An America First Energy Policy with Ted Ellis

Jack's Personal Stories and Podcast Welcome Hello and welcome back to the Power Hour, the Heritage Foundation Center for Energy, Climate and Environments podcast. I'm your host, Jack Spencer, and I got to be honest with you, I don't even know who's behind the glass producing this thing today. We have Jack out having babies, have Mark out roam in the world. We have God knows who. So I'm just gonna ask, who is producing this thing today? Speaker 2 It is Jack Haggard today. Speaker 1 Jack Haggard. I thought you were having a kid, man. Speaker 2 Well, we're working on it. Speaker 1 Wait, wait, you, you're getting close to the child coming? Speaker 2 Yes, very. Speaker 1 Close. All right. Very good. How should we expect not to see you next week? Speaker 2 You should expect not to see me next week. Speaker 1 Man, that's exciting. That is so exciting. I can't wait to talk to you when you come back because. Speaker 2 I'll be a real man. Speaker 1 Well, if if you build a desk out of slabs of wood while you're gone, you will then be a real man. Speaker 2 OK. All right. Speaker 1 I'm just teasing it just be get having that first kidder that for me it's my only kid. It's just awesome. I love being a dad. Best thing in the world, and I bet anything you will think the same. Anyway, I'm glad you're here. I'm glad you're here. I'm glad you're still with us. And I look forward to hearing your great stories. If you're not here next week when you come back. Speaking of great stories, Jack, I have bad news. I don't have any good stories this week. I did not get into any trouble. I didn't do anything. I I planted some peanuts. That's something new for me. So I guess I'm a peanut farmer now. I completely failed it. My Turkey hunting, I talked about doing that. I went out like 6 times this season. I got nothing. I saw nothing, I heard almost nothing. So this season went about like all the rest of my Turkey seasons, kind of a failure. Even though I bought an expensive decoy this year and it's a nice decoy. It looks real. I might Jack. I'm thinking I might go out and shoot that decoy. I might as well. Everything else in the world is pretty much fake and a lie. Why not make my Turkey hunting fake and a lie as well? I don't know, what do you think? Speaker 2 That would be hilarious. Speaker 1 Yeah, I've been. I've been thinking about starting a YouTube career. Maybe I will start it with fake hunting, shooting lifelike. You know how much these Turkey decoys are, by the way, it was $175 for a stupid plastic Turkey that didn't even make turkeys come in. Wow. Yeah, that's what I'm telling you. Anyway, the truth is, I don't even care going out and giving it the old college tries. What's fun anyway? And plus Jack, you know what? I have those peanuts to look forward to. So I guess all is good in the world. Speaker 2 Excellent. Speaker 1 Excellent. Welcoming Ted Ellis and Podcast Announcements Anyway, enough of that nonsense. People probably think, all right, Spencer, get on with it. We came here to listen to a podcast about energy and environment, and that's what we're going to do today. And I'm looking forward to this conversation. But before we get into that, I need to remind folks what always remind everyone. I know people are tired of it, but I love hearing from you. Our e-mail address, thepowerhourheritage.org. Send us an e-mail. Tell us what you want to hear. Not hear. e-mail us your questions at the Power hour at heritage.org. That's the power hour at heritage.org. I promise I will respond to you personally. I always do. We get a lot of ideas for this podcast from those emails. Don't forget you can find us out on our own feed where you get your podcast, Spotify, iTunes, wherever. We're on the Power Hour feed. And definitely when you, if, if you search the Power Hour, you got to use Power Hour and Heritage or Power Hour and my name, 'cause there are multiple power hours and there are multiple Jack Spencer's. And I assure you, if you just type in my name, the fella that comes up is not me. I just want to to warn everyone. So you got to combine those two things to get this awesome podcast. Tell your friends, family, colleagues to check us out. And remember, we are published. We publish every Monday. You can set your calendar, clocks, whatever you use to set time to check us out. Every Monday you will have a new Power Hour podcast. So please subscribe. All right, back to where we were. Now, Jack, we bring in a lot of folks, all good people. I mean, I wouldn't bring them in if they weren't awesome. We shunned the mere thought of mediocrity here at the Power Hour. Speaker 2 But we do flirt with fake turkeys. Speaker 1 That is my hunting. That is not the power out. Two very distinct things. Look, if I didn't, if I shunned the mere thought of mediocrity in my personal life, I don't know what I would do with my time to be quite honest, cause most of I, I, I thrive in a world of mediocrity. In fact, Jack, except for the power, but that's not me. It's 'cause I bring in these guests, many of them have a perspective though they were represent this interest or that company. Still awesome guests. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that, but they generally have a a perspective they're bringing to the table, which is part why we bring them in here for sure. But today's guest doesn't run a company. He's not from an association. He comes from a really important and influential policy shop. He focuses on energy broadly, also spends a lot of time on nuclear energy. He's a believer in free enterprise. He wants the American energy industry to dominate. He talks about the importance of innovation. Now, Jack, I know what you're thinking. Am I interviewing myself today? No, I'm not. There's at least one huge difference between me and our guest, and that is our guess. Is not a complete idiot. Not only is he not an idiot, but he's one of the most thoughtful and insightful energy minds in Washington today. He's the campaign director for the Powering America Initiative at the America First Policy Institute and the deputy director for energy and environment there as well. He's worked in government affairs. He was a professional staffer at the Republican Study Committee. Side note, if the person you're talking to came from the Republican Study Committee, they 9 times out of 10, are really, really good. He spent time at universities, some of which I can pronounce, like Oxford, and some that I can't, like I'm not even gonna try. We'll just have to ask him. His name is Ted Ellis, and he is our guest today on the Power Hour. Cooking, Umami, and Studying Abroad Experiences Ted, welcome my friend. Speaker 3 Jack, thank you, Jack. And Jack, thank you so much for having me. It is an absolute pleasure to be here. Thanks so much. Speaker 1 Well, it's great to have you. We're gonna have a nice conversation about energy policy and stuff. But first I need to get to know you better. We're more important. I I know you pretty well. Our fan. Our Do we have fans that are our listeners? Speaker 3 Definitely fans, yeah, maybe fans. Speaker 1 I I want them to get to know you better. So we'll start with non energy questions like this is for me personally. Have you ever haunted turkeys and can can you give me some pointers? Speaker 3 I've not haunted turkeys. I do enjoy fishing and hunting. I've haunted ducks before, that was a ton of fun. I recommend having a very good dog, otherwise you're not going to have as much fun eating the ducks as you did hunting the ducks. As far as turkeys, no advice to give, although I'm curious, are you a bow hunter or are you using a musket or what are you doing here? Speaker 1 Not with for turkeys, purely shotgun. Speaker 3 Shotgun, OK, I like it. Well, I just want to encourage you not to feel bound when you get this, this decoy on the range. Don't feel bound by the limitations of shotgun or no shotgun. Feel free to, you know, move into some explosives. I mean, that's what YouTube likes. Speaker 1 You're right. Maybe I will. That's a great idea. Actually, we maybe we will blow up a fake Turkey. That would be fun. All right, what else? What do you do for fun? What do you what do you do when you're not analyzing energy policies? Speaker 3 Great question. I really enjoy cooking so I have enjoyed that for many, many years. When I