Chris Wright Takes Venezuela Pitch To Oil Executives In Miami
The Trump administration is accelerating efforts to draw US oil companies into Venezuela, with Energy Secretary Chris Wright expected to hold discussions with industry leaders this week as Washington maps out plans to revive the country’s collapsed energy sector, according to Bloomberg.
Wright will be in Miami for the Goldman Sachs Energy, Clean Tech & Utilities Conference, a major industry gathering that will bring together executives from Chevron, ConocoPhillips and other producers. Chevron remains the only global oil supermajor maintaining operations inside Venezuela .
President Donald Trump is betting that American energy firms will ultimately anchor Venezuela’s recovery, but companies are signaling they won’t rush in without firm political and legal assurances. Years of corruption and neglect have severely damaged production, leaving infrastructure in need of massive long-term reinvestment.
Bloomberg writes that despite Venezuela holding the world’s largest proven crude reserves, experts estimate restoring its oil system would require approximately $10 billion in investment every year for the next decade.
Industry participants say interest in the country is real, but the recent removal of President Nicolás Maduro alone is not enough to unlock capital. Companies want clarity on whether a durable government will emerge, whether contracts and the rule of law will be respected, and whether US political support for their presence in Venezuela will extend beyond Trump’s term in office.
The White House has already engaged multiple energy companies in early-stage talks, according to a US official. Administration officials say the private sector is prepared to move when conditions stabilize.
“All of our oil companies are ready and willing to make big investments in Venezuela that will rebuild their oil infrastructure,” White House spokeswoman Taylor Rogers said.
From Virginia’s data-center corridor to multi-state electricity markets, analysts, government agencies, and AI insiders say the scramble to handle technology’s expanding power demands will be an uphill battle.
At the same time, big tech companies and data centers are working to reduce the impact of AI’s expansion on the United States’ grid infrastructure. Some experts believe changes and significant investment are needed to reduce grid stress and possible energy shortages.
A primary driver of this concern is the explosion in data centers being built across the United States to support rapid AI buildout. In 2024, energy consumption reached an all-time high, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. The agency expects 2025 and 2026 consumption to be even higher.
Presently, energy demands from data centers account for about 4 percent of electricity use in the United States and 1.5 percent of the world’s electricity use, EIA data show.
Although AI’s current computing needs represent just a fraction of total energy consumption, the rate of growth has raised the question of whether the United States’ energy infrastructure can keep up.
A significant portion of America’s power grid network dates back to the 1960s and 1970s, according to the Department of Energy. As of 2023, the agency observed that 70 percent of transmission lines were more than 25 years old and nearing the end of their lifecycles.
“This has major consequences on our communities: power outages, susceptibility to cyberattacks, or community emergencies caused by faulty grid infrastructure,” the agency stated.
And that’s without any added energy demands.
The Energy Department’s Grid Deployment Office has awarded $14.5 billion in grants to improve electrical infrastructure, according to Bank of America research, which also indicates that an additional $36.9 billion in private sector investments to U.S. grid upgrades have been made over the past couple of years.
The Bank of America analysis noted the United States is going through a period of power “load growth” primarily driven by building electrification, data centers, industrial demand, and the rise of electric vehicles (EVs).
“If load growth forecasts continue to rise, utilities will need to invest to meet required reserve margins and increase spending on both power generation and transmission and distribution capacity,” the July report said.
Perfect Storm
Even after two years of modernization efforts, the U.S. power grid network remains in a race to continue upgrading while consumption demand surges. Due to data center growth, researchers at S&P Global expect power grid requirements to increase 22 percent by the end of this year and nearly three times by 2030.
“People keep saying the lack of chips is the problem, and it’s not. It’s a lack of power,” Tyler Saltsman, CEO of Seattle-based EdgeRunner AI, told The Epoch Times.
Part of the conversation surrounding unsustainable AI growth in recent months homes in on structural shifts in support sectors.
A Rand Technology analysis called graphics processing units, high-performance memory, and networking integrated circuits the “bedrock of AI infrastructure.” The demand for these components is rising faster than suppliers can deliver.
However, Saltsman believes a shortage of microchips is moot if the power grid can’t support AI’s rapid buildout.
