Latest news with #SustainabilityLeaders2025
Forbes
02-06-2025
- Business
- Forbes
Climate: U.S. Clean Energy Investment Boom Is Winding Down
Current Climate brings you the latest news about the business of sustainability every Monday. Sign up to get it in your inbox. getty The Biden years saw the sharpest increase in U.S. investment in clean energy and clean transportation in the country's history, creating the potential for sizable future progress toward reducing climate-warming emissions and creating tens of thousands of new jobs in the process. The good news is that 2025's first quarter saw solid growth in that space, up 6.9% from a year ago to $67.3 billion, according to data compiled by the Rhodium Group and MIT's Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research. The bad news is it's probably the year's high-water mark. That's because the budget bill making its way through Congress, if passed in its current form, eviscerates federal support for renewable energy, electric vehicle tax credits and EV charging infrastructure–and all the jobs they've created. Though the quarterly figure rose year over year, it was down 3.8% from the final quarter of 2024, according to the study's authors. Still, clean investment activity accounted for just under 5% of overall private investment in structures, equipment, and durable consumer goods in the first quarter. Most of the gains in the quarter came from consumer spending on things like heat pumps and electric cars. In fact, it would have been stronger had it not been for Tesla's 9% sales drop in the period, even as overall electric vehicles posted an 11% sales gain. However, there was a notable drop in new investments in utility-scale clean power and industrial decarbonization tech, which fell 7.7% from a year ago. New utility-scale solar and battery power projects remained relatively stable, but new industrial decarbonization projects plunged to $79 million in the quarter from $16 billion a year earlier. Additionally, six clean technology manufacturing projects worth about $7 billion were canceled in the first quarter. The controversial 'One Big Beautiful Bill' passed the House by a single vote. If it's not significantly revised in the Senate, the outlook for expanding clean energy gets pretty ugly as the year unfolds. We're once again seeking nominations from founders, policymakers, investors, organizers, artists, scientists and others driving meaningful impact in climate and sustainability efforts around the world. Is this you or someone you know? Sign up here: Sustainability Leaders 2025 Deadline for nominations is 9:00am ET on Friday, June 13, 2025. Courtesy of Rivian Automotive Achieving net zero, or the reduction or off-setting of greenhouse gasses to as close to zero as possible, by 2050 will cost nearly $300 trillion (about 7.5 percent of global GDP annually, on average), according to research by the consulting firm McKinsey & Co. Not achieving it, though, could cost double that, according to global reinsurance company Swiss Re. 'If we understood that alternative more, the benefits of climate leadership would be more clear, and the markets would be pricing in these risks and these opportunities,' says Vit Henisz, vice dean of the ESG Initiative at The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Not addressing emissions, Henisz says, would incur costs 'bigger than the great financial crisis, bigger than the housing crisis, bigger than the dot-com crisis.' To identify which companies have performed best in reducing or offsetting their greenhouse gas emissions, Forbes partnered with data providers Sustainalytics and Morningstar to create the third annual Net Zero Leaders list. Roughly 15,000 companies were evaluated for their efforts to achieve their net-zero targets within three ways in which a company can affect greenhouse gasses: emissions within the company's direct control, such as using energy to manufacture a product (known as Scope 1); emissions from purchased energy (Scope 2); and lastly, supply-chain emissions as well as emissions released from consumer use of the company's product (Scope 3). Firms are also assessed on how much of the emissions are managed by the company, their organizational preparedness, governance and financial strength to withstand challenges. At the top of this year's ranking are three electronic vehicle (EV) companies: Lucid Group at No. 1, followed by Rivian and Tesla. (Lucid and Rivian jumped to the top of the list after not even appearing on it last year.) The reason for EVs' dominance is strong Scope 3 emissions performance, says Alex Osborne-Saponja, Sustainalytics' director of ESG methodology and climate solutions. 