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HOUSTON — Clean energy technologies long considered compatible with oil and natural gas and closely associated with Republicans are likely to have a leading edge in the United States under President Donald Trump, who opposes traditional renewable solar and wind energy technologies.

This shifting landscape has been evident this week at the preeminent annual energy conference CERAWeek by S&P Global, underway in Houston, where the schedule is filled with panel discussions and meetings discussing the role fossil fuels would play in the energy transition.

Energy Secretary Chris Wright, who previously headed an oil drilling services company, kicked off the conference with a full-throated embrace of oil, gas and coal, mentioning wind and solar energy only to single them out for criticism.

“There is simply no physical way that wind, solar and batteries can replace natural gas, and I haven’t even mentioned oil and coal yet,” he told a ballroom crowded with thousands of energy industry executives, policy makers and academics to occasional rounds of applause.

The only clean energy Wright mentioned substantively was nuclear. “We are working to launch the long-awaited American nuclear renaissance, fission and fusion,” Wright said. “We want more reliable, affordable, secure energy.”

Analysts expect the Trump administration and the Republican-controlled Congress will advance clean energy technologies that harness the expertise of the fossil fuel industry, like geothermal, and boost fossil fuel production, like carbon capture and storage. Meanwhile, nuclear power — both traditional fission and early-stage fusion — has had enduring support among Republicans for years, extending now to the Trump administration.

U.S. Energy Department Secretary Chris Wright addresses attendees at the opening session of CERAWeek by S&P Global in Houston on March 10, 2025. Photo by Bill Spindle.

But rhetorical support does not necessarily mean real-world gains.

Predicting which clean-energy technologies will ultimately succeed is difficult, since project economics and availability of federal support will impact how it plays out. In many parts of the country, wind, solar and battery installations have already become the cheapest sources of electricity available. And Congress has not yet clarified which federal subsidies and tax credits will be continued, canceled or altered — all of which would have a significant impact on energy production, clean or otherwise.

The analysts Cipher interviewed said the U.S. will need “all the electrons” it can generate to meet surging electricity demand from data centers, artificial intelligence and increased manufacturing in coming years, and it will likely lean in on traditional fossil fuel sources since the infrastructure is already in place.

“A critical market need is for increased and reliable electricity generation, so energy sources and technologies that can provide firm power will be receiving the most attention,” said Joseph Hezir, president and treasurer of Washington, D.C.-based energy innovation think tank EFI Foundation.

In a sign of how focused the Trump administration is on reverting to a fossil fuel-dependent U.S. energy landscape, three of his cabinet secretaries — Interior Secretary Doug Burgum who also chairs the new National Energy Dominance Council, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin and Wright — are attending CERAWeek.

Burgum is a staunch supporter of carbon capture and storage, touting it in speeches. Wright was a shareholder in geothermal firm Fervo Energy and on the board of small modular reactor company Oklo. Zeldin began his tenure as EPA head by authorizing West Virginia to issue its own carbon storage permits.

A panel discussion on how energy giants can shape a sustainable future at CERAWeek by S&P Global in Houston on March 10, 2025. The speakers include Laura Sima, director of research and analysis at S&P Global; Sushil Purohit, chief executive officer of clean energy company Gentari Sdn Bhd; Jim Sledzik, managing director, North America for Aramco Ventures, the venture arm of Saudi Arabia’s state-owned oil company; and Vijay Swarup, senior director of climate strategy and technology at oil major ExxonMobil.

Many of the discussion subjects at the conference revolved around preventing leaks of natural gas from infrastructure, capturing carbon when fossil fuels are burned or pulling it out of the air directly to allow fossil fuels to be used for decades into the future — perhaps even permanently, some executives argued.

Oil and gas firms are already planning to use these kinds of technologies: Exxon and Chevron have both recently announced plans to power energy-hungry data centers directly with natural-gas generation equipped with carbon capture.

“Natural gas emissions are lower than coal, but using carbon capture reduces emissions even more, so it’s a plus,” said former U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu, who serves as an advisor to the advocacy group Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future.

Occidental Petroleum, meanwhile, is a vocal proponent of direct air capture, a technique to pull carbon dioxide directly out of the air. The energy giant, whose CEO Vicki Hollub spoke Tuesday at CERAWeek, is building a direct air capture facility in the Texas Permian Basin and plans to use the captured carbon to drill for more oil.

Also garnering enthusiasm in Houston this week were technologies that allow for the use of cleaner fuels — sometimes referred to as “drop-in” fuels — that can be used in existing fossil-fuel infrastructure. HIF Global, for example, aims to make clean methanol from captured carbon and renewable electricity, which can then be mixed with regular methanol to power ships or turned into jet fuel that’s chemically identical to existing fuel.

“Drop-in fuels are amazing, so there’s that opportunity with existing infrastructure,” said Lee Beck, senior vice president for global policy and commercial strategy at HIF Global.

Geothermal energy, which can be extracted using shale oil and gas techniques, has also gained high-profile traction recently, with deals inked by geothermal firms Fervo Energy and Sage Geosystems with Google and Meta, respectively. Indeed, new geothermal technologies using fracking and other horizontal drilling techniques could supply up to 64% of projected power-demand growth from data centers by the early 2030s, according to a new report from Rhodium Group.

A map of the third level of the George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston during CERAWeek by S&P Global 2025. Photo by Bill Spindle, March 10, 2025.

The preservation of tax credits and funding from laws like the Inflation Reduction Act and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act may matter more for nascent sectors, like carbon capture and clean hydrogen, than they do for better-established sectors, like solar. While Trump has called for a full rollback of Biden-era climate policies, Republicans in Congress have not indicated what exactly they will do.

At the energy confab in Houston, the head of the American Petroleum Institute told Axios it would advocate for the preservation of tax credits for carbon capture, hydrogen and green jet fuels. And over the weekend, 21 Republican lawmakers sent a letter pledging their support for maintaining clean energy tax credits.

On hydrogen, it is unclear whether the administration will move forward with funding for seven federally funded hubs to incubate the low-carbon hydrogen industry. But some remain optimistic, because hydrogen made with natural gas and carbon capture has ties to fossil fuels.

“I think the fundamentals around clean hydrogen hubs are so appealing because it’s a natural extension of the shale gas revolution,” said Alex Kizer, executive vice president of EFI Foundation.

Editor’s note: Fervo Energy’s investors include Breakthrough Energy Ventures, a program of Breakthrough Energy, which also supports Cipher.