The US Senate today approved the CEO of the shale oil and gas company "Liberty Energy" Chris Wright as Secretary of Energy in the Donald Trump administration, Reuters reported, quoted by BTA.
59 senators voted for his candidacy, and 38 against.
Sixty-year-old Wright, who has headed the company "Liberty Energy" since 2011, said he would hand over its leadership if he was approved as minister. Ron Gusek, who has served as the company's president since 2016, has been appointed as his successor.
Wright heads a ministry with a budget of nearly 50 billion. dollars, about half of which goes to maintaining the US's vast nuclear arsenal, Reuters reported.
He wrote in a report for his former company last year that he believed human-caused climate change was a reality but the risks were "distant and unclear". Wright has also said that top-down climate change policies are doomed to fail.