in
electric vehicles for about a decade and they have the
largest penetration of electric vehicles of any country in the world,
and they're old demands about the same as it was
fifteen years ago. I mean, they have not seen a

(30:31):
major decline in oil demand. And why is that. It's because,
you know, the fleet takes a long time to turn over.
It's because the population is growing. It's because a lot
of people get electric vehicle as a second car, and
so for their longer trips, they're still taking their gasoline automobile.
And so I've said again and again we have to

(30:52):
be very careful there of planning for less oil in
the future, when I don't think that's going to be
the case with electric vehicles. I mean, Bloomberg wrote an
article in I believe twenty fifteen and they said by
twenty twenty two, we could see a two million barrel
a day bite out of oil demand and a permanent

(31:13):
price plunge as a result. And I said, how ridiculous
it was because of electric vehicles, and.

Speaker 2 (31:19):
I would not want to be that journalist.

Speaker 3 (31:22):
Forward I called them, I called them mount in Forbes,
and I said, this is this is ridiculous. I mean,
this is not your research. Yeah, it's not remotely credible.
So yeah, I think that's the issue of electric vehicles.
And if not for Elon Musk, I would say that
the electric vehicle industry would be in a lot of

(31:44):
trouble because I think I think President Trump would say
no more money, no more subsidies, no more mandates, and
and that would be that. But with Elon Musk in there,
I think there's going to be a little bit of hey,
let's uh, let's don't get too carried away. And you know,
electric vehicles probably are the future longer term, so let's

(32:06):
not you know, completely get rid of them. Let's just
maybe tap the brakes a little bit here, you know,
as they get more cost competitive. Sure, if somebody wants
to buy an electric vehicle, but don't force people to
buy an electric vehicle. Don't throw huge amounts of taxpayer
money at trying to get people to get an electric vehicle.

(32:27):
And I think that's what we'll see. I think I
think there'll be a moderating effect there from Elon Musk.
And if not for that, I think all bets are
off of elect vehicles. But I think because of Elon Musk,
we won't see a full scale abandonment of electric vehicle strategy.

Speaker 2 (32:41):
Well, what about the dealer, the auto dealerships. Let's let's
sell him asch because he's very special, right, but let's
look at all the auto dealers. I mean, it was
to the point where Ford was losing actually the entire
amount of investment. They're actually losing money per each vehicle.
Thank goodness, they had those subsidies, right, But now what
do they do with the retooling product pushing it out?

(33:05):
And how do they maintain this? What what are we
going to see from those dealerships with their electric fleets?
Do we see just pull that retract?

Speaker 3 (33:13):
Well, see that Hurts is a good example that Hurts
tried to push out electric vehicles. I read a story
the other day that sometimes Hurts will tell people, you know,
if you like that car, just keep it, because they're
trying to get rid of their electric vehicles. That fleet
has cost them a lot of money, and they had
these real grandiose plans, and the one of the biggest

(33:33):
things was depreciation and maintenance cost far more is unbelievable,
and so Hurts is kind of abandon that. I don't
see Hurts jumping back on that bandwagon anytime soon. I
think Ford is going to back off here, and I
don't see them, you know, over the next four years.
I doubt they're going to invest a lot of money
now on electric vehicles, and so I think that's what

(33:56):
we'll see. I think we'll see some unwinding of those investments.
But you know, in some cases, people are too far
down the road here. One of the things I saw,
I think it was Chevron's CEO. It said, we've invested
a lot of money into renewable energy, and you know
some of those investments are you know, we're midway through them.
So don't completely pull the rug out from under us

(34:18):
on that. You know, let us continue, Let's continue with
the strategy and sort of maybe make some modifications, but
not a wholesale you know, end to renewable energy and
you know, everything into oil and gas, because that's not
how we've invested the last few years, and we don't
want to lose those investments.

Speaker 2 (34:38):
You know, you must really have a lot of courage
foresight of these executives that have to run these energy companies,
considering all of the stuff that they go through through
through different administrations, through different tactics to grow quire. It's
just massive that the average person couldn't understand how implicated

(35:00):
these things are. I want to I want to talk
about we're going to get ready for break. I want
to talk about the strategic Strategic Patroleum Reserve because President
Trump did talk about that in his inauguration speech. And
then of course I want to talk a little bit
about the economics to end out the show of what
you feel we will see with this new energy dominance policy.