was a young kid, I was not athletic and so I spent a lot of time in the kitchen instead. And that has translated to being something that I very much enjoy these days. And I'm trying to get a little more fancy these days, level up my cooking. I've got some preserved lemons that I started last night, and also some cured egg yolks so I can have some fancier and better garnishes to put on all of my stuff. Speaker 1 All right, this podcast is going to go real quick, but whatever. So how are you preserve? Are are you preserving the lemons and what method are you using? Speaker 3 I am preserving the lemons. It's a method where you take the lemons, chop in the quarters, fill a jar with lemons and salt, and then you let it sit there. The lemons sit in their own brine and they, I guess age over the next four to six weeks. And then when you pull them out, they have this wonderful kind of fermented character where there's just a lot more complexity and depth to that lemon flavor, which can often be sharp and bright and kind of one note, even though it's delicious. And so I'm looking forward to taking the rind and chopping it up and throwing it on top of many, many things. Maybe a cocktail or two. Speaker 1 All right, that sounds good. So it's it's a fermentation process. Speaker 3 It's a fermentation process. Speaker 1 And how about the yolks? Speaker 3 The same thing, actually very similar. So also just sitting in salt. And then what you get to do with the yolk is you take it and it's this little yellow puck and you get to grate it on your microplane. It's a little, you know, very fine grater and you get to shower your your pasta, your ravioli, your steak, your vegetables, anything you want with this little golden shower of, you know, umami rich egg yolk flakes. And it is gorgeous. I've done this before and I'm very much looking forward to round two learning the, you know, what I've learned in the past and applying that. All right. Speaker 1 I'm going to ask one more question about this stuff, then we're going to move on. You just use the phrase a word. My daughter also is a is a an aspiring cook, chef. She does fancy things. We we're preserving all kinds of Now you use the word that she rejects outright and she thinks that anyone that uses it or describes it is just trying to sound or they do sound pretentious. Now I'm not subscribing pretension to you. I'm just asking the question here. Speaker 3 Generous. Thank you. Speaker 1 Is umami a real thing? The people want to know. Speaker 3 I am told that it is a real thing. Apparently Japanese scientists discovered that back in the 90s I think or the early 2000s. We used to think that there were just 4 flavors that the human like tongue could detect. Salty, sweet, sour and one more bitter. Thank you. Yes, bitter and a lot. Speaker 1 Of people describe me that one. Speaker 3 I would not describe you that way, Jack, but there are, there are kind of two other tastes that are that are big on the palate. 1 is spice, which actually is, I learned this just the other day. That's just pain. That's just the, the sensation of pain on your palate. And then umami is this sort of 5th flavor that the Japanese have long attributed to being a thing. And then recently in the last, I guess 20 to 30 years, it was demonstrated to be a thing. Although I wish we had an American name. We need to get an America first name for umami. Maybe I'll just call the savory, but it just feels so fun to say. Speaker 1 That's what my daughter would say. She would say it's it's simply a combination of other flavors that people act like is a new thing, when in fact it's not. But we're not here to talk about umami, although I guess we already have some. Madeline, I know you're not listening, but if you do, that conversation was for you. See, I represent anyway. Ted, you come from No, I, I teased these schools. Now it's all starting to come together. A guy who goes to schools that you can't pronounce would do things like this in the kitchen, all of which, by the way, I went to I, I also attended school some universities abroad. So again, I'm for it. But could you tell us what these schools were and why you went there, ended up there, that kind of thing? Speaker 3 Absolutely. So this was about, gosh, like 10-12 years ago at this point, but I was a double major in economics in Spanish, and I was studying abroad for a full year in Spain. So I spent a month in a place called Santiago de Compostela. And actually, maybe I'll put my Spanish accent to work, Santiago de Compostela. And then I spent two more semesters in Spain at places called Bigo and Murcia. And 1 is up north in the cold, wet, rainy region of Galicia and one is down South in the sunny and dry region of Murcia. And it was a great time. Loved both places. But it was a long year, a long year abroad. I very much enjoyed it. But I'm I'm definitely glad now to be back in the US of A as of many years. Speaker 1 Awesome. It's interesting. I got this. Is this this this podcast has become the my Daughter podcast. She is will soon be going to college. She's has another year and a half left, but I really want her to get that international experience. It's such a good experience and really set you up. I think that at least for me, it gives you confidence at a young age. Just do anything like you just feel like, all right, I did this, I can go anywhere and do anything now, so. Speaker 3 Absolutely. Speaker 1 I mean, you know, let me add it. Speaker 3 If you'll give me a, a very small digression, I think that's, I think that's absolutely right. When I was about to go off for my first semester at the University of Bugle, I was, it was the night before or something like that, maybe two nights before I was supposed to leave on the plane. And my mom looks over and she's like, where are you staying, by the way? And I'm like, I don't know, I'm going to figure it out. And so I landed and I navigated to the nearest hostel, and I spent the next two to three days making phone calls and visiting apartments. And I figured it out and it was awesome. And by the end of it, I really did have that since, like, wow, I can basically do anything like I can. The world is kind of my oyster if I'm, you know, bold enough to capture it. It was great. Speaker 1 Yeah, I, I now I will do the same thing real quick. First time I ever went abroad. I come from, as the people of this program know, from small town in Western Maryland. And I went to Germany for a semester abroad and I didn't know what I was doing. I had literally no idea. And I fly there and I find a Stuttgart. Then you have to go on a number of train or no, a train to get to the town where the university was. I don't speak German at all. Get on the train. I figure out, you know, that's enough people figure out what train, get on the train. And then I missed the stop and I'm like, I like literally had no idea what to do. So I got off the next stop and you just figure it out. And the rest is the rest is the rest is history, as they say. Understanding the America First Policy Institute's Energy Vision Anyway, enough about all that. Here's what I want to know. What is the American First Policy Institute? Let's start with that. Let's start with where you work. Speaker 3 Absolutely. So the America First Policy Institute, AFPI, we are a think tank and I think we would also describe ourselves as a do tank. We're downtown. We have a a very close relationship with a number of key figures in the administration. We had 91, I believe people go from AFPI into the administration, including I think 789 at the cabinet level. So we're, we're very proud of that. And we've got a kind of a short history. We were founded just four years ago. And I think we have a, a really special place in this town if, if you'll permute to say so, there are a whole bunch of places in this town who serve corporate interests, special interests. We serve the interests of the American people. And I think that that's something that we take very, very seriously. I know I certainly do and, and all my colleagues do. And we exist at least on the energy side, to help advance the agenda of energy dominance. And energy dominance is this idea that America has this vast amount of natural resources, This is this bounty. And we don't want to just leave them in the ground. We want to take them out of the ground. We want to