Will Trump's 100th Day Be Greeted With a Shutdown?

appears we may be heading for yet another one. Laura Littvin covers the issues for us. She is the Bloomberg News congressional reporter. Laura, thank you so much for joining us. I want to just start with a better understanding of what exactly the deadline is that we're coming up against that could result in a government shutdown. Uh the deadline is we believe it's two a m. Saturday. And UH at this point, both sides are getting dug in. We

had both repellic. What is the deadline is it? Is it that the sort of funding is up, but they have to extend it a certain amount. I mean, what is the accepted corect if the government? Uh, the agencies, almost all of them have not been funded to the

remainder of the fiscal year. And if the deadline has reached and they don't have a continuation of funding a short term stop gap for something, if they want to continue their talks and aren't done with a full bill, then we had to see another shutdown, just like the Steen that was, of course a very extended sixteen day one. Uh. You know, it seems more likely than not that we would have some kind of a temporary extension. That's what

both sides are saying. Laura, Laura, could you just put this in a political context, because boy, this is you know what they say, deja vu all over again. I mean, after a while the public gets tired of hearing about this. You're bringing out Yogi Bear for this. I like it. Maybe he could, maybe he could fix what's going on in the government. Well, there's um a lessons interest in shutting the government down amongst some of the conservative Republicans

who drove the last one. But there and there's also there's what's going on right now is a bit of a disconnect between the White House and Republicans in the Capital. Republicans, the leaders in both chambers are really trying have been working in recent weeks overseeing some talk that has just been between both parties on the Hill and it's not

really involved the White House that much. And then the White House last Thursday started stepping in omb Director Mulvaney demanding funding for the border ball, which President Trump has requested as part of a supplemental budget request. On the Hill, they would rather take those and other tough issues like planned parenthood funding and other things and not deal with

those right now, just have a straight funding bill. Laura, I'm glad you mentioned the law because over the weekend I was reading a variety of articles in which they kind of described how there are neither Republican nor Democrat leaders in any of the border states that would actually have the wall. None of them wanted. That's a real

issue here this week. That's really kind of the backdrop, I think, is that you have a president who promised during the campaign that he would build a border wall, and you have Republicans in the capital all along have

been poor an approach. That's their long standing position, which is they want to see more money for border security, that they want something that's more flexible that might involve sensing drone, more border patrol agents, things like that, and maybe some concrete reinforced areas, but not that's not really

their primary goal here. And so there's that, and then there's also the question of whether people feel it should be about immediate and you see members of the Freedom Caucus, members from Texas who don't seem to be showing very much of an appetite to address any of this at this time when they are going to be turning around and talking about next physical year or sudget almost immediately, and what will drest it done? Well? But Laura, I mean, isn't this just always an exercise in kicking the can

down the road? I mean, are we really expecting something comprehensive? Why can't they just sort of renew things as they are before, you know, proposing something more comprehensive and getting it through. I mean, why isn't that not just sort of the obvious go to thing. Well, I think what happens sometimes is that you can see where it's probably going to go, and then it takes them a bit

of wrestling to get there. And I think we're maybe one or two away from doing something just like what you describe which is something fairly close to current levels of something it's short from extension, followed by something that will have some re juggled priorities that nothing particularly drastic,

because it has to be by part of them. You not only need eight votes in the Senate to get sixty votes to overcome a filibuster, because Republicans have just fifty two votes, but then the House you can almost bank on the Conservative Freedom Caucus Republicans not wanting to vote for any bill like this, regardless of border funding and the event. So you need some democratic support and

that's what they're rustling, is right. And you also you need something to keep the markets awake because people can now start worrying about a government shutdown. Can you just put into perspective what a government shutdown actually would look like and what the potential consequences would be on a broader scale, Well, you would have UM, almost all of the agencies have not had their funding approved, so you have everything shut down, from you know, the National Park