'Essentially, their product use is close to zero, and we only expect that to continue as they invest in the manufacture of electric vehicles.' Read more here Patrick McMullan via Getty Images What's your take on how the clean energy space will fare if the budget bill passes with its current language that eliminates federal incentives for solar power? This is a big topic of discussion all around. It's really kind of two, two prongs. I think the first is there's a full-on hardcore press with the Senate to get them to do something that's more rational. The good news is Trump has said he wants to sign something by July 4, and the debt ceiling hits in August. So this whole thing is going to be resolved before then. It's really just kind of madness for the next month or two, and then we should have some form of resolution. We've been talking throughout [the process] with Republicans in the House, and they've all said that where it ended up is kind of crazy. But they all voted for it. I think the conventional wisdom, which I am choosing to agree with, is that the House just punted on the issue. They felt the pressure just to get something out, kick it over to the Senate, and now they know the Senate is going to come back with a bunch of issues that are different–and more kind of favorable to the IRA. Then the real reconciliation process is going to have to happen. So all that groundwork is what everybody's doing now. I'm going to DC to lobby a few senators, bringing some of the portfolio companies we've invested in. We're putting a lot of money into Pennsylvania, so we're bringing one of our CEOs from the Pennsylvania solar farms we're developing, hoping to meet Senator McCormick and his staff. We've invested in a geothermal company in Texas, XGS, and we're bringing the CEO of that company. Hopefully, we're going to meet with one or two of the Republican senators. That lobbying is going on everywhere. We hope everyone feels we get some positive movement. The overwhelming amount of IRA spending for factories and everything is going into red districts, so there's just the basic economic self-interest of Republicans in those districts. … You have to believe people who believe in rational economic policy, trade policy, tax policy, would somehow come out. They've been awfully quiet so far. But all the discussions we've had, and we're talking to senior Republicans in leadership, they all get it. If the bill were to pass in its current form, I think the answer I'd want to give, which is actually what I believe, is it would just slow down what's happening. It doesn't get in the way of any trends, because 90% of everything built last year was wind, solar and battery in the United States. Everything that was built globally was wind, solar and battery. … Why solar and wind coupled with batteries? It's cheaper, it's cleaner, and it's faster to deploy. That's why there's so much distributed solar going on, which we're very focused on. That's not going to change. Solar is cheaper than gas now on an unsubsidized basis. If all the tax credits are gone, it totally screws up the industry, because you've got guys who are developing projects based on a 30% or 40% [Investment Tax Credit]. A lot of those deals would just are no longer financeable because of what people are going to pay for the assets. So a lot of deals will die. Do startups die if all federal incentives for clean energy go away? It's certainly not good for anything that's dependent on the incentives to get down the cost curve. I was at the Department of Energy when we were having to finance, the government was having to give loans, for utility-scale wind and solar projects because they were out of the money. It cost 20 cents to produce it. For the first offshore wind, the offtake agreement was 25 cents a kilowatt hour. It was too expensive to compete in the marketplace, and they were untried technologies, so people had to get comfortable, but it was too expensive. Wind and solar are now the cheapest, so they're fine. What needs that help are things like nuclear power certainly, and that's kind of under threat too, although they're trying to figure out how to keep some money going for that. But geothermal, hydrogen, nuclear, all those are out of the money and they're the ones that need the tax incentives to get down below the cost curves. So they're the ones that are going to suffer, those technologies. Hurricane season is upon us, but NOAA and FEMA are not ready. The turmoil at key U.S. agencies threatens everything from forecast quality to storm recovery. (Yale Climate Connections) The EU is nearly on track to reach its main climate target for this decade. The European Commission said the region is on course to cut its net greenhouse gas emissions by 54% by 2030, compared with 1990 levels–just shy of its legally-binding goal of a 55% cut (Reuters) Li-Cycle's quest to recycle lithium-ion batteries ends in bankruptcy. Its collapse is one of many setbacks plaguing the nascent battery recycling sector. (Canary Media) States, environmentalists sue Trump over billions in funding freezes for EV charging (Inside Climate News) Tesla sweetens lease deals for new Model Y Juniper, looking to boost sagging sales (Forbes) Global forest loss hit a record last year as fires raged. Forests around the world disappeared at a rate of 18 soccer fields every minute, a global survey found (New York Times)
Forbes
19-05-2025
- Business
- Forbes