put them to use on behalf of the American people, whether that's uranium for nuclear, natural gas for electricity and power in people's homes. So they don't freeze to death in the dark, as my colleague Jason Hayes likes to say. And I think that's tremendously important. We've had an agenda that's been intermittent but ongoing for the last 20 to 30 years and maybe even longer depending on how you calculate it. That says we want to have a managed scarcity kind of mindset. We want to manage decline and do less with less. And we reject that. We think the American people are entitled to a strong and, you know, intentional use of the natural resources that were afforded to. And so we're looking to support that alongside the administration. Speaker 1 Yeah, First of all, I appreciate your description of the AFPI. Coming from heritage, we look at ourselves very similarly. You know the and that's why I introduced you the way I did. We often have people. I, I don't, I'm not saying they were, they, they were all great guests. Like I've, I know 90% of the people who come on here personally and have for a long time and think they have the, the, the, the most ethical people and with the most integrity in this town. So it's not that, but they have a perspective. And I guess some people would argue you and I also have a perspective, and that's probably true, but it's not a perspective driven by certain industry or a certain company. It's this perspective of, it's a philosophical perspective that we then apply to general policy questions. And I think that's a different thing. Distinguishing Energy Independence from Energy Dominance And that's why I was looking. I'm glad you all exist and I'm glad that you're here to, to have that conversation on this notion of energy dominance and manage scarcity. I, I like that manage scarcity thing because that's a big issue. It's the it's convincing people that something is scarce that you use then to justify all sorts of nefarious stuff. And that happens across society and culture and all that stuff. But with energy, it's really a diabolical thing. I would argue, because no society has been successful. I shouldn't say that we've seen societies who have access to energy grow by leaps and bounds by every measure. And given our humanity's ability to to take something that produces energy, turn it into energy, and then use that energy to advance society to limit that in some way just has really deleterious impact for a lot of people. And that we live in this time right now of where we, you know, we, we should live it, we should have this massive energy abundance and that we don't, it is just a, it's a really not good thing. Speaker 3 Absolutely agree. I mean, like I say, there's been this war, I think a lot of people would call it, on American mining, on American fossil fuels, on the idea even that we should have access to abundant energy. I think you look back at the scope of the modern environmental movement and there were a number of environmentalists, radicals at the early days and they said, man, wouldn't it be a shame if we ever got access to affordable, plentiful power? And I think they were referring to nuclear power in this way. They said it would be like handing a small child a machine gun. Can you imagine all of the mischief that humanity would get up to? And, and we see it fundamentally the opposite. We know that when people get access to more energy, they get richer, they get more secure, they get safer from all kinds of different hazards. That you might have in the environment. And moreover, the richer people get, the more inclined, and you see this all over the world, the more inclined they are to invest in a environment that's clean and beautiful, that's a luxury good. When you're, you know, making it a dollar a day or $0.50 a day, $2.00 a day, your inclination is to take the nearest environmental resource, strip it and keep yourself alive for another day. And once you can start to build up that level of wealth, and it's not that high, I think it's like 5 to $10 a day, people suddenly start to think long term about their resources. How can they husband things? How can they steward things and how can they build something that they can leave for the next generation. And I think that's a really, really important and powerful factor that the environmental left often forgets. Speaker 1 Yeah. And you, you see that, you know, we do the index of economic freedom here. You can see the, the, the countries that have the most robust economies every time have the cleanest environments and the ones who have the least productive economies are the ones that are environmental hellholes. Like there's no exception to that. Like that is the rule. And as you were saying that I got to thinking even, you know, I'm not a big CO2 guy. Some people say I'm a CO2 denier. You can call me whatever you want. Even the CO2 alarmist folks should learn that lesson. If you, when you look at the when you look at any of the polls about when do do do do you care about CO2? Many people say they do. Then you ask, how much are you willing to spend pay for it? It's always almost nothing. The way you change that dynamic is to make people richer. You make people richer, then maybe they'd be willing. So even if you care about the CO2 thing, the way you get there is through prosperity And oh, by the way, a, a more technologically energy advanced people we are, the more efficient we'll be in the less CO2 that you emit. If you care about that kind of thing. There's, there's so many, there's, there's, there's so many things that's wrong with that whole debate. First of all, I just reject the idea that we here's the, here's the problem that politicians and bureaucrats confront more than any other or the problem with their ability to achieve what they say they want to achieve. They think they can manage complex systems and they just can't. That's not a good tool for managing complex systems. Whether it's the economy or the climate, there's just too much we don't know. There are too many variables. And for this whole notion that, you know, a little bit of, of CO2, relatively speaking, is going that, that you can use that as a metric to understand all these other things, I just think is garbage. The more, the more layers we peel back on the onion, we see more corruption throughout the whole system. But even aside from all that, and this goes back to the special interest conversation, we, we, we, we touched on earlier, absolutely none of their policies would have any impact on climate, even if you accept the whole scientific narrative that they put out there. So you know they're lying or you know, there, there's something else going on there. Speaker 3 There's something afoot here, no question about it. Speaker 1 Yes, I think that that as Bill and Ted said, something is afoot at the circle. Ki think it's what they said when strange things were happening. Anyway, yeah, it's crazy. Anyway, I want to ask you a derivative question of this energy Dominus and I'm interested in your perspective on this term I'm going to use because it's a term that's thrown out a lot and it's one that I question how it's used sometimes. I'm curious what you think this notion of energy independence. What do you think of when that? Like where? Where does energy independence fall into your calculation of energy dominance? Speaker 3 I think that's a good question. I think when people talk about energy independence, there's probably a couple of different things that they're alluding to. And I think maybe one of the most fundamental things is for a long time we were told that we needed to or that we were dependent on other countries, whether that was countries in the Middle East for oil, we had a significant dependence and, and are still working our way off this on on Russian uranium, foreign uranium sources. And I think the notion of energy independence is that we should acknowledge that we have vast natural resources here in oil and natural gas, many critical minerals, uranium, all of these different things, and that there's a fundamentally lower need to go abroad to or look abroad to supply ourselves. And I think the, the things that you've seen in the world have been a really good illustration of that. The, the shale revolution back in the day that really opened up our natural resources