Service to UM, you know, various agency work. UM. You know, it's meaning that nobody would go to work and no one would get paid. There's some provisions for dealing with people who have really important emergency related type jobs that do work, and they in the last time that's happened, I remember them doing some like back pay for people and working out some things. But if you remember it was, you know, things are pretty much shut down. Do uh

do members of Congress and their staffs? Do they continue to get paid? Um? But I've got to remember from the last one, I do remember that some of them were even shutting down. Uh, a lot of their staffers were. I think they weren't because at least their staffers weren't, because some people there were a lot of complaints from constituents that people weren't even answering the phones when they

were calling their congressmen to complain about it. Yeah, you know, it's it's striking to me that the deadline is coming up is going to also coincide with President Trump's one hundredth day in office, and the symbolism of that cannot have evaded him. How invested is he in making sure that we do not get the worst case outcome in this case? That's the that's a million dollar question right now, and no one can tell just how willing he is going to be to push this all the way over

the brink. On the one hand, if if they forestalled or shutdown and do it, even if it's just doing a stop gaps something pushing this off for a week, he can say he did something that Presidental Lindennis, you know President Obama had a shut down. He can say I was able to keep the government going. But at the same time, his supporters feel very strongly. The people who voted for President from feel so strongly about a border wall, horror wall. Immigration issues are one of their

cop issues. And he's already planned a rally in Pennsylvania just coming Saturday night, said going to the White House Correspondent Association, He's taking off and going a dinner. He's going to Pennsylvania's He's holding a rally. And it has a lot of people wondering is he planning on pulling out all the stops on the wall and then holding a rally. No one, No one knows, And so that's the big wild card in all of those. Well, we'll

have to wait and see what happens. And I know you're going to keep us up to date on it. I didn't know maybe Pennsylvania. I don't think they get in the wall though, But that's okay. I don't know. Maybe Pennsylvania and New York said, I don't know. Anyway, I want to appreciate it. Thanks very much. Laura Littvin is our Bloomberg News congressional reporter joining us from I believe she's in the Senate Press Gallery today, So thanks very much for being with us. We're broadcasting from the

the Future of Energy Summit. It's all powered by Bloomberg New Energy Finance. We are here broadcasting live from the two seventeen New York Future of Energy Summit, which is powered by Bloomberg New Energy Finance. And I'm honored to bring in Carl Pope. He's principal advisor for Inside Straight Strategies.

He also is the former head of the Sierra Club, and he's out with a new book which is called Climate of Hope, How Cities, Businesses and Citizens Can Save the Planet, which is co authored by Michael Bloomberg, former Mayor of New York City and the founder of Bloomberg LP. Carl, We're so happy to have you join us today. I wanted just to start before we get into what we can be doing to mitigate uh man made climate change.

Has your hope's proceeded since the latest US election, and given some of the rhetoric that has come out of the current presidential administration, well, I think we obviously have a new barrier to overcome in the attitude of the new administration in Washington. On the other hand, if I look at what's been happening in the rest of the world, my hope is greater than it was before election day.

The fact is, we have a very very powerful tail wind pushing us towards climate solutions in the form of city leadership, in the form of technological innovation, in the form of having a company as mainstream is Budweiser Beer decide that they really need to go one dent clean energy. That's not the kind of announcement I would have expect it even a year ago. So I'm actually more hopeful, although I'm really not too hopeful when to go to Washington, d C. So I tried to avoid it. Well Mr Mr, Okay,

we won't make you go there. But you know, obviously, the one of the themes in your book has to do with cities. So I'm wondering what should cities and municipalities be doing, not only in terms of let's say the clean energy agenda. But there's all the revenue that currently flows from the energy generation business, maybe call it a legacy business. All that revenue still flows to the municipalities.

