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Wright Discusses Refineries, Permitting and AI Electricity Demand With Charles Payne

February 14, 2025 · U.S. Department of Energy · 0:05:14

Embedded from the source channel — never re-uploaded. Watch on YouTube

What happened

Energy Secretary Chris Wright told Fox Business’s Charles Payne that huge interest in investing in the United States, including energy-intensive artificial-intelligence manufacturing, wants to locate in the country under President Trump, according to the Department of Energy’s upload of the February 13, 2025 interview. Wright said the United States will lead in AI, but that doing so means huge growth in electricity demand on the grid, which must be met while winning what he called the AI arms race and keeping electricity prices down for consumers — the President’s agenda, as he described it.

Payne asked why the United States has not built new refineries despite running existing ones near capacity and depending on imported heavy crude. Wright agreed the country has not built a new refinery since the 1970s and said that fact, in his words, screams out permitting reform and a new agenda of getting rid of the nonsense, so the country can invest and build things to address such opportunities.

Wright framed the administration as a coalition of common sense that would let investment and construction proceed in America, with refining capacity as his example of infrastructure blocked for decades.

Why it matters

One of Wright’s first interviews as secretary sets two themes that recur through his tenure: AI demand as the reason the grid must grow, and the half-century refinery gap as proof that permitting, not resources, is the constraint.

Sources: U.S. Department of Energy, “Secretary Wright joins FOX Business’s Charles Payne - February 13th, 2025”, 2025-02-14 (official upload, embedded above; published 2025-02-14). Transcript via Supadata (private research store, paraphrased and attributed, not republished). All figures and characterizations as stated by the speakers.