- The U.S. Department of Energy is launching a new program to build more advanced nuclear fuel production lines to strengthen domestic supply chains and reduce reliance on foreign nuclear power and uranium.
- The administration is working to relaunch the American nuclear industry and scale up private companies’ ability to produce nuclear fuel for U.S. reactors.
- There is a focus on increasing overall energy capacity in the U.S. by 100 gigawatts in the next 5 years, including expanding natural gas, nuclear, and coal power generation.
- The DOE is pushing back against alarmist narratives around climate change, arguing the impacts may be less severe than often portrayed in the media.
- The administration is working to sell more U.S. oil and gas to allies abroad, reducing their reliance on imports from Russia.
- There is a broader focus on achieving prosperity at home and peace abroad under the current administration.
This was another outstanding interview with Chris Wright on the Mornings with Maria show this morning. Secretary Wright is highlighting the significant advancements in nuclear and nuclear fuel production in the United States.
Full Transcript of the Interview:
Maria Bartiromo, Fox News Anchor [00:00:01] Welcome back. Good Thursday morning everybody. Thanks so much for joining us this morning. I’m Maria Bartiromo and it is Thursday, August 7th. It is 8.01 on the East Coast. The Trump administration working to make America less reliant on foreign nuclear power and uranium as we reach now day 200 of President Trump’s second term. The Department of Energy is launching a new program which builds more advanced fuel lines. To help strengthen domestic supply chains. The search is on for qualified U.S. Companies to build and operate these production lines using the DOE authorization process. Joining me now is U. S. Energy Secretary Christopher Wright. Mr. Secretary, it’s great to see you this morning. Thank you so much for being here.
Secretary Chris Wright [00:00:41] Thanks for having me, Maria.
Maria Bartiromo, Fox News Anchor [00:00:42] Well, this is such an important story as the president is trying hard to rely less and less on foreigners for the critical items Americans need. Tell us about this program. What are you hoping to achieve?
Secretary Chris Wright [00:00:57] And we’ve heard us talk about before bringing uranium enrichment back to the United States, but after you enrich uranium, you need to turn it into a form that can be used as fuel and nuclear reactors. So we just announced the first licensing we’re going to do to a Tennessee-based company to scale up from bench scale to producing commercial fuel per nuclear reactors, part President Trump’s effort to relaunch the American nuclear industry. It’s been talked about for 20 years, we’re gonna make it happen.
Maria Bartiromo, Fox News Anchor [00:01:27] So tell me about that, because I know you’ve said in the past, you’ve got all hands on deck, it’s oil, it’s gas, but it’s also nuclear. What’s the breakdown? How do you see those being used differently?
Secretary Chris Wright [00:01:39] Yeah, this is simply giving the authority for this company to scale up its activities. It’s private capital, it’s their own investments to do it, but a regulatory regime has just made it too slow and cumbersome to do. This is saying, hey, they’ve met the requirements, they got a safe process, and we’re allowing them to scale-up so they can supply fuel to our reactors. If we’re going to win the AI race, we’ve got to have more energy as rapidly as we can safely and thoughtfully, but we’ve gotta get out of this funk we’ve been in in four years where all we talk about is shutting stuff down.
Maria Bartiromo, Fox News Anchor [00:02:15] So how do we do that? Tell us how we fuel this AI boom. You’re right, we don’t have enough. And so what are you doing in a practical sense to do just that?
Secretary Chris Wright [00:02:29] First of all, we’re letting private businesses make those decisions of where they wanna invest. Our biggest source of electricity in the country by far today is natural gas. That’s gonna grow rapidly. That’s the biggest investment, but that’s again chosen by businesses, not by the government. But we wanna have nuclear as another affordable, reliable supply that can start growing again. It’s big today, but it hasn’t grown in decades. And we gotta stop shutting down coal plants. You know, look, we’re in day 200 in the United States, and we’re talking about expansion, new investments in this country, growing our sources of electricity, letting Americans choose what kind of cars and shower heads they wanna use. 300 days ago, we were talking about which things we’re gonna shut down and how fast can we shut them down. It’s just a different world we’re at.
Maria Bartiromo, Fox News Anchor [00:03:18] It sure is, it sure is a different world, and President Trump has his finger on everything, it seems like. Meanwhile, PPL utilities reached a settlement to add approximately 1.3 gigawatts of gas-fired power, primarily for data centers. So you said this is how we energize the nation to fuel America’s next industrial surge. Tell me what kind of capacity is needed.
Secretary Chris Wright [00:03:42] By our estimates, we probably need 100 gigawatts of new capacity in the next five years. And under the previous administration’s plans, they were shutting down almost 100 gigawatts of coal and natural gas plants in that same five-year period. So instead of going backwards 100 gigwatts, we’ve got to go forward 100 gigatts. So in that announcement, you just mentioned that it was two new natural gas power plants to give that 1.3 additional gigawatts was also extending the life of an existing coal plant that was going to be shut down. So that announcement’s more like two gigawatths of incremental from what we would have had under the previous administration. That’s incredible. But that’s two gigawatt. We need 100.
