Energy and Our World

This article originally ran on Forbes.com on April 7, 2026. All rights reserved.

Daniel B. Markind is a Forbes.com energy column contributor. The views expressed in this article are not to be associated with the views of Flaster Greenberg PC.

On March 16, 2026, the Trump Administration issued a sixty-day waiver to application of the Merchant Marine Act of 1920 (46 U.S.C. §55012), better known as the “Jones Act”.  Initially passed in the years immediately following World War I, the Jones Act mandates that, absent a waiver, all cargo transported between U.S. ports be carried on vessels that are U.S.-built, U.S.-owned, and U.S.-crewed.

The 2026 waiver was granted to ease overall disruption in the availability of energy and other much needed commodities in the wake of the Iran war. The problem of uneven energy availability has been exacerbated in recent years by the actions of certain states, most notably New York, in preventing the build-out of oil and natural gas pipelines generally. 

As a result, the ability to transport fossil fuels from one location to another in the United States is presently limited, if not curtailed.  This problem has been rendered even more acute by the fact that, nationally, there is only one tanker ship operating in the U.S. today that would qualify for transporting fossil fuels under the Jones Act, without a waiver.

As a result, states like New York and the New England states have now placed themselves in a quandary of their own making.  They need energy but, having closed the door several years ago on allowing oil and natural gas pipelines to transport fossil fuels within their borders, they now have no realistic way to get it.  Their grandiose plans to obtain energy through renewable means either are not coming to fruition or are years behind schedule. Massachusetts, for example, faced massive energy price spikes even before the Iran war began.

Now, states like it and New York need energy quickly but their shortsighted refusals to allow the transportation of fossil fuels within their borders now leave them with very few workable options to get it.  Enter the Trump Administration.

While not unprecedented, Jones Act waivers have been rare, and have usually related to natural disasters like hurricanes, not man-made conditions that could have been prevented by states like New York and Massachusetts had they only acted with better acumen from the start. 

The current situation reflects the fact that, over time, the law has changed.  In 2011, the Obama Administration issued dozens of Jones Act waivers in connection with a sale from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.  Since then, the ability of Presidents to issue waivers has been narrowed. 

In 2024, the National Bureau of Economic Research determined that eliminating the Jones Act would have benefitted American consumers by $769 million per year. That raises the basic question: Should the Jones Act new be repealed?  Is it even still necessary to remain on the books?

During World War I, Congress gave the U.S. Shipping Board permission to issue “permits” to foreign vessels to engage in U.S. domestic trade. Once the war ended in 1918, Senator Wesley Jones of Washington State introduced Section 27 of the Merchant Marine Act, which was motivated by a need to rebuild a United States fleet that had been damaged during the war with Germany.  It was felt that, during times of national emergency, this requirement could guarantee the nation could rely on its own maritime resources.

Unfortunately, recent history has shown this not to be the case. With so much of trade globalized, many fewer ships are being built in the United States, and fewer still are American flagged.  In August 2025, President Trump announced the “Make American Shipbuilding Great Again” (MASGA) initiative. This included a partnership with South Korea, which is a major shipbuilder, and which would invest $150B specifically for shipbuilding, including fossil fuel tankers.

Among those would be tankers is the South Korean owned Hanwha Philly Shipyard in Philadelphia, which is targeted to complete 1- 1.5 vessels per year. Hanwha received its first tanker order in July 2025, constituting the first order in nearly 50 years. Deliveries are expected around 2028.

Thus, for at least the next few years, it can be anticipated that there will continue to be few, if any, U.S. flagged fossil fuel tankers that will qualify as usable without a waiver under the Jones Act. Given the uncertainty of the oil and gas market relating to the Iran War and other international events, generally, and given the anti-fossil fuel energy policies of some American states, it is likely that we will see more Jones Act waivers in the near future. Perhaps then it will be time to either repeal or amend the 1920 law, which a century later may have, finally, outlived its usefulness.