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Lowering energy bills for low-income households will be more difficult with EPA cut, groups say

time2 days ago

  • Politics

Lowering energy bills for low-income households will be more difficult with EPA cut, groups say

The Environmental Protection Agency's decision to cancel a Biden-era solar grant program will hinder efforts to lower energy bills for middle to low-income households, according to several environmental groups. On Thursday, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin announced that the agency was terminating Solar for All, a $7 billion grant program intended to help pay for resident solar projects. Zeldin wrote on social media that the "EPA no longer has the statutory authority to administer the program or the appropriated funds "to keep the program alive." "Today, the Trump EPA is announcing that we are ending Solar for All for good, saving US taxpayers ANOTHER $7 BILLION!" Zeldin wrote. ' Households will lose the ability to save hundreds of dollars annually by implementing energy-reducing measures provided by the program, Zealan Hoover, a former EPA senior advisor who was involved in the inception of the program, told ABC News. "It would have significantly addressed the pain that so many families are facing with rapidly rising electricity prices," Hoover said. The goal of Solar for All was to reduce electricity costs for low and middle-income households by distributing federal funds to states and other partners who made it easier for 900,000 households to take advantage of solar power and battery storage. Part of the Inflation Reduction Act, one of former President Joe Biden's signature programs, the initiative estimated that it would save low-income households up to $400 a year on energy bills, create more than 200,000 jobs and cut toxic pollution by more than 30 million metric tons. Funding for investments such as rooftop solar and community solar gardens was awarded to 60 recipients, including states, tribes, nonprofits and local governments. "The Trump administration is once again gutting critical funding for community solar and harming communities for its false 'energy emergency,'" said Corey Solow, legislative director for climate and energy at Earthjustice, the nation's largest public interest environmental law firm, in a statement. "Solar for All projects were spurring positive, on-the-ground change in communities – early investments will provide reliable energy and lower costs for communities that stand to benefit the most from the clean energy transition." The move is "yet another blow" to working families, Climate Power, a communications organization focused on climate action, said in a statement. "Instead of cutting energy costs in half, like he promised, Donald Trump has taken an ax to popular bipartisan programs that help working families lower their energy costs," said Alex Glass, Climate Power communications director. In 2024, domestic solar energy production hit a record-breaking 50 gigawatts of capacity, and the solar energy sector provided more than 263,000 American jobs, according to the Sierra Club. The Trump administration's decision is "denying our most vulnerable communities a resource that would have helped alleviate their financial burdens and improved their quality of life," Sierra Club Climate Policy Director Patrick Drupp said in a statement. EPA authority over the Solar for All program was eliminated under the tax and spending bill signed by President Donald Trump last month, Zeldin said. The new tax law eliminated the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, approved under the Inflation Reduction Act, which set aside $20 billion for community projects for renewable energy, which the Solar for All program fell under. The EPA's move to terminate the Solar for All program will likely be challenged in court, Hoover said. "Terminating these grants midstream is not just reckless; it's legally and procedurally indefensible," said Jim Drummond, former lead grants attorney in EPA's Office of General Counsel said in a statement. "The grants were awarded in accordance with established federal grant regulations and EPA's strong competition policies. To break these commitments retroactively not only undermines the rule of law, it also potentially exposes the federal government to liability and erodes trust in public institutions. In my opinion, this is a violation of basic administrative accountability." According to the International Energy Agency, solar power is now the least expensive option for new electricity generation.

