US President Donald Trump Wednesday night broadly outlined his administration’s energy policy in a speech that touched on oil pipelines, ethanol production and the Paris climate accord.

The speech, at a rally in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, also included a number of false and misleading statements on the administration’s policy positions and their impact on energy markets.

Here’s a fact-check of some of Trump’s energy-related quotes:

TRUMP: “We’ve eliminated restrictions on the production of American energy.”

VERDICT: Mostly false.

The Trump administration has prioritized the repeal of numerous Obama-era regulations on oil, natural gas and coal production, including limits on methane emissions from oil and gas operations and new regulations for hydraulic fracturing on federal lands. But the regulations the administration has worked to roll back were not even in effect and some were only proposed rules. For example, the administration plans to repeal the Clean Power Plan, a key piece of former President Barack Obama’s regulatory effort to combat climate change, but that plan was not even set to enter into effect until 2022. Trump’s Interior Department also recently announced it was rescinding a 2015 fracking rule, but that rule would have only impacted about 5% of US oil production and had already been overturned by a US District Court in June.

Analysts claim that even if the rules were in place they would likely have only marginal impact on US supply, which mainly responds to price and other market fundamentals.

TRUMP: “Under our feet we have great wealth. Not only in the form of your kind of wealth, which is beautiful, fertile soil, but also in other locations in the form of energy. They wanted to take that power and that wealth away from us.”

VERDICT: Likely false.

The question is who is Trump referring to here? Some OPEC ministers wanted US oil producers to lose market share amid the shale boom and numerous environmental groups had pushed the Obama administration to dramatically curtail fossil production and focus on renewable energy sources, a position some in the previous administration likely viewed favorably.

But the Obama administration never seriously pushed a plan to curb US production. In fact, the opposite occurred. US oil production, for example, averaged 5.35 million b/d in 2009, Obama’s first year in office, and climbed to a peak of over 9.4 million b/d in 2015, according to the Energy Information Administration. US as production climbed from a low of nearly 64 Bcf/d in September 2008 to a peak of 92 Bcf/d in February 2016, according to EIA.

TRUMP: “And 33,000 mining jobs have been added since my inauguration.”

VERDICT: False.

There were 51,402 coal mining jobs in the fourth quarter of 2016 and 52,282 coal mining jobs in the first quarter of 2018, an increase of 880 jobs, according to the Department of Labor’s Mine Safety and Health Administration. The number of US coal mining jobs increased by 1,300 from December to the end of May, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics.

TRUMP: “In fact, you read about it, last week a brand, new coal mine just opened in the state of Pennsylvania, first time in decades, decades.”

VERDICT: False.

It hasn’t even been a decade, let alone decades, even if only considering mines in Pennsylvania. The Harvey mine, a thermal mine in Sycamore, about 50 miles southwest of Pittsburgh, was opened by Consol Energy in 2009. The 4 West mine, located about 60 miles south of Pittsburgh and near the West Virginia border, opened in 2005.

TRUMP: “We’ve approved, first day, the Keystone XL Pipeline and the Dakota Access Pipeline. First thing. Day one.”

VERDICT: False.

Trump’s first day in office was January 20. On January 24, Trump signed executive memos aimed at speeding the approvals of the stalled Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines, but these memos were not formal approvals. The State Department did not approve a long-awaited permit allowing TransCanada’s Keystone XL oil pipeline to cross the US-Canada border until March 24. TransCanada’s approval process for the pipeline’s proposed path is still ongoing. Dakota Access received its final permit to complete construction on February 8 and commercial service began this month.

TRUMP: “And again, we’re going to have all forms of energy. But coal is something we have a tremendous advantage at.”

VERDICT: False.

Shifting market fundamentals no longer support US coal production, a reality the Trump administration frequently ignores. US coal production totaled 1 billion short tons in 2014, but has declined in the last two and half years as a glut of domestically-produced natural gas has lowered prices for the fuel, which had led to a significant decline in the use of coal for power generation. Production this year is projected to total roughly 785 million st.

TRUMP: “But I put a little clause, handwritten. It said, anybody builds a pipeline in the United States will use American steel and fabricate in America.”

VERDICT: Misleading.

On January 24, Trump signed a memo aimed at encouraging the use of US steel in pipeline projects. But, as he did Wednesday night in Iowa, Trump has repeatedly referred to this memo as a new, legal requirement for US pipeline builders. The memo merely calls for a federal study of such a “Buy American” requirement and, even if ultimately enacted, the provision is expected to draw severe opposition from US trading partners. The White House has said Keystone XL is exempt from a Trump executive memorandum encouraging the use of US steel in pipeline projects because the project is already under way. TransCanada has already sourced the pipe, with half of it coming from US steel mills and the rest from mills in Canada (24%), Italy (16%) and India (10%).

TRUMP: [On his decision to leave the Paris climate agreement] “And they all say it’s nonbinding. Like hell it’s nonbinding. When we get sued by everybody because we thought it was nonbinding, then you can tell me it was nonbinding.”

VERDICT: False.

The 2015 Paris Agreement on climate aims to curb global greenhouse gas emissions and prevent a further increase in the global average temperature. The agreement calls on countries to make Intended Nationally Determined Contributions for how they will curb carbon emissions. These contributions are non-binding, a point even Trump made when he announced he was withdrawing the US from the deal earlier this month. “Thus, as of today, the United States will cease all implementation of the non-binding Paris Accord and the draconian financial and economic burdens the agreement imposes on our country,” Trump said in a Rose Garden speech on June 1.

TRUMP: “And by the way, we’re saving your ethanol industries in the state of Iowa, just like I promised I would do in my campaign. And believe me, they are under siege, folks. I don’t know if you know it, but they are under siege.”

VERDICT: Likely false.

It remains to be seen if Trump was referring to a potential shift in policy on ethanol, but it is unclear in what way ethanol is or was under siege. About 15.33 billion gallons of fuel ethanol were produced in the US in 2016, up 2 billion gallons from 2013, according to the Renewable Fuels Association, an ethanol industry group. Over the past decade, annual US fuel ethanol production has more than tripled, according to the trade group.

The Trump administration has been facing pressure from the oil industry to lower the ethanol mandate in the Renewable Fuel Standard, but this has been the case since Congress created the program over a decade ago. The EPA is expected to publish its proposed Renewable Volume Obligations for the RFS program next week, according to industry sources.

Source: Platts