The US renewed threats to quit the International Energy Agency unless the organization scales back climate advocacy and focuses on energy security.
“We’re definitely not satisfied,” US Energy Secretary Chris Wright said Tuesday, ahead of an IEA ministerial meeting opening Wednesday. The agency must complete reforms “for the US to remain a long-term member,” he said.
The Paris-based agency, which was established in response to the 1970s oil crisis, has faced criticism in recent years for the publication of long-term scenarios which factor in more active government policies to shift away from fossil fuels. Republican lawmakers last year sought to cut US funding and denounced the agency for politicizing its projections.
The IEA didn’t immediately comment on the US official’s remarks, though confirmed Executive Director Fatih Birol and Wright met Tuesday to discuss energy issues, including a clean cooking fuel initiative.
A flagship report published in November tempered the IEA’s scenarios on an imminent peak in oil demand, and reintroduced a “Current Policies Scenario” after a five-year hiatus, which bases the analysis on existing conditions. The decision reflected rising political and economic uncertainty and wasn’t the result of US pressure, Birol said at the time.
Birol deserves credit for that shift, but must continue to drive reforms to refocus the IEA, Wright said at a Tuesday event hosted by the French Institute of International Relations.
“If it goes back to what it was — it was a fabulous international data recording agency, it was getting into critical minerals, was focused on big energy issues — we’re all in on that,” he said. “But if they insist that it’s so dominated and infused with climate stuff — yes, then we’re out.”
Wright previously flagged last July that the US could quit the IEA without additional reforms. The agency receives roughly $6 million annually, or about 14% of its budget, from the US.
At the IEA ministerial meeting in Paris on Wednesday, Wright said that the agency had gotten off track and isn’t needed as a climate advocacy group. The US wants IEA countries to focus on energy security and the pathway to a better world is more energy, Wright added.
President Donald Trump’s administration last month expanded its retreat from global cooperation on climate change by withdrawing from dozens of international organizations, including UN bodies and the International Renewable Energy Agency.