(35:23):
But we're going to take a quick break. When we
come back, we'll talk about the spr you're listening to
the Energy Mix radio show, and we'll be right back.

Speaker 1 (35:33):
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Speaker 2 (36:12):
And we're back. You're listening to the Energy Mixed radio show.
My guest today is Robert Raypier, editor of show magazine. Robert.
President Trump discussed the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. I like to
cover that because that is an important reserve to me.
We have a war, we need it filled. President Trump
announced that he was going to fill it to the
very top. What does that mean when he says he

(36:32):
wants to fill it to the top. What are the
implications good or bad?

Speaker 3 (36:35):
Well, it depends on you know, who's It depends on
who you're asking that of. For the oil companies, is great.
I mean there's more oil that they can sell. This
is something that will take barrels off the market, and
it is something that will uplift the price. So and
maybe that's one of the reasons President Trump is asking
OPEC to open up the taps and bring prices down,

(36:56):
because if he wants to fill the Strategic Patrol and Reserve,
and he wants to do it without really lifting oil prices,
he needs more oil barrels on the market. And uh,
you know, that's that's one thing I agree that you know,
Biden came in and he really depleted the strategic PROLLN
deserve and uh uh you know, it'd be good for
the industry, but it would be good for national security

(37:16):
for us to have that, uh, you know, back in
a good spot. We never expect that we're gonna need it,
and in reality, we've never really needed it. But you know,
we've gotten We're in an age now we don't really
think about war that much like World War Two. You know,
if you got into another world war and you didn't
have the strategy of coroners are, it could be devastating.
So uh, you know, it's just an insurance policy for

(37:39):
worst case scenarios. So you know, I agree filled it
back up, Uh, but that's gonna, you know, potentially lift
the price.

Speaker 2 (37:48):
I think that it is important because the fact that
what you said, if we get into war, that things
should be filled and it's gonna need to be filled,
and that's not the time to be looking around and
saying we don't have enough energy to supply our planes,
tos and military that's needed. So this is why nobody
drives around anymore without insurance on their vehicle. So it's
the same thing in a way, but it just secures

(38:10):
that we have enough energy should we get attacked in
some kind of war.

Speaker 3 (38:15):
Analogy I've used is this, if you have a half
million dollar house, you should have a half million dollars
of insurance on it. And what we've done is now
we've insured our half million dollar house for one hundred
thousand dollars. So you know, if your house burns down,
you better hope you can get access to another four
hundred thousand dollars to rebuild your house, because that's what
we've done. We're operating the ESPR now at much lower volumes,

(38:36):
and that is risky.

Speaker 2 (38:38):
Let's talk about the appointments of Chris Right with Liberty Energy,
and there's been a few more. Who are they and
how do they sit in the world of energy. I
know we have the Interior Secretary, Chris Wright is Secretary
of Energy. They've been through Congress. Can you give us
an update? And then also, what do you feel as
far as their energy policies experience? What will we see

(39:00):
from them?

Speaker 3 (39:02):
So President Trump has made a few controversial picks for
his cabinet. These are not controversial picks. I know some
environmentalists were upset that you would have an energy insider
as energy secretary, and I always thought that was kind
of funny to me. You want somebody who understands the
energy business, absolutely, not a politician in the energy in
the you know, energy secretary role. So you know, for me,

(39:25):
it's a good thing to have somebody in there that
understands the energy sector. So this is not a controversial
Burgerham is somebody else who's you know, he's pro development,
uh you know, pro energy. Not a controversial pick in
there at all. So I think these guys, you know,
they'll smooth sale into confirmation and uh uh no issues there.

(39:46):
It's it's not going to be like some of these
other hearings at you know, I would imagine the hearing
for RFK Junior is going to be pretty interesting.

Speaker 2 (39:54):
Oh yes, well, so what do you think of these
two gentlemen and they're their energy policy And I know
Chris Wright, Liberty Energies CEO, he totally gets it. He's
been in the industries like you, he's a veteran, and
he's going to be pushing for stronger policies, more protection,
you know, lowering regulations, these things in a balanced way

(40:16):
and understand what are like the priorities And do you
feel that the people that President Trump has nominated that
they are all sitting in a very seasoned position that
we're actually going to start seeing some real movement and
not just this energy dominance, but actually start seeing real
changes at the level at the federal government in regulations
and things that really start taking hold of shaping the policies.