and we found ourselves way, way more prosperous for that reasons. And I think that's something that folks are looking at today as well. One, one thing that I just mentioned, you know, Russian uranium, I think the administration has really signaled an interest in how can we move ourselves out of that supply chain. You look at agreements like the Sapporo 5 in nuclear fuel supplies. How can we work with aligned partners elsewhere in the world to wean ourselves from hostile controlled supply chains and look not only to American energy dominance, mining dominance for uranium, and then also how can we encourage friendly partners like Australia to do more in their own backyards? Australia has, I think, more than 1/4 of all of the recoverable uranium reserves in the world right now. They ought to do more. I think there's an interest in both being independent, but also looking for independence in the sense of not being dependent on hostile supply chains. Speaker 1 Yeah. That, that's what I'm that that's my view. I want to talk about that a little bit more than I also want to get into the Russian uranium issue a little bit. One of the frustrating things being in the energy policy discussion for so long is that people, I think, often use the energy independence argument as one to justify isolationism. And I think that's the wrong approach. I think that that that is it's an easy narrative to speak of and to gain momentum for. When you say we're America, we should get all of our energy here and therefore we should do this policy and that policy, whatever. I think, I think that's can be dangerous. I think the better way to look at it is where America, we should maximize our energy resources. And we also have a bunch of friends and allies that we should maximize their energy and resources. And what we should be independent of is a foreign or hostile power using energy's leverage against us. And that's the that the, the dependence that allows for that is the one that's dangerous. And the dependence of that is what we fell into during the 70s and 80s and early 90s when we were still dependent on Middle Eastern oil, Russian uranium. I would argue regardless of the thing, it's when you, it's we, we should, I think our interests are served when there are more molecules flowing around the world, more uranium atoms flowing around the world safely. Obviously, of course, I don't mean, you know what I mean on that. And so, yeah, yeah, that that's all. I, I, I, I, I think it's really important to be specific in what we mean when we talk about energy and independence because we benefit. America benefits so much from producing as much as we can, but also having access to the world's resources both to procure for our use, but also to sell into. There's just a lot of benefit for for that anyway. Speaker 3 I think that's exactly right. How Past Policies Influence Current Energy Prices I mean, you see the the way that we're shipping LNG, liquefied natural gas abroad at unprecedented numbers, I mean record-breaking numbers, that's American energy dominance abroad. That's a story of what mutual benefit between ourselves and other countries. And you look at the Forge initiative from the Trump administration, some of the critical minerals partnerships working at work that they're doing. I think there's certainly an acknowledgement that getting where we need to go, we're going to have to maximize not only our own resources, but work with partners who are credible, who are trustworthy, who are interested in not undercutting us, but helping us get where we're trying to go and, and working with them to do the same. Yeah. Speaker 1 Yeah, I think it's critical. I think it puts us all in a better position. And, you know, the truth is something like the Iran crisis and the energy implications of that, You know, we should be in a position where the oil you can you you can cut off the Strait of Hormuz from oil transportation and the oil molecules should just flow around that like water over a rock and a river. Like we should be producing that much where Iran would have no, no reason to blockade that because they would be they can't have any impact on markets. Like that's how much gas and oil we should be producing or at, at at minimum the, the regulatory friction to, to growing production should be so small that yeah, you might get a, a short term price spike when something like that happens, but you'll be able to, to, to, to focus resources on more production so efficiently that it just doesn't matter at the end of the day. And it's really a sad situation that we're we just despite the Trump administration's awesome energy policies, it's coming on the back of literally decades, as you pointed out, intermittent. But you if we, if we would have had, you know, Trump energy policies from 1970, like there would be no energy issue at all. I mean, it would just be, you know, who, who would care? It wouldn't be. Who would care if the Strait of Hormuz gets blockaded? But really, from an energy standpoint, it wouldn't matter so much. Speaker 3 I think that's fundamentally right. And man, what a, what a different world we would live in if we had Trump administration energy policies. I think we would have nuclear reactors on the moon at this point, I'm sure of it. But I think that's fundamentally right. Look, the, the Strait of Hormuz is a choke point for some of the world's oil. But we have such vast reserves that really, although certain certain pundits, let's say, have tried to paint this as an example of, wow, we're, we're too dependent on oil, You know, we're too dependent on this one choke point. The truth is we've choked ourselves out for many, many years. And it's more of an indictment on too many failed energy policies from too many past administrations that we don't have the ability, as you say, to turn up the dial very quickly or to just already have that capacity up and booming. Because we live in a world where the demand for energy is, in a sense, almost unlimited. The the more energy we have, the more energy, the more things we will think to do with it. And I think if we had had the ability to just turn up that dial a long time ago and keep it turned up, I think we would be in a situation as you say, where this would be much more of a non issue. Speaker 1 Yeah. I mean, you know, that that's something that people need to realize because what you said is exactly right. The more energy you have, the more things you will do with it because the more energy you have, the lower prices go, then that opens up economic opportunities to apply those energy resources to something else. Then prices start to go up, then they come back down. And like, that's how it works. And the politicians and bureaucrats try to take a sliver in time and act as if, like all energy prices are high, we need to do XY. And no, you need to get out of the way and let people respond to prices, produce energy and allow this this future where energy's not an issue to emerge, which it will be. And, you know, that's another God. I could go on on this. You know, politicians like to use this is probably before you were. Well, I'm sure that you you've heard this term. I'm sure you've dealt with it. The whole peak oil debate. Oh, yeah. Like, you know, oh, we're headed toward peak oil. Therefore, we need the government to start doing this and that No, you're never going to run out of oil because even if we were headed towards peak oil prices would go up. And oh, by the way, the energy economy is a multi trillion dollar economy. So, you know, someone will figure out a way, way quicker than you guys over. And God love Chris right in the DOE. Oh yeah, you know, God love him. Yeah, but I guarantee you that the private sector, the George Mitchells of the world, the guy who who I would credit, who many would credit, but not all with giving us fracking, like these are the guys who innovate and what would drive drive technology forward. Like, the government has so much stuff that they can get involved. There's lots of stuff to keep government busy. I wish that, you know, they would just be like, you know what, we can't do everything. So we'll just let this energy thing go. Speaker 3 No. And that, that, that's so true. I mean, one of the things that's been so exciting and fun to see is the, the world of small modular reactors and the, the