President Donald Trump has signed five executive orders that address critical segments of the nation’s energy infrastructure – a move made under the presidential determinations of the Defense Production Act that allows a U.S. president to mobilize industry for purposes of national security. 

The two-term president has long pushed for energy development and the infrastructure to support it as a key aspect of national security. The orders, signed amid the U.S. war with Iran, seek to address issues with the aging electricity grid, the need for natural gas pipelines, coal supply chains and large-scale electricity projects. They don’t refer to wind and solar energy, but they identify "intermittent energy" as a threat to a secure supply of energy. 

Iran and neighboring Persian Gulf states account for as much as 50% of the world's oil reserves, but the U.S. is not dependent on the region for its oil. 

Still, the orders signed Tuesday by Trump will go a long way toward helping secure American energy dominance, David Blackmon, an analyst with over 40 years of experience in the oil and gas industry, said on his “Energy Additions” Substack, 

“Taken together, these five actions represent the most comprehensive federal push for all-of-the-above energy in modern history. They cut through the red tape, provide the financial backstops markets sometimes need for massive infrastructure bets, and explicitly reject the notion that we can ‘transition’ away from reliable hydrocarbons without destroying our economy and security,” he wrote. 

Order 1: Large-scale energy development 

Focuses on large-scale energy development, covering a range of activities from the development of power plants to financing. It aims to cut through red tape and long permitting times to accelerate projects. 

• Reduces financial risks, regulatory delays and other barriers that impede investment and development. 

• Supports the deployment of power plants, supports manufacturing, enables infrastructure construction, site preparation and financing in the early stages of the projects. 

• Prioritizes domestic energy-related manufacturing to support infrastructure development.

Order 2: Grid infrastructure

Aims to shore up America’s electricity grid, which has run into bottlenecks due to long lead times for things like transformers, dependency on foreign supply chains and permitting delays. Transmission projects can take decades and cost billions of dollars. The order identifies America’s aging and inadequate grid as a threat to national defense and economic prosperity. 

• Identifies the need to reduce lead times on equipment and infrastructure, including transformers, conductors, substations and related raw materials. 

• Encourages increased domestic production of materials and components.

• Identifies purchases, purchase commitments and financial support as actions needed for development of U.S. production capabilities. 

Order 3: Domestic petroleum production

Emphasizes that an intermittent energy supply leaves the U.S. vulnerable to hostile foreign actors, and encourages an increase in production, transportation, refining and generation capacity of domestic petroleum production. 

• Provides support for exploration, storage and pipelines

• Identifies petroleum products as essential for fueling the military and economy

• Cuts through permitting delays and financial constraints 

Order 4: Liquefied natural gas production and infrastructure

This order appears to be directly in response to the impacts of Iran’s blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, which has thrown liquefied natural gas markets into chaos and driven up costs. The order states that “hostile foreign actors” weaponized America’s reliance on foreign energy, which caused dramatic swings in international commodity markets. 

The U.S. has been largely shielded from these shocks due to it being the largest producer of natural gas in the world, and the support of export terminals likely aims to make the U.S. more capable of supplying its allies’ energy needs. 

The order seeks to:

• Provides support for pipelines, compression and processing facilities, underground storage, and export terminals

• Seeks to remove financing constraints, permitting delays and infrastructure bottlenecks

• Calls for purchases, purchasing commitments and financial support for the development of natural gas production capabilities. 

Order 5: Support for the coal industry

America’s coal industry has long been in decline. It’s partly due to competition from natural gas, but climate policies that began under the Obama administration sought to force coal-fired electrical generation into early retirement. Trump’s order identifies coal as an important energy resource that provides baseload power to the grid. 

• Supports coal mining and rail and barge logistics, export terminals and life-extension work on power plants and on-site stockpiles of coal.

• Addresses financial constraints, long lead times on maintenance, and expensive repair cycles

• Provides financial support for the development of production capabilities

Blackmon acknowledged the orders aren’t “magic bullets,” but they will be encouraging to investors, developers and allies that the federal government is supporting American energy production. 

Energy Secretary Chris “Wright now has the tools to act decisively to speed permitting, reshore supply chains, and speed crucial projects long stuck in bureaucratic limbo to finally break ground,” Blackmon wrote.