It’s no surprise that the American political climate and the commitment to reversing climate change are not always on the same page.
As the Biden Administration has implemented some of the most climate-friendly policies in United States history, plenty of concern exists about whether that momentum would continue if former President Trump and the Republicans gain control of Congress and the White House.
Even though Trump’s acceptance speech for the Republican nomination last week emphasized his plans for returning to more fossil fuel reliance, experts remain hopeful that enough momentum has built under Biden’s clean-energy policies to keep moving forward, albeit the progress would develop more slowly.
“Nobody believes that policy changes will destroy these industries,” Arvin Ganesan, chief executive of the start-up battery storage company Fourth Power, said at a Washington conference this month as reported by Politico’s E&E News. “But it’s just absolutely a fact that policy will determine how quickly these technologies get to market.”
A June report from Wood Mackenzie energy research said that U.S. clean energy investment could fall by half and affect net-zero and net-zero emission goals and potentially lead to irreversible weather changes.
The continuing U.S. policy changes depending on the administration do not help the climate change effort either.
“The wheels fall off,” when policies change regularly, one analyst told Politico.
How would a Trump Administration affect Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), the landmark clean energy policy? The IRA locked in tax credits for wind, solar and other clean energy projects for 10 years after it was passed in 2022.
Experts feel that the benefits of the projects already in motion – in both red and blue states – as well as bipartisan support for many of the projects – would likely mean the IRA would avoid being repealed under a new administration.
Dave Lubach is executive editor for the facility market.