many different designs that they're taking. Clearly there's no shortage of potential for innovation and new exciting good ideas out there. And I, I think that the DOE, Chris Wright at the helm has done a really great job of offering a, an expedited path for those reactor types to demonstrate their potential. And we were coming up on a important July 4 date very soon to see kind of where all that stands. But I agree with you. I think if we had let the oil and gas industry, the coal industry, other industries play around in the sandbox in a way that they fundamentally were prohibited from doing for many, many years, and the same goes for large light water reactors. I think we would just see so much more opportunity. And I think industry would have found ways to continue to drive safety forward, possibly even safer than they are now, and to drive down costs and to bring abundance to the forefront. Speaker 1 Yeah, I, I totally agree. But we are where we are. And that's why having someone like Chris Wright at DOE is a, you know, you know, despite my critique of, you know, politicians and bureaucrats in general, you know, having guys like Chris at DOE is an important, important piece of getting it back on track and, and right again. So I wanted to bring something up that builds on what you something you were just saying, which is about the impact of past administrations, past bad energy policy. And we see with gas prices now where the people are quick to argue that, that the high gas prices we have now are just the function of, of, of, of, of what's going on in Iran and put all of that, all of that blame wherever they choose to put that blame. And some of us would argue, no, that's not that's not correct. Yeah, there's going to be price implications of that because of the system we live in. But what we're seeing now is the culmination of a lot of years of that energy policy where we don't open up federal lands as open as they could. We don't fully explore offshore, drill offshore resources as much as we should for years and years and years. We couldn't export crude, which people say, well, if you export it, won't that decrease supply? No exporting. Exporting we see time and again tells people to develop more and that's why it helps price stabilize prices and bring down. Then you had, you know, the Biden years where literally he said we're going to put gas and oil out of business. And so like all of that matters too. And how do you think of that? Like to what extent, you know, how do you think about where gas and oil prices are today and sort of what led up to them? But also I'm interested in and I won't, I ask a question that I answer half of it, which is a problem of mine. I want to know you, but I'm not going to say what should we do about it going forward to both bring prices down now in as efficient way as we can, but also to set us up for the future. Analyzing the Impact of Biden's 'End Fossil Fuels' Agenda I think that's a great question. I, I think you alluded to a lot of it already. President Biden, when he was on the campaign trail, he said, quote, I guarantee you we're going to end fossil fuels. And he then came into office and established what he called a whole of government climate agenda. He declared an emergency and instituted action across all of the agencies. And he worked with Congress to pass a bill, the so-called Inflation Reduction Act, which was a terrible name and not at all what it did. And it's. Speaker 1 Just so dumb. Speaker 3 Absolutely. The green new scam, as we call it, and what they did was put tremendous pressure on affordable, reliable fuels like fossil fuels, coal, natural gas, oil, and tried to keep them in the ground, tried to take any company that was profitable and make them unprofitable. And that's an agenda that unfortunately was also reflected during the Obama administration. So this is, this is something that is neither recent nor ignorable. This is a core and fundamental cause of the, the difficulties that we're seeing now. And, and you look at the, the Biden administration, they tried to blame what they were or the impacts of what they were doing on, on Putin's war in the, in Ukraine. And, and what we saw was that when President Trump came into office, he was able to flip a couple of levers and the cast, the price of gas came way down. And so it clearly wasn't, you know, Putin's war in Ukraine, which is ongoing. It's just a question of are there short term spikes like we're dealing now? And are there fundamentally better policies like those that President Trump is pursuing that really do drive down the price of gas by expanding the supply and giving companies the certainty to make investments that they can then can use for the good of the American people? And so I think that's what we need to see more of going forward, more candidates who commit to policies of energy security, energy dominance, certainty for fossil fuels and for nuclear. I think that will be a fundamentally good thing for America. And the work that Administrator Zeldin is doing over at the EPA is certainly fantastic work. The same goes for Chris Wright, Doug Bergum. Really appreciate what they're doing to unlock our natural resources. Speaker 1 Yeah, you used the word in there about you talked about investment and that's something that we need to recognize. Like when Biden comes in and says, we're going to put you out of business, not only does that prevent people from making the near term investments to expand capacity, like right then, you know, bringing, you know, expanding the, the, the, the oil wellheads and things like that, but it also prevents them from making the investments that would allow us to expand capacity in the future. So, you know, it's decisions that are made back then are what literally are impacting us now. And what folks need to keep in mind is that those investment decisions now will be the ones that stabilize energy prices in the future. So we, we can't listen to these people. We're like, we're to depend. We need more solar and wind, blah, blah, blah. No like. Don't tell me that like that money that you are spending on that taxpayer, money that you're diverting from my pocket into the tax, the wind and solar developer. I can keep that money and the gas and oil people will spend their own money to make the investments that will feel the the benefit of 10-15 years down the road. Speaker 3 That's right. And you talk about this taxpayer money that was being spent on wind and solar. This is Money that's not just coming out of the listener's pocket, but going in, in many senses, directly into the pockets of the Communist Chinese Party, a Chinese Communist Party and their affiliates. You know, the supply chain for solar and wind is dominated by the CCP. And the presence of solar and wind, not only is it grid destroying and does it make our energy or electricity much, much more expensive, which it does, but also it makes us fundamentally reliant on a hostile or at least semi hostile foreign power with which we are I think working towards some kind of agreement and and some some smoother ways forward, which is good. But it's not the same as as getting a product from Britain or France or Australia. These are supply chains that we want to be less entangled with. And the the effect of this has just been disastrous, not just for energy prices, but on our own energy security. Speaker 1 Yeah. And with the whole China thing, I mean it's one thing and and I'm not making any judgement one right there. I'm just saying it's one thing if you develop some kind of dependence on China, which we shouldn't, but just as a matter of point of discussion through the normal market forces, it's a whole nother when you manufacture that dependence as a matter of policy. And it's just utterly unbelievable that we've done that. And that's exactly what we were doing. You know, people talk about, you know, the the whole critical minerals thing. The first thing we could do to minimize the critical, the, I mean we've done it, but the first thing that we needed to do to minimize the critical mineral dependence on China is to get rid of the wind and solar mandates. I mean that would be helpful. Speaker 3 That would be extremely helpful and and we're very grateful to President Trump and the Congress for beginning to wind those down. The sun setting of those