Working at the intersection of AI and energy, Saltsman’s company has three active research and development contracts with the U.S. military. From his perspective, alarm over AI and U.S. energy infrastructure isn’t overstated.
“If anything, it’s downplayed. Our grid is pretty fried ... nationwide, you see a lot of lazy [maintenance] practices,” Saltsman said.
While he hasn’t encountered any power-related issues while working on the front lines of AI, Saltsman said he expects to if data center growth continues at the current rate.
“We can make chips much faster than we can make power,” he added.
When asked what could be done to safeguard U.S. power grids, Saltsman said, “We need to commit to building nuclear reactors, and we need to do it now, but that isn’t a quick fix.”
On average, a nuclear power plant takes more than five years to build, according to the World Nuclear Association.
Meanwhile, some energy experts believe concerns over AI and power demands are legitimate, but aren’t being framed correctly.
“The risk isn’t that AI will ‘break’ the U.S. grid, rather the risk is that outdated planning, cost-allocation rules, and inflexible load assumptions will force inefficient solutions like emergency peakers or deferred retirements despite smarter and cleaner alternatives that exist,” Gaurav Shah, managing partner at Trident Renewables, told The Epoch Times.
Emergency peakers are peak demand power plants that act as quick-start power generators that supply electricity to a grid during times of unexpectedly high demand. Incidents such as extreme weather events or power failures from other sources are often the impetus for their use.
Despite the relatively small portion of America’s total electricity consumption for which AI is responsible, energy demand growth has been enough to require the use of peaker plants.
Peaker plants contribute about 3 percent to the country’s electricity use, but have the capacity to produce 19 percent, according to a 2024 report by the Government Accountability Office.
“There are a ton of peaker plants that could operate more,” Energy Secretary Chris Wright told Reuters in an interview in September.
Shah has spent nearly 20 years working with U.S. energy infrastructure, including renewable energy, grid-connected assets, fuel transition projects, and, most recently, AI-linked energy strategy.
“This is a governance and market-design challenge more than a physics problem,” he said.
“The grid struggles with concentrated AI clusters in places like Northern Virginia, Texas, and parts of the Southeast,not because power doesn’t exist but because deliverability, redundancy, and timing don’t align,” Shah explained.
“Reforms like faster permitting for transmission upgrades and incentives for siting data centers near retiring industrial sites with existing grid headroom are much needed,” he said. “Without reforms, we are likely to see higher costs, delayed retirements of older plants, and localized reliability stress.”
“With the increase in EVs, it’s a perfect storm of factors,” Saltsman said.
He believes AI has the potential to be dangerous for U.S. electrical infrastructure. With the power grids already stressed and in need of upgrades, sudden surges in power loads—or even a rogue AI agent—could tip the scales for the worse.
“If you were to attack our power grid, you could potentially bring this country to its knees,” Saltsman said.
Regional Challenges
Shah said AI’s energy footprint is “hyperlocal,” and power grids will likely fail locally, not nationally.
He said a 100 megawatt data center in a congested area can cause more stress than 1 gigawatt of overall national growth in power demand.
Energy grids in the United States are broken down into different sections instead of a seamless power supply. Most of these subgrids are part of the Eastern Interconnection, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), or the Western Interconnection.
The Pennsylvania-New Jersey-Maryland (PJM) Interconnection serves what’s known as “data center alley” in Virginia, which is currently experiencing unprecedented data center growth alongside soaring energy demands, according to PJM Inside Lines.
Officials for the PJM Interconnection warned that an energy capacity shortage could affect its systems as early as June 2026.
“The demand for electricity is growing at the fastest pace in years, primarily from the proliferation of data centers, electrification of buildings and vehicles, and manufacturing,” the agency stated.
“Regions like ERCOT and PJM face different challenges. Texas has generation but not transmission constraints. The Northeast has aging infrastructure and limited siting options. AI load growth is geographically concentrated, capital-intensive, and fast,” Shah explained.
“National averages hide the fact that a single county can suddenly need the equivalent of a mid-sized city’s power demand. Planning frameworks were not built for this,” he said.
