While much of the early focus on the incoming Trump administration will be on the immediate reversals of Biden-era policies, the American Petroleum Institute (API) says it plans to focus on legislation that doesn’t shift with political winds.

“In our communications with the transition team, we're focused on durable action that lasts the test of time,” API CEO Mike Sommers said during a Jan. 13 press conference. “Oftentimes that means that it takes an act of Congress to get durable action enacted.”

Sommers spoke to the press the day before the API’s annual State of American Energy event in Washington, D.C. The API, one of the country’s largest oil and gas trade groups, uses the event to discuss goals and priorities for the year.

The ebb and flow of U.S. governmental energy policy needs to be smoothed out for everyone’s benefit, Sommers said at the conference.

“We're going to be working with Congress to make sure that what they're focused on is putting a lot of these things in law so they're not just at the whims of executive orders from the swinging pendulum of American politics,” he said.

API also plans to work with the new administration to change policies enacted during the Biden administration that the organization considers to be anti-energy industry. That will take work through the Administrative Procedures Act, which Sommers said could take years.

There are also policy decisions the organization said could be made rapidly. As part of the event, API published a five-point plan as a guideline for federal action on current energy policy. Under each point is a list of recommendations regarding federal law or policy.

The plan offers a “clear path forward,” Sommers said.

The topics included protecting consumer choice, bolstering U.S. geopolitical strength, leveraging natural resources, permitting system reform and changing tax policy.

For example, under “Protect Consumer Choice,” the organization listed policies that affect emissions standards for transportation, such as the Environmental Protection Agency’s tailpipe rules. Current policy mandates that electric vehicles or plug-in hybrid electric vehicles make up the majority of new sales for some types of vehicles by 2032.

“Smart policy certainly has a role to play in reducing emissions from the transportation sector, but these efforts should instead take a life-cycle approach, be technology-neutral and implemented on a workable timeline,” the API wrote.

During the press conference, Sommers was asked about the API’s stance on the climate accords in the Paris Agreement. Sommers reiterated the API’s support for reducing overall emissions, regardless of whether the U.S. stays in the agreement.

Sommers said the API could potentially be at odds with the Trump administration over tariffs. The incoming president has threatened Canada and Mexico with a 25% tariff on all products, including the millions of barrels of oil and billions of cubic feet of natural gas that flow into the U.S. every day.

“Free trade has worked for our industry,” Sommers said. “In fact, the oil and gas industry, in particular, is an area where free trade has worked throughout the world.”

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