during the working families tax cut was a a very strong move and we're we're really grateful now. Speaker 1 I'm gonna ask you something, Ted. This is just between us, all right? Sure. Just between us. Speaker 3 You, me and the listener. Yeah. Speaker 1 Yeah, you, me and the listener. Hello. By the way, I appreciate you out there. Do you really think these things are going to go away? I'll, I'll you you can't. I don't Like, I knew that. I believe that Trump wants them to go away. I have no faith in Congress ultimately making them go away because I've seen it so many times. And even if they go away for a year, they'll come back because they, these folks have been masterful in building a constituency. All the rest of you know, it'll be like we're going to lose 10,000 jobs, whatever, because they've created essentially, you know, jobs that are dependent on taxpayer funding. So do you think they're going to go away? Speaker 3 Gosh, I think it's I think it speaks to the importance of strong leadership like we've seen under President Trump. I think if you you and I were having this conversation, let's say four years ago, it would have been very hard to imagine even the sun setting that we've had now. I think that when you have strong leadership at the helm, who's got clear eyes looking at the horizon and saying, what does the American American energy industry need? What do the American people need? I think that that makes it easier to articulate that case and that gives me some faith that we will see this go away. But in terms of being clear eyed, like you say, there is a significant constituency for these tax credits. They've strategically made investments and and given campaign dollars where they they know it can help. So I know it's gonna be an uphill battle, but you're fighting for the American people over at the Heritage Foundation at AFPI, we're fighting for the American people for grid security, grid stability, lower energy prices. And we know that it's a clear prescription, getting rid of these wasteful and ineffective tax credits for unreliable solar and wind. That is a clear way to ensure that the American people see relief at the kitchen table in their electricity bills, and so we're going to fight for it. Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah, we'll, we'll keep fighting as well. And now I want to be optimistic, but God, I've just seen it so many times, so many times where you think, oh, we finally won the wind subsidy thing. And then the next, you know, within two years it's back. And I don't mean to be pessimistic, but it's just just a concern. Addressing AI's Power Demand and Grid Infrastructure I'm related to oil prices. We see the same thing with electricity prices, people blaming data centers and such for increasing electricity prices, people arguing that, you know, rejecting data centers altogether because of their fear of what it'll do to electricity prices. Where are you on that whole debate 'cause I, I I would argue it's very similar to the gas price issue. Speaker 3 I think the North Star for for me is the right pair protection pledge that President Trump brokered with the heads of a number of hyperscaler AI folks are the big AI folks. And what it says is look, whatever build out this requires, it can't come on the backs of the American people. And I think that's exactly right. It encouraged hyper scalers and other AI data centers to bring their own power or pay for the power they need even if they don't end up using that power. I think that's the way forward. The encouraging thing is that when you look at the data about data centers and where they are and what the electricity rates are, it's not at all clear that data centers are driving up the rates. So the, the empirical, the early empirical data are in and they're positive. And in addition, fundamentally we would expect that where new large load comes onto the grid, they'll be paying for grid upgrades and infrastructure. And the, the economics say that the price should come down as they cover those shared costs in addition to paying for the, the variable costs of the energy they need. So I do think that there's a lot of concern and and consternation in the with the American people about what these data centers mean for their communities will why electricity rates go up, will there be questions around water usage. But I think fundamentally this is a get to know you exercise between these new big economic players that again, are going to be, I think, very helpful in securing US against the the folks in in other parts of the world, say China, who may have a different set of interests than those we have here in establishing AUS LED artificial intelligence capacity for for both ourselves and our friends and allies around the world. So I think that's going to be very important. And I think people need to realize one these things that I've said about the energy cost, like, look, there's, there's plenty of reasons, you know that on the surface you might be concerned, the data say, actually, you probably don't need to be that concerned. Things are probably going to trend the right way, especially if we give hyperscalers the ability to bring their own power. I think that's going to be absolutely transformative. And then again, on the water issue, there's been a lot of fear and and hype around the water issue. When you start to peel back that onion, what people are finding is actually there's a lot of reason to think that it's not going to be as big of a deal. There's a lot of early misreporting on the issue and there's a lot of confusion about what it means to have water in your system, to use water water and to actually quote destroy water to make it unproductive or, you know, just evaporating and, and leaving your part of the the ecosystem. And what we find is that data centers tend to be pretty good at this, keeping water fresh and clean and usable time after time. Speaker 1 One of the issues that I think the narrative, whatever gets wrong is they forget again why we're in this electricity crisis to begin with. And that it's easier for the politicians to blame the data centers than to acknowledge the it's their policies that created this situation. And the inability of many politicians that to be accountable for their past decision making, I think is at the heart of all this. Data centers are not the bad guys here. It's not data centers who made it hard to build power plants. It's not data centers who made it hard to build a coal plant. It's not data centers who distorted markets and made wind and solar cost less than a cent an hour so no one else could compete with them. That's all your politicians and bureaucrats doing that. Not all the politicians and bureaucrats. I'm not saying all of them do it, but it's, it's, it's a policy choice that was totally predictable. If not data centers, it would have been the next industrial power user. And, and what I mean, that's my view anyway. I think it's just it, it's a, it's placing the, it, it's, it's the accusations are being put in the wrong direction. And that's what you know, the the, the, the, the agreement that was made. The name that slip slips my mind. Speaker 3 The the Rate payer Protection pledge. Speaker 1 That's a. That's a a good way to help bridge that gap. I think that it's a because because these guys are going to want to produce energy anyway. So it gives them a way to produce more electrons. I think again, this is just me and you saw, I get it's, it's a good way to break the whole system in a positive way that the old system being meeting of being broken. I think this is a good way to show a new way to produce energy in a more decentralized way that's not bound by the old utility model. Love the utilities, not, you know, but I think that I think it'll be interesting how all of this plays out and that there might be 1,000,000 reasons to be against, there might be 1,000,000 reasons to be against data centres, but electricity isn't one of their need for electricity is what's going to drive massive, massive power production in the future. That is, we're all going to benefit from. Speaker 3 I think that's exactly right. And it's that Silicon Valley mindset. I mean, they, they had essentially an unregulated space that they were playing in for many years, the software space, the, the Internet and of course we need reasonable regulations there. But what that, what that fostered was an environment where folks really felt free to play around and break things and to iterate extremely quickly. And I think it was that level of innovation freedom that made us the unquestioned leader in software and Internet over places like Europe who just couldn't get out of their own way for many, many years and still haven't to my knowledge. And I think you're starting to see these folks in Silicon Valley, maybe Elon Musk at the helm, turn their their view from strictly software to hardware to rockets to data centers to nuclear energy to whatever. And I'm really excited to see how that fundamentally American spirit of innovation can be applied to energy to, as you say, build the next generation of stuff and power all of this amazing technology here in the United States for the benefit of the American people. I see that. It's tremendously exciting. Building a Uniquely American and Innovative Nuclear Future I do too. I think it's the most exciting thing. And I want to transition now to nuclear energy. We'll just spend a couple of minutes doing that. And I have two more sort of lines of question I want to talk to you about. 