Trump promised supporters his plan will lead to an unprecedented production of oil, coal, natural gas and energy from renewables, guaranteeing US energy independence.
But speaking at the annual Williston Basin Petroleum Conference in Bismarck, North Dakota, Trump also disturbingly vowed to opt out of the Paris climate agreement and stop all US payments to a United Nations earmarked to mitigate effects of climate change worldwide.
In the past the candidate has pointed to significant winter storms in the northeastern as "proof' the planet is actually cooling.
The irony is that the same day, American media outlets reported that one of Trump's companies cited climate change-related sea level rise and stronger storms in paperwork seeking permission to build a nearly two-mile-long stone wall to fortify the shoreline at one of his golf courses in Ireland.
He also promised to revive the US coal industry - big business in the state's he most needs to win to prevail in the general election in November -- and put coal miners "back to work."
On the renewable front, Trump has suggested he would support continuing subsidies for wind energy, although he has also sued to oppose offshore wind energy near his luxury resorts, including those in Scotland.
"I don't think they work without subsidy, which is a problem," Trump said.
He has also said he supports the corn-ethanol mandate in the US, which again is popular in states in the nation's middle west.
Conversely, Trump continues to lambast the Environmental Protection Agency, which he promises to "get rid of."
The EPA is the federal agency that has promulgated strict new rules for coal-fired power plants and other greenhouse gas emitting industries.
Seth Stein, a spokesman for the League of Conservation Voters, s=said in a statement that "severely cutting the EPA and recommending ending their ability to regulate harmful pollution" would essentially give polluters "a free pass."
"Trump's already poor judgment" Stein said, threatens "our economy and the health of our families, by eliminating clean air and water safeguards at the federal level."
Reportedly joining the chorus of Trump critics was the theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking, who told ITV's "Good Morning Britain" in a prerecorded interview that has yet to be broadcast that he has no explanation for Trump's electoral success in the US.
"He is a demagogue who seems to appeal to the lowest common denominator," Hawking is reported to have said.
