Colorado oil and gas executive Chris Wright nominated for energy secretary, hailed as a "pragmatic problem solver"
A Colorado oil and gas executive will head the U.S. Department of Energy if President-elect Donald Trump's pick is confirmed.
Chris Wright is founder and CEO of Liberty Energy, a fracking company based in Denver. He is the first oil and gas executive to be nominated for Energy secretary.
Trump called him a "pioneer in the shale revolution." He is also a vocal opponent of climate policies and says energy has become over-politicized.
The Energy secretary oversees the nation's nuclear arsenal and federal labs. But it has also led the transition away from fossil fuels in the last four years, a transition Trump plans to dial back with Wright's help.
Wright is a mechanical and electrical engineer, or -- as he says -- a tech nerd. But he has a lighter side too. In 2021, he roasted North Face in a mock award ceremony. The Colorado Oil and Gas Association gave North Face its "Extraordinary Customer Award" after the company refused to fill an order for 400 coats because it came from an oil and gas company.
Wright noted the irony, given petroleum is in almost everything North Face makes, "So it's hard to top the all-in nature of North Face as a consumer of our product."
It epitomized Wright's blunt style. While critics call him a climate denier, he says he believes climate change is real. But he told a congressional committee last year that its impact on natural disasters is overblown.
U.S. Rep. Sean Casten (D-IL) said Wright was full of it. "We could talk about the number of places in the world where the wet bulb temperature now regularly exceeds 35 degrees Celsius, 95 [fahrenheight], which is beyond the ability of humans to live for more than 6 hours a time in India, Bangladesh, maybe not in your air conditioned office," Casten said to Wright during a hearing. "But this stuff is real. And I'm not going to get into an argument with you because ultimately you don't matter."
As head of the agency at the forefront of President Joe Biden's clean energy push, Wright would matter a lot. The energy department has doled out billions of dollars in funding for climate policies that Trump plans to claw back. Wright would also be charged with resurrecting liquified natural gas exports.
Dan Haley, head of the Colorado Oil and Gas Association, says he's just the person for the job.
"Chris Wright is not a climate denier, and Chris Wright believes in all energy sources. He's very agnostic when it comes to energy. He is a pragmatic problem solver from the west," Haley told CBS Colorado.
Wright describes himself as a humanitarian focused on making American energy more affordable, reliable and secure.
"Chris understands that the world needs energy. he understand that the united States needs energy, and he understands that system needs to be affordable, efficient, and it needs to work for everybody," Haley said. "If it doesn't work for the poorest among us, it doesn't work for any of us."
Wright will also serve on a new National Energy Council, which Trump says will oversee the "path to U.S. energy dominance by cutting red tape, enhancing private sector investments and focusing on innovation over regulation."
If confirmed, Wright would be the second Coloradan to serve as Energy secretary after Federico Pena.