Big tech companies are well aware they’re in the hot seat when it comes to data center energy consumption, which is why many are rapidly adopting more energy-efficient practices to reduce their load demands. Companies such as Amazon, Google, Meta, and Microsoft are among the top purchasers of renewable energy, which amounted to nearly as much as the entire state of Florida last year, according to an annual report by the American Clean Power Association.
Major players in tech are investing in multiple strategies to blunt the impact of data center-related power demand spikes, including energy-efficient hardware, advanced cooling systems, and power management systems, according to NZero and Flexential.
Saltsman said with the current rate of AI expansion, it’s “not going to be a pretty sight … unless you also plan to build a power plant in that same area.”
“We need a unified plan on modernizing the grid,” he said.
California is cracking down on extreme speeding in a move that could lead to faster license revocation for drivers exceeding 100 mph on highways, according to the California State Transportation Agency.
Drivers cited by the California Highway Patrol (CHP) for the crime “will have their citation automatically forwarded to the DMV’s Driver Safety Branch—no matter their prior record” under the new joint pilot program between CHP and the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV), the agency stated in a press release.
The DMV will review each case and the person’s driving history to determine the penalty, which may include “suspension or revocation of driving privileges,” before the person is even scheduled for court.
“We believe that early intervention is the key to saving lives,” said DMV Director Steve Gordon in a press release. “We want to take immediate action against dangerous drivers before their carelessness leads to a deadly crash.”
CHP cites roughly 1,600 individuals each month for driving 100 mph or faster. In 2024, the CHP issued a total of more than 18,000 citations for extreme speeding, the DMV stated.
In May 2025, the CHP adopted a fleet of 100 low-profile patrol cars, allowing officers to blend in with traffic better and spot reckless behavior. During the following six months, CHP officers driving these cars issued close to 33,000 speeding tickets across the state, according to the DMV.
“Driving over 100 miles per hour is not a mistake; it is a reckless choice that endangers everyone on the road,” said CHP Commissioner Sean Duryee in the DMV press release. “This new program delivers swift consequences to keep dangerous drivers off California’s roadways before their actions cause irreversible harm.”
The DMV stated that the process of penalizing drivers through the legal system is often lengthy. Once a driver is cited for extreme speeding, the citation is sent to the courts for processing.
Under the current California vehicle code, driving over 100 mph will result in a maximum fine of $500 and potentially a license suspension of up to 30 days for the first offense. Subsequent violations result in higher fines and a license suspension.
Drivers who are cited for speeding can also receive additional citations for other violations that may result in jail time, including reckless driving or causing bodily injury to others on the road.
The new DMV–CHP pilot program is “designed to act more quickly” than the court system, according to the DMV.
The state reported speeding as a “major factor in traffic deaths statewide,” as it contributes to about a third of traffic fatalities, according to the transportation agency.
In October 2025, the state launched a Southern California-focused initiative to address speeding-related traffic fatalities.
The state allocated $7 million to the Los Angeles Department of Transportation to help fund safety upgrades along Avalon Boulevard, and invested over $191 million for safety improvements along State Route 91, the state transportation agency stated on its website.
The improvements may include automated speeding detection cameras, high-visibility traffic markings, redesigning intersections to reduce conflicts, and upgrading infrastructure for safe walking and biking, in addition to promoting community engagement and law enforcement partnerships.
At that time, the agency said it set an “interim goal to cut deadly and serious injury crashes” by 30 percent by 2035.
The agency said the DMV will compare citation and outcome data to evaluate the effectiveness of the CHP–DMV pilot program in reducing car crashes.
Zelensky Names Canada's Chrystia Freeland, Notable Anti-Russia Hawk As Top Advisor
Apparently Zelensky is simply skipping his own people and going straight to appointing officials within foreign governments to top advisory positions.
Ukraine has named former Canadian Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland as an economic advisor amid a broader reshuffle of senior government positions, also coming on the heels of the massive energy ministry related corruption scandal which has unleashed chaos within his administration.
It should also be noted that Canada is a founding member of NATO - so handing Freeland a position in the Ukrainian presidential office won't go down well at the Kremlin, which will see this as yet more justification for its vehement condemnation of NATO expansion.