Maria Bartiromo, Fox News Anchor [00:04:27] Yeah. Well, the Department of Energy, meanwhile, released its climate report assessing the impact of greenhouse gas emissions. It includes carbon dioxide-induced warming may be less damaging than previously believed, which many people expected. The DOE is receiving pushback, however, from the New York Times. The Times writes that the Energy Department is attacking climate science in contentious reports. Secretary, your reaction?
Secretary Chris Wright [00:04:52] Oh, what a crazy headline, but I guess that’s par for the course for the New York Times. In fact, we’re doing the exact opposite. We’re exposing the American people and the broader scientific community to what actually is in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Reports, not the hyperbolic summaries for policymakers or media headlines that claim all sorts of crazy stuff. This is what we actually know. How often do you hear that the planet’s getting greener because there’s more carbon dioxide in the air that contributes to increased crop productivity and greater wilderness, greener wilderness. How often you hear that deaths from extreme weather have been falling like a stone for a century and that insured losses from extreme weather events have been on a multi-decadal decline. Those are just facts, instead we’re scaring kids in school, we’re promoting an alarmist view of climate change that’s simply contrary to the facts. It’s a real physical phenomenon that we want to talk about honestly and openly, but we got to get past the scaremonger campaign that you can’t do this because of climate change or the government’s going to stop your plans here to fight climate change. Just nonsense.
Maria Bartiromo, Fox News Anchor [00:06:09] Just incredible, you are so right. Look, Secretary, let me get your take on the shale revolution and where we are right now. You, of course, one of the founders of this revolution, there at the birth of the revolution in shale technology. What are you seeing in regards to shale today and how is that helpful in terms of increasing capacity?
Secretary Chris Wright [00:06:32] Well, that, yeah, that of course transformed the United States from the biggest importer of oil and natural gas in the world to the biggest exporter. So we’re excited about that. And what that’s meant is more supply drives down prices. Sometimes that makes it tough for the industry to compete when prices are low, but the industry keeps getting more efficient, keep dealing with lower and lower prices. But think about that problem, isn’t what that we want? We want consumers struggling because it’s too cheap to fill their gas tanks or their cost to heat their homes are going down that’s exactly President Trump’s agenda make America affordable more opportunities for Americans and yes Businesses have to have to wrestle and innovate to compete in a lower price world, but that’s the world we want That’s the World President Trump is promised to bring and 200 days in he’s delivering
Maria Bartiromo, Fox News Anchor [00:07:22] Well, the president has been doing trade deals and tax deals and now peace deals as well. White House Special Envoy Steve Witkoff meeting with Vladimir Putin yesterday in Moscow ahead of President Trump’s deadline for Russia to make peace with Ukraine. The president signaling great progress in the talks on truth social, and he hopes to meet with Vladimir in person as soon as next week. We do not know where the location is, although some sources are telling me the United Arab Emirates is a possible place for this meeting. The president’s sanctions on countries buying Russian oil are still set to take effect tomorrow. He raised the levy on exports from India to 50 percent, Secretary. Your reaction there and where this is going in terms of India and its relationship with the U.S.?
Secretary Chris Wright [00:08:10] Look at our regular dialogs with President Trump. There’s just two things he’s passionate about. You know, prosperity at home. You hear just ceaselessly about he wants money invested in this country that’ll create more job opportunities, better incomes for Americans, and peace abroad. That’s his agenda, prosperity at home and peace of abroad. Seeing on the news kids getting killed and murdered, civilian buildings getting bombed. He is passionate. What is the mechanisms we have to bring these wars to an end. Believe me, it is energizing to see a president so passionate about bettering the lives of Americans and those abroad. And he’s willing to go a different direction, break the mold, figure out how we’re going to bring peace abroad and prosperity at home, thrilled by his efforts, thrilled by that boldness that the old way we’ve been doing things just hasn’t worked. Let’s try something different.
Maria Bartiromo, Fox News Anchor [00:09:02] So what are the efforts to sell American oil and gas to partners across the world? I mean, you see a country like India continuing to buy energy from Russia, and that has triggered President Trump to raise those tariffs on India. What progress has been made in terms of the U.S. Selling its energy?
Secretary Chris Wright [00:09:24] Well, look, Europe’s biggest source of imported oil was Russia. Europe’s big source of natural gas was Russia, the United States is replacing both of those supplies to Europe instead of Russia. We’re talking the same thing with the Asian countries, India is just earlier on in those dialogs, but President Trump has sold US energy around the world. The interest is just tremendous. Who wouldn’t rather buy from a secure ally as opposed to a threat being a foe? But people get in habits, they get in ways, and they don’t change those easily. But President Trump is a tenacious salesman, a tenuous negotiator, and you’re seeing these dramatic changes of where energy supplies are coming from. Our allies abroad, their dominant source of energy that’s imported is going to be the United States.
Maria Bartiromo, Fox News Anchor [00:10:18] That is a great point. Secretary, it’s good to see you this morning. Thanks so much.
Secretary Chris Wright [00:10:22] Thanks, Maria. Great to see you.
Maria Bartiromo, Fox News Anchor [00:10:24] Energy Secretary Christopher Wright, don’t miss my interview.
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