As the battle in Ukraine stresses suppliers, rising gas prices, and driving inflation up, U.S. President Joe Biden is under pressure to use Cold War-era authorities to compel more oil and gas production, Bloomberg reports.
Lawmakers and labor groups have pushed Biden to use the 1950 Defense Manufacturing Act to compel the deployment of drilling rigs and solar panels, the same authority used by Harry Truman to manufacture steel during the Korean War and Donald Trump to boost mask production to combat the coronavirus.
The Biden administration has displayed little enthusiasm for the initiative thus far.
Nonetheless, Russia’s attack on Ukraine is swiftly reshaping the possibilities. The administration has already been considering a limited use of the 72-year-old statute to jump-start manufacturing of electric heat pumps, which might reduce Europe’s dependency on Russian gas, which in turn would help with gas prices.
In Washington, politicians seeking to confront Russia’s energy supremacy are promoting the Defense Production Act as a solution to supply-chain bottlenecks and stalled gas projects.
Senator Joe Manchin, a powerful West Virginia Democrat, has tried to persuade Biden to use the DPA to force the building of the Mountain Valley Pipeline, which would be used to transport gas to the East Coast, despite the fact that the act would not resolve all of the pipeline’s ethical and regulatory challenges. Furthermore, four senators, including Manchin and Alaska Republican Lisa Murkowski, requested Biden on Friday to utilize the act to speed up the manufacture of lithium-ion battery materials required to power electric cars.
The president has the authority under federal law to effectively nationalize private enterprise in order to ensure that the United States has the resources it may need in a catastrophe. Energy is even designated as a “strategic and important substance,” allowing the president to prioritize contracts and compel enterprises to furnish the government with goods and services.
Be the first to comment