Fracking has suddenly leapt to the front burner ahead of tomorrow’s presidential debate. No, not the curse word from a certain well-known sci-fi series. Kamala Harris and Donald Trump have both seized on the shorthand for hydraulic fracturing as they prepare to square off in Philadelphia and win over voters in the swing state of Pennsylvania. Most paths to winning the presidency include the state’s 19 electoral votes. And fracking is important to Pennsylvania’s economy, not to mention its unions. Harris says she no longer supports a fracking ban, which she called for in 2019 during her short-lived presidential campaign. Trump has seized on that reversal to accuse Harris of flip-flopping, while Harris has asserted that Trump is in the pocket of Big Oil and corporate donors. But as I write today, fracking as rhetoric doesn’t really have much to do with fracking in reality. And as Ben Lefebvre notes, it’s become a stand-in for a much wider debate about energy and climate policy. First, it bears noting here that the president can't ban fracking. That would require an act of Congress, which has not shown any interest in taking that step, not even when Democrats are in charge. Fracking is also not a type of drilling; it's part of the process of building an oil and gas well. And it’s not new: The oil industry developed the process in the 1940s, though new fracking techniques fueled the oil and gas production boom of the last decade or so. But as ClearView Energy Partners' Kevin Book explained to me, the political debate over fracking isn't really about the process of shoving water, sand and chemicals down a pipe at extremely high pressure to crack open rock and release oil and gas. “The issue of a ban is really more of a symbolic statement,” said Book, managing director at the consulting firm. “What we’re really asking is, ‘What is the Harris position on oil and gas?’” The next president will be deciding whether to slam the brakes on President Joe Biden's fight against climate change. That's what Trump wants to do — frack, baby, frack. For Harris, any fracas onstage tomorrow night about fracking could yield some sought-after clues. Biden made it clear in 2020 he wasn't for banning fracking. And Harris adopted his position after becoming his running mate. Now that she's at the top of the ticket, does she plan to follow Biden's approach on the broad array of energy policies — massive incentives for clean sources such as wind and solar coupled with tightened regulations on an oil industry that boasts record output? Or would she take steps that would accelerate a clean energy transition so quickly that it crimps oil and gas production?? Tune in tomorrow night to (maybe) find out.
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