EPA eliminates $7 billion rooftop solar grant program
EPA eliminates $7 billion rooftop solar grant program

Los Angeles Times

time3 days ago

  • Politics
  • Los Angeles Times

EPA eliminates $7 billion rooftop solar grant program

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday announced that it will eliminate a $7 billion grant program designed to help low-income households install solar panels on their homes. The so-called 'Solar for All' program was awarded to 60 recipients including states, tribal groups, regions and nonprofits under the Biden administration's Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, a $27 billion program geared toward addressing climate change. The Solar for All funds would have delivered residential solar projects to more than 900,000 households nationwide. In a post on X, EPA administrator Lee Zeldin described the program as a boondoggle in which not enough was actually going for solar. 'One of the more shocking features of Solar For All was with regards to the massive dilution of the money, as many grants go through pass-through after pass-through after pass-through after pass-through with all of the middlemen taking their own cut — at least 15% by conservative estimates,' Zeldin said. 'What a grift.' 'With clear language and intent from Congress in the One Big Beautiful Bill, EPA is taking action to end this program for good,' Zeldin added, referring to President Trump's budget reconciliation bill. Solar energy is widely considered one of the best ways to address climate change, by eliminating emissions that come from burning coal or natural gas to make electricity. Earlier this week, Los Angeles celebrated the opening of one of the nation's largest solar and battery power plants, the Eland facility in Kern County, which is now supplying 7% of the city's power. California is home to multiple projects that received funding from the Solar for All program, according to the federal project database. They include a $250 million award for California's Solar for All Program, intended to fund solar initiatives statewide. The California Public Utilities Commission, the California Energy Commission and the California Labor and Workforce Development Agency were going to oversee and distribute the grant funds, which were particularly focused on low-income and disadvantaged communities and California tribes. Two nonprofits — the Community Power Coalition and GRID Alternatives — each had $250 million awards for separate efforts to develop community solar and multifamily solar projects across several states, including in California. Environmental groups were outraged by the announcement. Estimates were that the program would have saved low-income households $400 a year on electricity bills, created more than 200,000 jobs and eliminated more than 30 million metric tons of air pollution, according to the nonprofit Climate Power. 'This is a deliberate choice to make life harder for working Americans,' said Alex Glass, Climate Power's communications director, in a statement. 'The Trump Administration isn't just walking away from climate solutions — they're ripping affordable energy away from the families who need it most.' Trump — who received record donations from fossil fuel companies during his 2024 presidential campaign — is making a number of efforts to slow the transition to clean energy while encouraging the use of fossil fuels, including canceling credits for solar and wind projects by the end of 2027. The president has said these efforts will help save taxpayers money and strengthen American energy independence. Senator Edward Markey (D-Massachusetts), a member of the Environment and Public Works committee, denounced the EPA's decision to cancel the program as illegal. The funding for the program had already been fully obligated and contracts for all recipients were signed, he said. 'This latest heist from the Trump administration will cause energy costs to rise, keep Americans beholden to monopolistic electric utilities, and make our grid overburdened and less reliable,' Markey said in a statement. 'Trump and Zeldin's attacks on the Solar for All program and their attempts to cancel legally-binding contracts will mean energy bills are going to continue to spike nationwide.' The program would have created more than $8 billion in overall savings across all fifty states, Markey said. The Environmental Protection Network, composed of more than 600 former EPA employees, described the decision as an 'abrupt and arbitrary' betrayal of public health, environmental justice and economic opportunity. 'Communities promised relief from punishing energy costs are now left in the dark,' said former EPA senior adviser Zealan Hoover, in a statement. 'Nearly a million families will pay hundreds of dollars more each year for their electricity bill because the Trump administration killed a program that would have more than paid for itself.'

Fossil Fuel Companies' Profitable Bet on Trump
Fossil Fuel Companies' Profitable Bet on Trump

New York Times

time31-07-2025

  • Business
  • New York Times

Fossil Fuel Companies' Profitable Bet on Trump

Last year, when Donald Trump was running for president, he made a bold pitch to oil executives and lobbyists at a chopped-steak dinner at Mar-a-Lago: Donate $1 billion to his campaign, and they'd save more than that in taxes and legal expenses if he took the White House. Fossil fuel interests ponied up less than half that much in donations, lobbying and advertising during the election, according to an analysis by the environmental group Climate Power. Yet, Trump has already more than delivered for the oil and gas industry, according to new reporting by Lisa Friedman. For the fossil fuel donors who bought into Trump's promise, the first six months of his second term have delivered a remarkable return on investment. Here are some of the numbers from Lisa's article. All told, provisions in Trump's domestic policy bill passed this month will save the oil and gas industry roughly $18 billion in new and expanded tax benefits, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation, which analyzes tax policies for Congress. One surprising measure offered tax breaks worth an estimated $1.48 billion for metallurgical coal, a type of coal used to make steel that is typically exported. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.

