The Republican Party platform on climate change is “drill, baby, drill.”

It’s as simple as that. There is no mention — no recognition — of climate in the document.

Republicans, of course, have many differences with Democrats on energy policy and the GOP platform calls for ending “market-distorting restrictions on oil, natural gas and coal.” The goal is to lower energy prices and make the U.S. “energy dominant.”

The Inflation Reduction Act signed into law by President Joe Biden in August 2022 includes billions of dollars in tax credits to promote “green” industries and its full impact won’t be felt for years.

In the meantime, the profits of the top five publicly traded oil companies — BP, Shell, Exxon, Chevron, and TotalEnergies — amounted to $410 billion during the first three years of the Biden administration, a 100% increase over the first three years of Donald Trump’s presidency, according to data compiled by Reuters.

Go figure. One explanation is that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine helped push oil and gas prices higher. The global recovery following the COVID-19 pandemic also pushed up demand.

It hasn’t gotten much attention, but U.S. oil production has hit record highs under the Biden administration and the U.S. also produces more natural gas than ever.

That’s not saying it would remain that way under another Democratic term. Oil and gas industry officials have reason to fear that Democratic policies will lessen their standing in the years ahead. The Democrats’ stated goal is an economy that’s less dependent on fossil fuels.

Republicans, if we’re to take them at their word, will have none it. Because, what’s the point if there is no recognition of the negative impact of fossil fuels?

As for Democrats, their push for alternative energy is real, but so is their reliance on a healthy oil and gas industry to keep the economy on course. Biden, in his State of the Union address, never mentioned that American energy production has reached historic highs. A published draft of the 2024 Democratic platform promises to scale up solar, wind, and geothermal projects made possible by the Inflation Reduction Act and invest in clean energy research and development.

But the document appears to play two sides on oil and gas. It claims Democrats have “lowered prices at the pump for American families” through “record energy production of clean energy, oil, and gas.” At the same time, it calls for the elimination of “tens of billions of dollars in unfair oil and gas subsidies.”

In making his case for “drill, baby, drill,” Trump has repeatedly cited imaginary statistics about the extent to which sea levels are expected to rise. At a June 28 rally in Virginia, for instance, he claimed, “… the ocean will rise — maybe, it may go down, also — but it may rise one eighth of an inch in the next 497 years, they say. One eighth.”

Actually, NASA reports that sea level rise is now more than an eighth of an inch annually — and it is accelerating. According to the World Economic Forum, by 2100 up to 410 million people could be at risk from coastal flooding as sea levels rise even higher.

Trump, in speeches and interviews, likes to joke that sea level rise means more “beachfront property.” This past spring, in a private meeting with oil executives, he reportedly offered to remove environmental restraints in exchange for $1 billion in campaign funding.

Meanwhile, the Heritage Foundation’s 2025 Presidential Transition Project calls for a repeal of the Inflation Reduction Act and proposes elimination of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, calling it “one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry.”

Trump has denied any association with Project 2025, preferring instead to reference “our very well received Republican platform.”