Making Sustainable Jet Fuel From Clean Hydrogen
Current Climate brings you the latest news about the business of sustainability every Monday. Sign up to get it in your inbox. Christie Hemm Klok for Forbes The clean hydrogen push in the U.S. has cooled in the past year, but Electric Hydrogen, a maker of highly efficient, cheaper electrolyzers, just snagged a deal to supply a 100-megawatt hydrogen production system to Infinium to make sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) at Infinium's new Pecos, Texas, plant. Electric Hydrogen's tech, which splits water molecules using renewable electricity, will produce 45 tons of hydrogen a day, CEO Raffi Garabedian told Forbes. When it begins full operation in 2027 it will be one of the largest electrolytic hydrogen plants in the U.S. The companies aren't disclosing the project's financial details. 'That hydrogen will go into a gas-to-liquids synthesis plant–a chemical plant–which also takes CO2 out of a pipeline that would've otherwise been vented from nearby wellheads,' he said. The elements are combined to make hydrocarbon chains, building blocks of different fuels, including SAF. 'It's pretty cool technology to go from power to gas to liquid fuel that you can put in an airplane.' 'The entire process is effectively zero carbon,' he said. 'The plant is powered 100% off of procured renewable power, a combination of solar and wind. The CO2 is 'free' CO2 because it's CO2 that was otherwise vented into the atmosphere.' Electric Hydrogen's goal is to be able to supply affordable clean hydrogen in the absence of subsidies, a wise move as the Trump Administration and Republican Congress move to end federal support for a broad range of clean energy initiatives. And though U.S. policies have changed, international markets, particularly Europe, are powering ahead. 'Our market is primarily in Europe, and Europe is a completely different animal,' Garabedian said. 'Europe is messy; it's slow; it's cumbersome in a lot of ways. But it's also consistently committed to a program of energy transformation.' Along with the EU's efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions, it's pushing for much greater energy independence and seeking to cut reliance on imported fuels, like LNG, which make energy costs there higher. 'Europe is doing what it's doing not just because it's green, but also because the economics are different there,' Garabedian said. 'As a result, we're focused on the European market and it's pretty good news, honestly.' We're once again seeking nominations from founders, policymakers, investors, organizers, artists, scientists and others driving meaningful impact in climate and sustainability efforts around the world. Is this you or someone you know? Sign up here: Sustainability Leaders 2025 Deadline for nominations is 9:00am ET on Friday, June 13, 2025. tmp5i61axgm General Motors, which sells the biggest lineup of electric vehicles in the U.S., plans to slash the cost of its rechargeable pickups and large SUVs by thousands of dollars thanks to a new type of battery that uses more of the cheap material manganese and much less of expensive metals cobalt and nickel while still offering a long driving range. The lithium-manganese-rich (LMR) cathode, which has been in development by GM and battery partner LG Energy for a decade, will cut the cost of battery packs in electric vehicles like the Chevrolet Silverado EV, GMC Hummer and Cadillac Escalade by more than $6,000, GM's vice president of battery propulsion Kurt Kelty told Forbes. It has nearly the same driving range as 'high nickel' lithium-ion cells now used in most EVs while competing on price with cheaper lithium-iron-phosphate (LFP) cells from Chinese battery makers that are heavier and offer less range, he said. The new batteries are also durable enough to be recharged frequently for at least eight years. 'We look at this as a game-changing battery for EV trucks, and that's really going to set the new bar for performance in this particular segment,' said Kelty, who built up Tesla's battery operations for over a decade and previously worked for battery maker Panasonic. 'With LMR we can actually deliver over 400 miles of range while reducing our costs.' Read more here Jonathan Silver You're advising cleantech companies, but will Multplier also be an investor? Silver: No. One of the things that makes Multiplier unique is that our interests are aligned completely with the entrepreneurs and initial investors. We're not taking fees or retainers, there's really no cash compensation upfront at all. What we end up with is a modest piece of equity in the company, and then when the company wins, we win. If the company doesn't win, we don't win either. Our interests are completely aligned with their successful outcome. What will that look like? If I have a hydrogen company, a battery company, a solar company, what would multiplier do for me? Shah: We're only selecting companies that we think have a confident pathway by which we can help them get to an exit. Whether they're in hydrogen