You can only make money if you produce value. If you stop producing value because your old industries decline/collapse and you miss out on new industries, your wealth will trend towards that of a third world country.
Let's say an agent needs to do 10 brain surgeries on a human to remove a tumor and a human doctor can do it in a single surgery.
I would prefer the human.
"steps" are important to optimize if they have negative externalities.
(Based on AI research) fossile fuel production takes a few years to recoup investment. Only refineries seem quite long term (15-20 years). I'm sure the companies have projections about future demand to decide which projects are worth pursuing. If they miscalculate, the oil companies loose money (oh no! /s).
Anyway, you won't loose money on this.
There is of course also an argument about national security, not being at the whim of some Iranian dictator. So some form of government investment would be justified, but not necessary IMO.
Voters in the US have the ability to actually change the course of their country.
Voters can say they want Obama or Trump in charge and the government has to obey that choice.
In Europe you only have the same parties/"uniparty" in power all the time. Many people never had a representative they voted for.
I understand the nuance about the US voting system. But when I look at the outcomes, the US seems way more democratic than Europe.
Re gas demand:
Renewables are cheaper than fossile fuels. They will obviously win out in a free market. No subsidies needed.
Building out fossile fuel production shifts oil revenue from various dictatorships around the world to the US in this case. That's a good thing. I wish we in Europe produced more gas ourselves instead of being highly dependent on other countries.
This does not mean higher gas demand, which is what matters for CO2 reduction.
They only had to comply with EU laws when they were already a big player in China. EU manufacturers need their new vehicles to be compliant on day one. That is, if they want to launch in the EU market first. Audi recently launched a China-only car (AUDI E5 Sportback).