1 is nuclear energy. And it's this idea that you just said. I I like to use the term uniquely American. It is often the case in talking about nuclear energy. People are quick to point out what China's doing, what Russia's doing, and God forbid what France is doing. And I'm like, no, that's not what we should be doing. That's not, we're not going to out Chinese, the Chinese, we're not going to out Russian, the Russians. And I don't want to out French, the France, out France, the French, whatever. We're Americans. We should build a uniquely American nuclear industry. One is competitive and innovative and kicks all of their rear ends in the marketplace. And we can do that if we just get out of the way. And we know we can because we did it in the past. We did it with, I mean we've done it in nuclear, but we did it with, with almost everything that's innovative. It's because we have the spirit of entrepreneurship here where we're not, we're not. We, we don't ask the government, may I first before going off and doing these things, we need to bring that, that same spirit of entrepreneurship and of innovation back to nuclear energy. And, and we have just the guys who can do that now. And that's where I think there's just this tremendous opportunity. And I see it percolating in, in policy space, but it's not dominating yet. And I'm curious, what is your view of, of where nuclear energy is? And let's just sort of, that's my opening salvo into the nuclear energy conversation. What's your you know, talk to me. Speaker 3 Well, you just made me think of, by the way, that amazing country song. What's that lyric? We'll put a boot up your ass. It's the American way. Speaker 1 I don't know that song, but I like it. Speaker 3 It's a great song, man question where the the nuclear industry is today, where nuclear energy is in America today. Well, look, I think one we have despite Gale force headwinds, we have a lot to be proud of. We have currently the largest and most energetic nuclear fleet in the entire world, which employs something like 70,000 people across the United States paying wages that I think are double the median wage across America. So that's tremendous. This is an industry, and we don't represent this industry. We don't work for this industry. But just looking at the raw numbers, this is an industry that's providing for American families in a fantastic way, that's giving them generational employment at good wages and in places where you can build communities in that really uniquely American way that we're talking about. I think that's tremendously exciting. I think we need to do a lot more. And I think the the administration is racing ahead on this to create licensing frameworks that actually work for reactors instead of this tired maybe Part 50, Part 52 process that firms have had to deal with for a long time. We've seen just recently the drop of the Part 53 micro reactor or small modular reactor framework, technology size agnostic, but obviously that's where it's where it's aimed. We've seen the proposal to develop a similar framework, I think under Part 57 for micro reactors. So that's gonna be very, very exciting too. We've seen investments in supply chain. We've seen the government lean in to help folks get siding done faster and easier. And I think there's a a lot that's being done. That said, we have so much more that that we can do and must do. I mean, this is a tremendously dense power source that can provide tons and tons of around the clock reliable energy. So we should do more. And I think we're moving that way about as fast as anyone ever thought we could, which is tremendously exciting. Speaker 1 Yeah, I think that that what this minute administration is doing is really innovative and fun and and great to see. You know, a couple of regulatory proposed rules were just introduced in the last few weeks. One on that you talked about 1, expanding the DOE and Department of War's authority creating, I shouldn't say expanding, that's the wrong word, creating a specific regulatory pathway that takes advantage of the authorities that they already have. Something that I've advocated for a long time and I'm really glad to see it and I hope that it becomes what it could be. The current, the current DOE program where they have 11 reactors being built, micro or small reactors that you had alluded to that should that are supposed, some of which should go critical by 4th of July this year. That's a that's a fine first start. It's not my totally my cup of tea, but I get it. I'm not like, I'm not, you know, whatever, but using that framework to expand that authority so that any firm can build anywhere under that authority, I think would would be awesome. Like that's the kind of thing that I think really moves us forward. And then the other thing that I really think could blow things open and they, I know you're not supposed to say blow things open and whatever, you know, there's a section 274 B that establishes the partnership program that that gave states some initial authority to do nuclear. I just think we need to recognize we have 70 years of, of safe operations history and that nuclear energy is not some magical thing. And there are a lot of reactors have much different risk profiles than others. And especially as you go small, I think that there's that we need to think long and hard about to expanding that 274 B authority and giving states who want to not every state's going to have their own NRC. I'm not suggesting that, but give states more authority to regulate some, you know, a greater swath of nuclear energy. But I, I could see, you know, when I think about it, I could see a, an ecosystem. I hate that word, but I'm going to use it. An ecosystem where you have like your research development demonstration plants being built under the DOE authority, but they know that the the the commercial requirements that would be made and they're building to to meet those. And you take that over to the NRC, who gives it a good commercial look over, make sure it meets all those requirements, gives them their permit and that goes to the states who then take over the day-to-day oversight operation. I don't I don't know but and, and Trump is making those things possible. I'm not saying he has laid out that vision per SE, but the pieces are there to do that kind of thing. I don't know. That's kind of the way I look at it. Speaker 3 I think that's right. I mean, I think President Trump is interested in, in giving as much room to run as can be given, you know, within the existing world that we live in to, to these nuclear companies to, to build that base of, of energy dominance. I think is it 200 gigawatts by 2040 or 400 gigawatts by 2040? Speaker 1 Quadrupling. Speaker 3 It's quadrupling, I think, and I think that would be. Speaker 1 300 more I guess. Speaker 3 That's right. And I think that reflects both President Trump's vision for having a really dominant nuclear industry here in the United States, and I think it also reflects the amount of demand that's coming online. I think we're constantly revising demand forecasts up, but I think 2:00 this idea of of allowing the