US senator warns of fossil fuel coup, economic reckoning
US senator warns of fossil fuel coup, economic reckoning

News.com.au

time09-07-2025

  • Politics
  • News.com.au

US senator warns of fossil fuel coup, economic reckoning

One of the US Senate's leading climate advocates says President Donald Trump's administration no longer governs -- it "occupies" the nation on behalf of Big Oil. In an interview, Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island blamed the sweeping rollback of environmental protections on a flood of unlimited, anonymous corporate political spending, and said exposing the scale of this "fraud" is key to breaking its grip. His remarks came as the death toll from catastrophic flooding in Texas linked by scientists to climate change threatened to surge further. "This isn't even government any longer," the 69-year-old told a small group of reporters ahead of an address to Congress Wednesday -- his 300th so-called "Time to Wake Up" speech, delivered as activists reel from Trump's actions. "This is an occupying force from the fossil fuel industry that has injected itself into the key positions of responsibility," said the lawmaker. "It has the appearance of being government -- they ride around in the black cars... they have the offices, they have the titles," he said. But in reality, "they're fossil fuel flunkies... and they care not a whit for public opinion or public safety." Big Oil spent at least $445 million to help elect Trump, according to a recent analysis by Climate Power, which said its figure was likely a vast underestimate because of undisclosed donations. - Dark money takeover - In his second term, Republican Trump has pulled the United States out of the Paris climate accord, gutted science agencies, fired researchers and forecasters, scrapped his predecessor Joe Biden's clean energy tax cuts and rolled back powerplant and vehicle efficiency standards. Whitehouse calls it the oil, coal and gas industry's "most sordid dreams come true" and says the stage was set by the 2010 Supreme Court "Citizens United" ruling, which unleashed an era of unchecked corporate political spending. A former state attorney general who battled corporate polluters, he recalled that when he first joined the Senate, climate bipartisanship flourished: John McCain, the GOP's 2008 presidential nominee, had "a perfectly respectable climate platform," while Republican senators proposed bills. "These weren't little tiddlywinks, nibble-at-the-edges bills," he recalled, but would have genuinely changed the trajectory of climate emissions. Citizens United reversed century-old campaign finance restrictions and opened the floodgates to dark money. "They were able to come into the Republican Party and say, 'We will give you unlimited amounts of money. You will have more money in your elections than you've ever seen before.'" - The way forward - Despite the bleak landscape, Whitehouse still sees a narrow path to climate safety — and points to several potential game changers. First, he cites the possible emergence of a global carbon pricing effort, spearheaded by the European Union's Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, which taxes importers based on their climate footprint. Countries like the UK, Canada, Mexico and Australia could join this movement, creating a de facto global price on carbon, enforced through trade -- without US legislation. Second, he says, Democrats can and must expose fossil fuel's stranglehold on the Republican party, a phenomenon he calls one of the "most grave incidents of political corruption and fraud that the country has ever seen," and pass a bill forcing donor transparency. Third, what was once framed as a crisis for polar bears -- and later as an opportunity for green jobs -- is today directly hitting Americans where it hurts most: their wallets. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell has warned that climate change will shrink mortgage availability across swaths of the United States in the coming years as banks and insurers retreat from fire- and flood-prone regions. Risks could cascade from an insurance crunch into a broader mortgage collapse -- potentially triggering a 2008-style crash. Whitehouse predicts the fossil fuel industry's hold on Republicans won't last forever. "When it becomes clear what has been done here, then there's going to be a dramatic reset," he said. "A reckoning will come for this. There's no doubt about it -- it's just the nature of human affairs." Trump himself, he added, was merely swept along by the dominant current of the post-2010 Republican Party, with no ideological stake in the issue. As recently as 2009, he co-signed a full-page advertisement in the New York Times demanding stronger climate action from then president Barack Obama.

