The End of U.S. "Green" Energy Colonialism in Africa

U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright delivers a seminal speech at the Powering Africa Summit in Washington, D.C, fundamentally altering the U.S. approach to energizing Africa.

On March 7, 2025, U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright introduced the Trump Administration’s energy policy towards Africa. It was a break from decades of the repetitive U.S. development support for African nations and an end to American green energy colonialism that saw prohibition on support for desperately needed domestic African fossil energy sources and a crazy focus on deploying intermittent renewables, microgrids, and other energy technologies that will not support the proper development and growth Africans need and deserve.

I’ll let Wright’s own words do most of the talking in this post. Here we go…

I am honored to join all of you today at the Powering Africa Summit here in our nation’s capital. Today, as our nation’s Energy Secretary under President Trump, I’d like to share with you our Administration’s energy direction and what it can mean for Africa and its peoples.

The first thing I want to say is that nothing is more important to me than getting our energy direction right. Why — because energy is the lifeblood of civilization.

From the first spark of fire to the harnessing of the atom, energy has been the foundation of every advancement in human history. Energy is about more than power plants and transmission lines.

It is the force behind economic opportunity, public health, and technological advancement. And energy success is not measured solely by abstract targets like CO2 emissions. It is measured in children who can do their homework at night, in factories running at full capacity, in hospitals with reliable power.

Energy is about powering real lives, real businesses, and real economies and doing it in a way that is safe, affordable, and reliable. Most of all, it is about putting people first.

And that is what our energy agenda is about. When we forget these realities, what we end up with is bad energy policy driven by a mindset of scarcity rather than abundance. The mindset of scarcity goes something like this:

People are problems. People are liabilities. People are mouths to feed. People are plagues on the environment and drains on resources.

Simply stated, the mindset of scarcity starts with the one-sided, pessimistic view of people — a view which denies or downplays human worth, human dignity, and human potential.

Now, here is what the mindset of abundance looks like:

People are problem solvers. People are assets. People are feeders of mouths. People are the solutions to environmental challenges and people are the greatest resources we have.

Put a different way, we believe that the true sources of wealth are not in the ground, but in us. Oil was just a liquid, buried in the ground, until one day people made it into a resource that can empower humanity. The same can be said for every other source of energy we have. It was just matter until a human being transformed it into energy.

The implications are powerful. If we underrate humanity, if we forget who and what we are as a people, we will constantly worry about running our of resources or polluting everything we touch.

Whenever someone tells you we are running out of resources, or that we should ration, restrict, or ban any fuel, that person has forgotten who they are and who you are.

To say we are running out of resources is to say we are running out of human ingenuity, creativity, and innovation. If someone says we must drive down every fuel that produces emissions, we say why not drive down the emissions and produce more of the fuel? The same human ingenuity that created the fuels can reduce the emissions.

And yet, for the past few years, that’s what we’ve been hearing from Washington. The result has been energy policies that seek to produce less energy, not more. It’s led to exclusive, rather than inclusive energy policies that seek to ban or regulate out of existence every form of energy besides renewables.

And make no mistake. Policies that exclude energy exclude people. Exclusive energy policies have withheld life-giving energy and energy technology from billions of people across the world, including the African continent.

Well, I’m here to tell you that thanks to President Trump’s leadership, the days of energy exclusivity are over. The days of energy inclusivity have returned. The days of a scarcity mindset in Washington are over. The says of an abundance mentality have begun. The days of putting people first have arrived.

What does that mean in practice? Well, let’s look back over the decades. Coal was always environmentally unfriendly, so did we ban it? No, through human ingenuity we kept making it cleaner even as we relied more on the cleanest fossil fuel, natural gas. And when we began running out of readily available natural gas, did we hunker down and ration it? No, through human ingenuity we produced more of it through fracking. I know all about that. I was on the forefront of the fracking revolution. I started a fracking business thirty years ago.

Today, as renewables prove less reliable resulting in blackouts in California and other regions, should we pretend its not happening? No, through human ingenuity we should revive emissions reliable nuclear energy and we should work towards the day when we have viable technology to make wind and solar reliable as well.

So that is our energy policy today. How does this new direction relate to you who are committed to the prosperity and well-being of the nations and people of Africa?

First and foremost, we believe in a model for Africa that empowers and elevates people. We support a model that’s less about assistance and more about investment. We believe our African partners don’t need handouts. They need investment, innovation, and partnerships. We believe in sharing not just our energy bounty, but our technology and our know-how so African can produce more energy of every kind.

In the assistance model, we were the benefactors and Africans our recipients. We reject that notion completely. We see you as partners in every respect. And our goal is win-win. We want both sides to benefit from the relationship. We are structuring partnerships that create value for American taxpayers, companies, and workers — while delivering real, lasting benefits to African citizens and businesses.

And not only do we reject the assistance model, we also reject the China model, or what some call Chinese debt diplomacy. This is just a new form of colonialism, where China seeks to make other countries totally dependent on them as vassals and subordinates.

And we firmly recognize Africa’s tremendous potential in the coming years and decades.

Africa is the world’s fastest growing continent. By 2050, one in every three people on Earth will live in Africa.

Africa has a rapidly growing middle class and urban centers, which is why Africa’s energy demand is expected to double by 2040.

For anyone who wants to invest in Africa, the opportunity is massive.

And contrary to those who are mired in a mindset of scarcity and restrictions, we believe Africa has every right to industrialize, to build, to prosper. The question is not whether Africa should, but rather how Africa can ensure that energy development is reliable, affordable, and secure.

We believe that partnering with America is a huge part of the answer. What does America have to offer? We offer partnerships based on mutual respect and shared prosperity. We offer not just capital — we bring the best of our world-leading companies, our renowned national labs, our private sector, and our cutting-edge technology.

We offer world class technology, reliable infrastructure, and financing that strengthens economies rather than ensnaring them in debt traps. Our contracts are transparent, our financing is sustainable, and our focus in on long-term stability, not short term prosperity.

As we look to the future, we see Africa not as a market to be exploited, but a continent filled with partners to be empowered. From LNG to small modular reactors, we see an Africa that boldly embraces every form of energy and energy technology, bar none, with each nation tailoring its energy choices to its people’s needs.

We see an Africa that rises up and brings the blessings of abundant, affordable, reliable energy everywhere, from its largest cities to its tiniest hamlets, and becomes and example to the world.

We see an Africa where nations boom with prosperity and where families and communities thrive like never before. We see an Africa that is so overflowing in energy and economic abundance, it brings similar blessings to the world.

That is our vision for Africa that I offer you today. And speaking for the United States of America, we would be honored and delighted to play a role in making that happen.

Thank you.

A great speech. Now its time for America to execute this vision in the coming Trump Administration.