this post was submitted on 10 Jan 2026
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Donald Trump has asked for at least $100bn (£75bn) in oil industry spending for Venezuela, but received a lukewarm response at the White House as one executive warned the South American country was currently "uninvestable".

Bosses of the biggest US oil firms who attended the meeting acknowledged that Venezuela, sitting on vast energy reserves, represented an enticing opportunity.

But they said significant changes would be needed to make the region an attractive investment. No major financial commitments were immediately forthcoming.

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[–] TheDemonBuer@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago

I really think this all comes down to a belief that Trump and many Americans hold, that oil is irreplaceable. They have convinced themselves, or have been convinced by others, that civilizations can't exist without oil, and fossil fuels more broadly. Because of this belief, they're betting hard on oil and gas. They want to take control of as much of the world's remaining oil reserves as possible, both to secure oil for ourselves but also to restrict access to adversaries, like China.

But this belief is wrong. Civilizations can exist without fossil fuels, or at least with very minimal fossil fuel use, especially for energy. Fossil fuels are very inefficient and nonrenewable, in addition to being highly polluting. Renewables, like solar and wind, are much more efficient, especially for electricity generation. To generate electricity with fossil fuels, you have to extract the material from the ground, refine it, transport it, then burn it to boil water to generate steam to turn a turbine to generate the electricity. There are a lot of steps there, and a lot of the energy is lost in the process. With solar and wind, electricity is generated at the source. It's true that solar panels and wind turbines are not very efficient at turning the wind and sunlight into electricity, but once the electricity is generated, all you have to do is transmit it to where it is either stored or used. Some energy is lost in transmission, but that's true of electricity generated from fossil fuels, too. Renewables are simply more efficient. And, as the name implies, they are renewable. The sun will continue to shine and the wind will continue to blow for a very long time.

So as the world wakes up this realization, the world will continue to transition away from fossil fuels and toward renewables. That will reduce the demand for fossil fuels. The oil companies know this, that's why they're not in any great hurry to go and spend billions of dollars to significantly increase oil production. If they dramatically increase oil production, but the overall demand for oil doesn't also increase significantly, the price for their product will fall. They don't want to sell their product for less money, because that will reduce their profits. Lowering the price of oil sounds great to consumers of the product, who want lower gas and diesel prices, but the companies selling it don't want that. Companies want to sell their product for the highest price possible, so they can maximize their profit.

The US is betting on a fossil fuel future, but we're going to lose that bet. We've convinced ourselves, or have been convinced, that oil especially is irreplaceable and that renewables/electrification are a scam. We're wrong. An electrified world powered primarily by renewables is the future. The longer we continue down this misguided path, the further behind the rest of the world we will fall.