Report says more than 25K Michigan jobs threatened if IRA tax credits are canceled
Report says more than 25K Michigan jobs threatened if IRA tax credits are canceled

Yahoo

time02-05-2025

  • Business
  • Yahoo

Report says more than 25K Michigan jobs threatened if IRA tax credits are canceled

Getty Images Since former President Joe Biden launched billions in grants, loans, tax breaks and other efforts incentivizing clean energy development through the Inflation Reduction Act, or IRA, Michigan has proven itself as a leader in the sector. However, a recent report warns that President Donald Trump's efforts to eliminate those policies are already cutting into the state's clean energy gains. Climate Power, a strategic communications firm centered on climate progress, has issued several reports tracking the impacts of Biden's climate policies across the U.S., repeatedly pointing to Michigan as the state attracting the largest share of clean energy projects, in addition to drawing significant investments and creating thousands of jobs. However, in the months since Trump has taken office, the president's attacks on clean energy policy alongside the impact of his tariff policies have threatened, delayed or outright canceled $14.2 billion in investments alongside 2,667 jobs, the firm's latest report said. If congressional Republicans repeal the IRA's tax credits for clean energy manufacturing, Climate Power warns that $39.85 billion in investments and 25,357 jobs could be lost. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX The report also emphasizes that these cuts would harm low-income communities, where companies have announced $13.3 billion in investments, creating 17,245 clean energy jobs. Additionally projects announced in rural communities which are expected to bring $5.8 billion in investment and 2,886 jobs could also be placed at risk. While Climate Power has projected that the state will bring in 167,000 new jobs over the next ten years, the loss of federal support and impacts of Trump's trade war would similarly jeopardize these gains. 'Trump's war on clean energy and his chaotic policies have already caused a hemorrhaging of manufacturing jobs in sectors that had been booming for two years,' Lori Lodes, Climate Power's executive director said in a statement. 'Repealing clean energy investments would jeopardize hundreds of thousands of good-paying jobs on its own. On top of this crisis of uncertainty, repeal would devastate American manufacturing — halting construction, sending jobs overseas, hiking energy costs, and forfeiting the future to China and our other competitors.' Of the 74 clean energy projects committed to investing in Michigan, the majority are centered in electric vehicles and batteries, with 35 projects centered on EV manufacturing and 19 on batteries. These sectors were also the largest for jobs, with the battery industry accounting for 46.9% of incoming jobs, while the electric vehicles sector accounts for 32.6%. However, the clean technology sector has drawn the greatest amount of investments, bringing $13.2 billion into the state. The report also points to several projects in these sectors, including a $1.6 billion battery cell plant in Van Buren Township from Michigan-based Our Next Energy, and General Motors' plan to retool its Lansing Grand River Plant for electric vehicle production using a $500 million clean energy grant. Climate power also noted that more than a third of the clean energy projects coming into Michigan would be housed in districts represented by Republicans in Congress, for a total of $12.5 billion in investments. As Republicans work to cut spendings in order to extend Trump's 2017 tax policy, some House Republicans have spoken out against eliminating the clean energy tax credit, including Rep. John James (R-Shelby Twp.) whose district expects to see 275 new jobs and over $16 million in investments. According to a report from Politico, Rep. Bill Huizenga (R-Zeeland) signed onto a letter Thursday calling for House Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith (R-Mo.) to maintain incentives for nuclear energy. Huizenga's district houses the Palisades Nuclear Plant in Covert, which has approval for a $1.52 billion loan from the federal government to restart the plant.

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