What happens if that revenue starts to dry up because people put solar panels on their roof or they are no longer going to be driving as much, So that means that the taxes paid for improving highways decreases. What what are some of the challenges. Well, one of the things that is actually happening is that more and more American cities are moving from legacy fossil fuels to innovative wind and solar. The reason they're moving, for the most part, frankly,

is not the climate. The reason they're moving is it saves their customers money. And if a city can give its businesses and it's red and it's cheaper electricity, that is very good for economic development. Let me tell you, mayors love that. Similarly, we just saw an announcement by twenty cities that they are putting out a joint tender, a bid trying to buy a hundred thousand electric vehicles because they understand if they buy their electric vehicles together,

they'll be able to get a better price. Volume drives down cost. And second, when they go electric, all of a sudden, they don't need to spend as much money buying diesel or gasoline, and diesel and gasoline do not come from inside cities those that's money that has to be sent somewhere else. So cities are realizing that a clean energy future is an energy future in which more of the dollars that are generated in that city stay to the benefit of that city. That's one of the

major things driving mayors forward. Just to follow up there having to do with cities, do you believe that things like congestion charges and offering free parking for all electric vehicle is something that all cities should embrace, Well, all cities shouldn't embrace probably any one solution because every city is different. My partnership with Mike Bloomberg actually began as an effort to implement congestion pricing is a way of financing mass transit and Lower Manhattan. We didn't get there.

So there is resistance to ideas like congestion pricing, even in a city is sophisticated as New York, although really the problem was in New York. The problem with state government in Albany that wouldn't give Mayor Bloomberg permission to do that. And even today New York's transit system still needs the money that would have been raised by congestion pricing.

I think the key thing to understand, though, is every city has its own unique set of problems and its own unique set of opportunities, and you need to look at the problems, look at the opportunities, pair them up, and move forward. One of the things that's frankly depressing about Washington is Washington is looking to the rear view mirror. Washington is trying to make a mayor America great by

holding onto yesterday's technologies. Cities don't have that. Luxury cities are not competing to be the home of the next bug equipped manufacturer. Cities are competing to be the home of the next electric car dealership. Right Well, Carl, is there anything that's currently going on in any particular city that you can point to as something that is an

optimistic development that you think should serve as a model. Sure, I'm gonna point to Salt Lake City, and I'm gonna point to Salt Lake City because it is after all, the largest city in the most republican state in the nation, so you can't say it's Berkeley or even New York City. Salt Lake City has announced that it is going to source one hundred percent of its electricity from renewables, and Salt Lake City has the fastest growing mass transit capacity

of any large city in North America. And Salt Lake City is doing that because the people, the residents care about the quality of their life. They want to have a dynamic economy. Used to be dependent on mining and extraction industries. Now they're dependent on knowledge and invention industries. That's the way to the future. And it's not just

Salt Lake City. The first the first city in the United States to go on renewable was Georgetown, Texas, and the mayor of Georgetown had to explain, folks, I'm not doing this because I'm green. I mean, Al Gore didn't come and take over our city. I'm doing this because it saves money, cleaner, cheaper, and what's not the like? All right, thanks very much. Carl Pope as a principal

advisor inside a Straight Strategies. He is also the former executive director and chairman of the Sierra Club, and he is the co author of a new book entitled Climate of Hope, How Cities, businesses, and citizens Can Save the Planet that is co authored also by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Michael Bloomberg is the founder and majority owner of Bloomberg Peak. We want to take a moment to let you know about something new from Bloomberg.

Starting right now, you can use our i O s app or our new Google Chrome extension to scan any news story on any website, instantly revealing relevant news and market data from Bloomberg and other sources related to the companies and people you're reading about. So no matter where you're reading the news, you can bring the power of Bloomberg's news and data with you. It's pretty amazing. Download our io s app or search for the Bloomberg extension on the Chrome Store to try it out. Learn more

at Bloomberg dot com slash lens. We are broadcasting from the future of energy some but it's all powered by Bloomberg and New Energy Finance. And here to tell us more about energy is Alka Lunt, the President and the chief executive of Statenet, and he joins us here at the conference rate to have you with us. Thanks for

coming in. Um. You know, I wonder if you could just give people a little bit of your background because they may not know about stating net and Norwegian Company and the role that it plays not just in Norway but throughout the world when it comes to energy generator transmission. Thank you very much. Stopping that is the National Grid Company of Norway. We are basically running the central ridd for the hold of the country. We have only renewable

production in Norway, so we were very happy to do that. Uh. And that hydro power which we have enables us to move both production from one time to the other and do that by interconnecting our system to our neighboring countries. So you know, one thing that people talk about with renewables, one big problem is you can't really store it the same way you can take oil and put it on a tanker and float it out in the Mediterranean. Uh.