states to have a greater role, I think that's something that very possibly the original drafters of our Atomic Energy legislation here in America envisioned. I think that's what the the last energy lawsuit with Texas is trying to articulate. Speaker 1 It's just objectively true that the United States built a bunch of reactors from the from the late 50s to. To late 60s that cost way less than they do now. They had the same exact safety record. That is no one's ever been as much as injured or sickened as a result of radioactive release. We had you know, people don't remember or maybe they never knew. They didn't care. Why would they it we didn't just build light water reactors. We've commercialized other types of react high temperature gas cooled reactors at Fort St. Vrain and Peach Bottom. So like we've done these things. So you know, we, it's often the case of people talk about the advanced reactors as if they're new. They're not new. Those were mostly developed long time ago and that there were specific policy decisions. I would say rightfully so, more or less that led us down the road that we're on. But it's time to get off that road and like recognize the the opportunity before us and, and I think that for the first time in a long time, you have a chance to do that. But like there, there's still a lot more we need to do. We need to be innovative on the waste side. That problem needs to be solved. Speaker 3 The spent nuclear fuel, yeah. Speaker 1 Spent, well, it could be way. It's certainly spent nuclear fuel. Call it whatever you want, but yeah, there's so many opportunities there. I'm real skeptical of subsidies just across the board. I feel like they are that that as long as the promise of subsidies are out there diverts too many people's attention away from forcing real reforms and rather going after subsidies. We don't need to get into all that unless you want to. But you know, I think that there are things that are that still need to be overcome. And I'll say this too, if we quadruple nuclear power, we're going to do way more than that 'cause if we will have quadrupled it, then we will solve the economics issue, which is I think the main, that's the really the only issue between what we have now and and broad success. Once we solve that, you're going to build a lot of nuclear power plants. I think quadrupling the size of the current fleet is like a floor. I think that you'd get way more than that if you solve that that fundamental issue of the economics. Speaker 3 I think that's right. And I think that speaks to the need not only to embrace these advanced reactor designs, these SMR, these micro reactors, but also to double down on what's made our fleet as large and energetic as it already has been are large light water reactors. Those are something that we don't need to turn away from. They do fantastic work. But we do need to give them a framework that actually works. And we do need to give them the regulatory relief and the the the room to breathe, so to speak, so that they can do that again. The Challenge of Reversing 'Green' Policies at State Level All right, one more question. We're out of time, but I needed to ask you one last question. So, you know, I'll try to be make it quick. One of the things I'm really worried about right now is the Trump administration has done a great job of pushing back against these dumb so-called green policies, which are not green at all. But we see in Virginia right now, you know, the new governor there doing everything she can to bring them back hard. Do you fear that that the that that Trump's work could be President Trump's work could be easily reversed in this space? And I I thought it wouldn't be. Whenever you see what happened in Spain, you've really begun to see the implications of the dumb net zero stuff. But here comes Virginia just being like, I don't know anything about all these bad things happen and this is fired in there fire in the green policies. So what's your kind of thought on that? Speaker 3 Man, that's such an interesting question. You know, we've seen some interesting movement towards the the energy sanity side. We saw that from Governor Hochul, who agreed with the Trump administration to allow the construction of a natural gas pipeline that had been stonewalled for many, many years. This is gonna deliver affordable natural gas to folks in the Northeast so that they can pull their electric bills down in the in the winter and the summer. We've seen Gavin Newsom out in California, who's not traditionally been known for any kind of energy sanity at all. Yeah, he's, he's expressed some interest in protecting the the few refineries that remain in California. And you can point to to different kinds of examples. That said, I, I can't really speak to Virginia, although what exactly is going on in Governor Spanberger's mind? Although it's an interesting tale, no one can, perhaps. Speaker 1 I'll just let my laughter speak for yourself. Speaker 3 There, there's an interesting set of two stories that's happening here. 1 You see Governor Spanberger embracing policies that put American energy last and that are known to make energy more expensive in Virginia, like getting back into the regional greenhouse Greenhouse Gas Initiative. Reggie, it's, it's clearly been demonstrated there's no there's no real discussion about this or debate about this. It will make energy in Virginia more expensive. That said, in the same region, the, the PJM region, they opened up a new interconnection queue the other day. And what we're seeing is that this queue is being dominated by natural gas as developers, particularly for the energy needed to power data centers, they're looking for affordable, reliable options that can be built quickly. And they're turning to natural gas predominantly, and may I say also 17 gigawatts of new nuclear, which is tremendously exciting. And so I think there's a shift in the mindset of the American people. I think they've seen the consequences of this disastrous race to so-called net zero and this viewpoint that nothing else matters except for carbon dioxide emissions. And I think people are saying, wow, there's a lot of other things that matter like keeping my lights on and keeping my electricity bill low and making sure that we're secure in the world and and using our own resources. That said that there there are still some politicians, unfortunately, that are interested in doubling down on policies that will make energy more expensive. I hope they don't, and I hope they turn the ship around. Final Thoughts, Contact Information, and Thanks I'll take that as a positive. Last thought that was pretty positive. I'll take it. I'll take it. Thank you to everyone who took some time out of your day to listen to the Power Hour. If you enjoyed the podcast, please tell your friends, family and colleagues to check us out. And remember, we're no longer on the herded Heritage feed, though you should definitely check out that great content. There we are at we are. You can find us at the Power Hour and don't forget to combine that with Jack Spencer or the Heritage Foundation. e-mail us at the Power Hour at heritage.org. Don't forget to subscribe now before we end. Ted, is there anything else that you'd like to add? Did I miss anything? Where can people find out about you? Find out more about AFPI. Speaker 3 Man, I think we had a great conversation. Thanks again for having me on. It was so much fun. Yeah, man. America First policy.com. You can find me there. You can find the work of all of our scholars and experts on on energy and a wide variety of other topics. Again, my name is Ted Ellis, so you can just search Ted Ellis AFPI. You can also follow me on Twitter at Ted White and Blue, which is my which is my punny littlex.com handle. So please follow me there. Please tune into our work at AFPI. And Jack, it's been an absolute pleasure. Thanks again. Speaker 1 Ted, white and blue, I like it. So there you go, folks. Remember to e-mail us at the Power Hour at heritage.org. Thank you, Jack, for being an awesome producer. Thank you, Ted, for being an awesome guest. Don't forget to get your copy of Nuclear Revolution. You can get it at Amazon or wherever you get your books. Don't forget to check out our nuclear documentary. Most importantly, thanks to all of you for listening. We'll see you next time.