Speaker 3 (40:39):
Well, sure, I mean the other the other big nine
n there's Burgham, the who's from North Dakota, and North
Dakota is a major oil producer site. So absolutely, so
he gets it. So you've got guys that I think understand, uh,
the importance of American energy. And I don't think that's
always been the case that that people, I think take
oil production and natural gas structure for granted, they don't

(41:02):
recognize the importance of it and or they even you know,
protest against it or try to legislate it out of existence.
I think these guys get it, and they'll be like
very pro energy. They'll be advising President Trump, you know,
on measures that can help the industry. And so so
I think I think all that's good.

Speaker 2 (41:22):
Yeah, let's switch gears and talk a little bit about
something else that you're very familiar with as an expert,
and that is investing in how to look at stocks
and things. We everybody is hearing about artificial intelligence and
these large data centers that we're going to need a
lot more data, and pretty much all the media is

(41:44):
covering how are we going to get there? And how
are we going to do this? And so my question
would be to you, in what way do you see
the energy industry grappling with and the Trump administration That
we know that there's going to be more population growth,
we know there's going to be more demand for energy
in the future, and it almost appears as though we
don't start really figuring it out now, we're going to

(42:06):
hit a brick wall of not having enough period globally.
And now that was before artificial intelligence came into the mix.
So where are we heading with all of this demand
and can the oil and gas industry really produce everything
that is needed or what's the solution?

Speaker 3 (42:21):
So I just did an interview earlier today where I
was asked about AI, and let me say just just
up front, there have been some really big revolutionary things
that happened in my lifetime. The Internet was one, smartphones
were one, and AI will be one, and AI is
going to be I think in my opinion bigger than smartphones.

(42:42):
The problem is it does demand a lot of energy,
So utilities are well, all these companies are building these
data centers, and the data centers consume a lot of energy.
So last year we saw electricity usage in the US
spike and some of these util of these, especially the
ones that sell competitive power like nerg Energy, which is

(43:04):
an investment I have and recommend, was up I think
eighty percent last year. So utilities we're surging last year.
So companies that produce competitive electricity, companies that supply them energy,
the pipeline companies that transport that energy. Those are all
really unconventional ways to play the AI doom as outside
of the buying stocks that invest in AI ships. So

(43:26):
there is definitely an energy angle there, and one that
investors could get in on if they are paying attention
to the utilities that have to supply that energy for
those data centers.

Speaker 2 (43:34):
I heard that tip that guess what, we're out of
time again? These shows go so fast, don't they and
talking about energy? What's coming at Robert, what's happening in
the in show magazine?

Speaker 3 (43:48):
Well, the first quarter issue is about done. I guess
we should be out the door pretty quick, and it's,
you know, a pretty interesting issue. You know, we've got
a lot to write about this year. I mean, this
is going to be a very very interesting year relative
to last year. I think a lot's going to happen.
I think there'll be headlines almost every day that we
can write about. I found myself covered up with things

(44:10):
that I could write about, and I think that's the
way that you will be. I think it's going to
be a very exciting, dynamic and interesting year. And it's
very hard for me to forecast prices in production right now.
I mean my crystal ball is very hazy right now.
And all this is going well.

Speaker 2 (44:25):
I'll go ahead and tell the listeners sneak peek that
the cover that we're getting that y'all are getting ready
to release is actually Commissioner Don Buckingham of the General
Land Office, and she's definitely dynamite. So I can't wait
to read that issue and it should be out probably
in about a week or so on our platforms. Robert,
thank you for joining me. That's all the time we
have look forward to having you back on the show.

(44:46):
Like you said, there's going to be a whole lot
to cover. Buckle up. We're going to have a fun
ride covering and energy for the next four years. Thank you,
Robert got.

Speaker 1 (44:55):
The Energy Mix Radio Show is where we explore topics
that affect us all in the oil and gas industry.
Every week, our host will interview the movers and shakers
in this fast paced industry. You'll hear from industry experts,
elected officials, and many more on the Energy Mix Radio Show.