How have you solved this problem? Because you're you're sort of touching on it but being explicitly please about how exactly this sort of connect Those ideas are the idea of storing renewables versus transmitting them. So hydro is a is a great source. You can open the valve if you want it and you need it, and you can stop it if you don't need it. So we through hydro reservoirs we can collect water during rainy periods and

let the water run during dry periods. So that's basically a way of storying, and that's how we solve our own demand because sometimes it doesn't rain also in Norway, so we need that for our own system. But we also have interconnected our grid to the Danish, the Dutch and the German and going to do it to the German and the UK grid. Through those interconnections you can move this storage capacity we have also down to those countries.

If you look at Denmark, they've been able to install a huge amount of wind power and are running from time to time like sixty or seven of their demand is covered by wind and the remaining parts would then actually come through the interconnectors from Norway. Just to be very clear about what this is, it sort of flips the idea of storage on its head. It's not that you're actually storing, and it's at the electrical current is going somewhere at all times, but it's going to where

it need. It's needed exactly, and so it's not necessarily storing in a way that a lot of people think of storage, which is you put it in a box and you hold it till later. Well, yes or no. You can imagine that the through these interconnectors in Denmark, sometimes the wind is so strong that they produce more wind than they need and then they basically send that

power to Norway. And what we do is that we then stop our turbines to produce, and it means we store the water in our reservoirs and leave it for the next day. And even in sometimes if prices are really low because of the oversupply wind, we would read pump. We would pump water from a lower level to a higher level and could then the day after reverse it and thereby get electricity back. So basically you do actually

store in reservoirs. But a very important part here is that you have a market which really works, because the market gives you the signal when should I keep the water in the reservoir, when should they let it go? When it is electricity from wind very cheap, and I could get that in my system and and store it for the next day, I wonder if you could just speak to the issue of being a state owned company, because obviously utilities are owned in many different forms all

over the world. How does being state owned help you? I think it's almost in the country like you actually should say that, but it's almost a predicacit preg with it for our the way we have functioned or or created our markets. We have installed a completely independent system up Rador owning the transmission system which is start meet

and it is stayed downed. So we have a very strong mandate to take care of security supply in Norway at any point in time and run the system at what they call the socio economic within socio economic view on how we do things. And that distinguishes a little bit from the other companies who could have specific maybe have shareholders exactly, so we we have, I would argue, a much broader view than the individual companies which produce

and and and connect. So do you think that the model that you're talking about the markets that you follow could be replicated in a uh non state owned company or do you think that it's very specific to the model that you currently have in Norway. No, I think you can do it. Of course, it's not the only way to organize the market. We have also one of our Navory countries. We have a similar company like Startnet, which partly owned by pension funds, and its functions although

a bit different than we do. I just want to catch your talks on something that you own. I think about a third of nord Pool, right, nord Pool. Just to give you a thirty second what is nordpol. Explain to people how that's interesting. Well, as I mentioned just a minute ago, that the markets are extremely important in this type of system, you need the right pricing signals. North Pole is the power exchange where all producers have to nominate what they're going to deliver and the market

will tell what they want to ask in. The market will clear and give prices, and those prices give the right signals whether we should store water or we should we should leave the water down. Thank you so much for joining us. Truly fascinating discussion. Okay Launde is president and chief executive as stat Net, which is Norway's power and electric grid. Thanks for listening to the Bloomberg P and L podcast. You can subscribe and listen to interviews

at Apple pod Casts, SoundCloud or whatever podcast platform. You prefer. I'm pim Fox. I'm on Twitter at pim Fox. I'm on Twitter at Lisa Abramo wits one Before the podcast, you can always catch us worldwide on Bloomberg Radio