Musk layoffs shredding US energy capability, say insiders

The layoffs are part of Trump ally Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) efforts to cut federal spending and, according to some, reflect policy priorities expressed in the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025. Media reports on how many federal workers have been affected range from 100,000-200,000 of the 3 million-strong workforce.

Between 800-1,300 personnel were let go at the Department of Commerce’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) last Friday, a move that could impact global weather and climate science.

NOAA’s meteorological and climate research underpins much of the globe’s earth science, and its National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), also known as NOAA-Fisheries, is a key reporting agency for permitting offshore energy, both fossil and renewables.

The layoffs follow up to 2,000 fired at the Department of the Interior, which includes the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) and the Bureau of Land Management, both key to approving onshore and offshore energy projects.

Several thousand were likewise let go at the Department of Energy (DoE), with scores of lawyers with expertise navigating federal environmental laws as well as those in R&D and grid development now scrambling for work in the private sector.

“Everything the federal government does it has to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and the National Historic Preservation Act and the other environmental laws, and that compliance was my role,” said a lawyer that was let go by DoE in February.

The firings of staff central to permitting of energy infrastructure "really shows how this administration's actions don't match their words," he said.

Most of the fired workers were in their probationary periods, usually from one to two or more rarely three years, and lacked the civil service protection enjoyed by longstanding staff.

Many were also experienced staff who were in their probationary periods because they had recently changed positions.

'Inefficient cost sink'

“Some of these employees would have been coming in at a lower grade level, which means you can pay them less than the people who will otherwise now be asked to do the same work,” she said, adding that permitting “often is a question of capacity. It’s just a person-heavy exercise.”

“Mass firings is not going to help get infrastructure of any kind built faster,” she said.

Klein was a political appointee who stepped down when the new administration took office. BOEM is currently headed by perennial stand-in Walter Cruikshank, who was also acting director for the entirety of Trump's first term.

Many of the federal workers laid off were in DoE’s Grid Deployment Office which has provided billions of dollars in loans to bolster and expand US transmission capacity.

Doug Burgum, Trump’s Interior secretary, and Chris Wright, the head of DoE, both told the Senate that expanding the nation’s grid is central to maintaining American dominance in power-hungry artificial intelligence (AI).

'Transmission should be nonpartisan'

“If we don't have our mission solutions ready as a nation, you can build all the generation you want, but if you can't get the power to where it needs to go, then you're out of luck,” she added.

“Bipartisan has become a dirty word,” she said.

Fired workers described fear among federal workers as Musk's DoGE team geared up its firings, with rumours that staff were being let go due to performance issues, rather than political expediency.

Being let go for poor performance could impact their ability to gain unemployment benefits and future job opportunities.

Unions representing federal employees have begun to file lawsuits against the mass layoffs but have struggled in federal court, according to affected workers.