"Chrystia is a professional... and has significant experience in attracting investments and conducting economic transformations," President Zelensky announced on Telegram Monday.
Freeland was Canada's deputy prime minister from 2019 to 2024 under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and was appointed Canada's special representative for Ukraine's reconstruction in 2025.
But she might better be remembered for leading the legal crackdown on Canada's trucker 'Freedom Convoy' movement, the large anti-vaccine mandate and Covid lockdown protest that had gripped Ottawa for several weeks in 2022.
Freeland sought to legally prosecute (and later some of these cases ended in convictions on "mischief") innocent truckers who were merely exercising their rights to politically organize and protest.
So we doubt she's going to 'help' Ukraine's situation, amid the grinding war at a moment Kiev is at a crossroads: reach a peace agreement with Moscow, or the war drags on with no end in sight.
🚨"This aged very well"
In 2014, Mearsheimer debated Chrystia Freeland and Michael McFaul in London, he told both of them that if they continued with their policies that Ukraine would be destroyed as a consequence of their actions, to which they laughed.pic.twitter.com/2kUfmmJW11
— Ignorance, the root and stem of all evil (@ivan_8848) November 13, 2025
"Ukraine needs to increase its internal resilience — for the sake of Ukraine's recovery, if diplomacy works as quickly as possible, and for the sake of strengthening our defense, if we have to work longer to end the war due to our partners' delays," Zelensky recently wrote on Telegram, looking ahead to 2026.
Venezuela’s strategic Russian and Chinese partners predictably condemned the US’ capture of President Nicolas Maduro while the US’ EU junior partner released a statement that lacked any criticism of the US but also didn’t endorse its actions either.
Therein lies the hypocrisy that was just exposed by the US’ “special military operation” in Venezuela since the EU would have certainly condemned Russia’s hypothetical capture of Zelensky in the harshest language possible.
Their implied excuse for these double standards towards the US’ capture of Maduro is that he’s illegitimate, but Russia now deems Zelensky to be illegitimate too, so third parties’ assessments of other leaders’ legitimacy is ultimately subjective and this leads to the reality that was just exposed.
At the end of the day, Great Powers like the US (which is arguably still a superpower even if it was hitherto in decline till Trump’s return to office) always pursue their perceived interests but cloak them in the language of international law or norms, which is more palatable for the global public.
The US previously relied on the “rules-based order” concept to justify its actions abroad, but this was eventually exposed by Russian media as pure hypocrisy, ergo why Trump 2.0 didn’t employ it this time.
Rather, it boldly explained how the US intends to restore its “sphere of influence” over the Americas in accordance with the new National Security Strategy (NSS), thus representing a Hyper-Realist approach in the sense of explicitly embracing the pursuit of power as a goal instead of denying it like before.
As the NSS portrays it, this “sphere of influence” is meant to ensure the US’ national security interests and prosperity, which is similar to what Russia aims to achieve in Ukraine through its own specialoperation.
Without the power that comes from the US restoring its “sphere of influence” over what it calls its “backyard” or Russia restoring its own over what it calls its “Near Abroad”, they’d remain exposed to a panoply of threats from their rivals, including economic ones that could reduce their people’s prosperity. Correspondingly, Great Powers therefore also try to undermine their rivals in their respective “sphere of influence”, which they perceive as a means towards giving them leverage or at least an edge over them.
This is the reality of Great Power geopolitics, which has up till now been covered up with rhetoric about “democracy”, “international law”, and/or the “rules-based order”, but the US is no longer playing these mind games.
Ideally, it’ll finally behave as a “benign hegemon” that still profits from those within its sphere (but not as excessively as before) and also genuinely provides for their security, since this Putin-pioneered model is the most sustainable way to ensure stability within a Great Power’s region.
The US’ history of “malign hegemony” led to the anti-hegemonic movements that arose in the Americas so repeating the same policy will inevitably lead to the same result and consequently harm the US’ Great Power interests.
It’s premature to predict whether Trump 2.0 will take a page from Putin’s model of “benign hegemony”, but regardless of one’s opinion about Venezuela, it’s still refreshing that the US just exposed the reality of Great Power geopolitics since no one needs to keep up the charade any longer.
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ZeroHedge.
