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Europe trying to reduce dependency on gas from Russia

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Trump not worried about export effect on domestic gas

price

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Trump says 'clean coal' could back up some power plants

(Adds comments from Trump, background)

By Timothy Gardner

Jan 23 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump said on

Thursday the United States would guarantee supplies of liquefied

natural gas to Europe, even amid worries that the booming export

industry could boost prices of gas for U.S. consumers.

TotalEnergies CEO Patrick Pouyanne asked Trump,

who was speaking remotely at the World Economic Forum on

Thursday in Davos, Switzerland, what he would do if expected

growth in U.S. LNG projects boosted the domestic gas price.

He also asked Trump if he would agree to guarantee

security of LNG supplies to Europe, which is reducing its

dependency on gas from Russia.

"I would make sure that you get it," Trump said, adding

that he is looking at speeding up permits for LNG projects even

after the U.S. became the world's top exporter of the

super-chilled form of natural gas in 2023 under his predecessor.

"I think the more that you do, the lower the price is

going to go, and what I'd like to see is rapid approvals," Trump

said.

The president on Monday

ordered

the U.S. Energy Department to resume considering

applications for LNG exports after the previous Biden

administration froze them. The department this week also

extended a comment period

on a study on the environmental and economic impacts of the

flourishing industry, indicating that approvals would not be

immediate.

Some U.S. manufacturing businesses that consume large

amounts of gas have opposed the rapid build-out of LNG, worried

that it could boost the price for consumers.

Trump also said the U.S. is going to build more power

plants amid growing electricity demand from artificial

intelligence. "I'm going to get them the approval under

emergency declaration

, I can get the approvals done myself without having to go

through years of waiting."

He also praised coal as a potential backup to power

generating facilities. Decades ago coal generated about 50% of

U.S. electricity, but it has since dropped to about 16% on

concerns about its carbon emissions, and competition from

natural gas and wind and solar.

"There are some companies in the U.S. that have coal

sitting right by the plant, so that if there's an emergency,

they can go to that short-term basis and use our very clean

coal," Trump said.

He also said the European Union treated the U.S. badly and

made it difficult to get products into Europe, "and yet they

expect to be selling and they do sell their products in the

United States".