Trump condemns UK net zero push
Donald Trump has publicly criticised the UK’s net zero policy, saying it is disincentivising oil drilling and needlessly inflating energy prices.
In an unusual intervention, the US President said that the UK’s North Sea reserves still had “a century of drilling left”, which if tapped would help bring costs down, “and fast”.
“I strongly recommend to [the UK] that in order to get their Energy Costs down, they stop with the costly and unsightly windmills, and incentivize modernized drilling in the North Sea, where large amounts of oil lay waiting to be taken,” he wrote on Truth Social, his social media platform.
The comments pose a direct rebuke to the government’s flagship manifesto promise to make Britain a ‘clean energy superpower’ by ramping up investment into sustainable energy and slapping a moratorium on new drilling projects.
In an effort being ring-led by energy minister Ed Miliband, the Starmer administration has vowed to accelerate the UK’s transition to net zero. While other countries have dialled back their green commitments, the government has reaffirmed its plans for the UK to reach net zero by 2050, and brought forward a target to cut emissions by 81 per cent before 2035.
As part of those efforts, it has stopped issuing any new drilling licences in the UK’s oil reserves in the North Sea while safeguarding projects that have already been granted.
Trump’s comments put the US in direct opposition to those plans. As part the same post – in which he also declared the recent US-UK trade deal as “working out well for all” – he added: “A century of drilling left, with Aberdeen as the hub. The old fashioned tax system disincentivizes drilling, rather than the opposite. U.K.’s Energy Costs would go WAY DOWN, and FAST!”
Reform woos energy execs
Trump unleashed his salvo on the same day it emerged that Reform UK has been promising energy executives it would reverse Labour’s net zero policy immediately were it to be elected.
According to the Financial Times, Richard Tice, the insurgent party’s deputy leader, has been currying favour with North Sea firms, telling them he would launch a “day one” assault on the country’s current energy strategy.
The mooted proposal would, Tice was reported to say, unlock billions of pounds of investment in hydrocarbons in which taxpayers would gain a stake.
“I’m urging them not to give up,” Tice told the Financial Times. “There’s about to be a sea change in less than four years,” he said, adding that these companies “should be getting their licence applications ready for Reform to fast-track when it comes into government”.