or solar or EV charging or advanced building materials, there are a lot of sectors that encompass sustainability. The goal for us is to determine that they've achieved enough product and market fit and that they've got enough really excited customers, that we see a pathway to helping them get to an exit within a reasonable amount of time. Silver: We think we can help a certain number of companies in certain industries turbocharge their growth. We want to be working with companies that already have product and take them to additional potential customer relationships. We want to help them avoid some of the things that we refer to as scar tissue that we've seen many companies have to work their way through. We also want to talk to them seriously about the nature of the company they're building. Many of these companies have terrific products, but they're really point solutions. The question is, is the intent to grow a dominant company around a single-point solution? Or is it a better strategy to tuck up under a larger strategic or different platform so that the technology has room to breathe? Shah: One of the things I've found through all the conversations I've had with these companies is that for most they have never actually plotted out their exact course to an exit. If you say to them, who do you want to exit to? They're like, 'oh, I don't have a ready answer.' Is it an IPO? Is it a sale to a company? If it's a sale to a company, do you have three companies in mind that you think would want to buy you? What do they want you to accomplish before they buy you? Part of this is just helping them with that checklist and saying, if they want you to hit these three milestones, are you actually working toward those three milestones so that you could sell your company to these folks? There's been an assumption in the cleantech sector that it will operate the same as the Silicon Valley traditional approach. I think the reality is that what we do for a living doesn't operate under a go-fast-and-break-things model. We're working in global infrastructure. By definition, people's lives are on the line. Stuff actually has to work. Given moves by the Trump Administration and Republican-controlled Congress isn't this going to be a tough time for cleantech startups? Shah: It's very clear that you have a set of technologies that we've invented and demonstrated here in this country, and for years and years and years, those technologies went to other countries to be scaled up. Then we imported them back in. I think over the last four years, there was a set of policies passed to get people to do big things here in this country. With the uncertainty of this administration and the recent House Bill, you're starting to see some of those technologies revert back to going to other countries. We continue to invent the best stuff in the world, and I think for a short period of time there we tried to get people to commercialize the technologies here. I do think that the message this administration is sending and that the House bill is sending is that [cleantech] commercialization is not something we have the patience for here in this country. Silver: The great tragedy in this is that it's a self-inflicted wound because by pulling away from these technologies, which are inarguably among the fastest-growing industries in the world, we're sort of ceding the field and all the related business opportunities to the rest of the world and especially to China. To circle back, one of the reasons we wanted to do [Multiplier] was to help U.S.-based companies realize the value of the work they've done, get those technologies more deeply embedded in the marketplace and create value for the entrepreneurs, whether that's in the form of a sale or anything else. Otherwise, we run the risk of creating literally nothing at all. Jigar Shah House Republicans stall spending package for steeper cuts to Medicaid and green energy. In a massive setback, Republicans failed to push their big package of tax breaks and spending cuts through the Budget Committee as a handful of conservatives joined all Democrats in a stunning vote against it (Associated Press) GOP budget plan contains a massive poison pill for clean energy. 'Totally unworkable' rules could kill manufacturing and clean energy investment by restricting tax credits for any project remotely tied to China, experts warn (Canary Media) A clean energy boom was just starting. Now, a Republican bill aims to end it. The party's signature tax plan would kill most Biden-era incentives, but there's a sticking point: G.O.P. districts have the most to lose (New York Times) Trump officials want to cut limits on PFAS in drinking water – what will the impact be? The EPA is attempting actions that violate the law, some say, and Biden administration's progress can't be fully undone (The Guardian) Polestar's luxury electric SUV has a lower lifetime environmental impact than a tiny petrol car. Yes, the planet should have fewer cars, but small ICE cars are not necessarily cleaner than some large EVs (Forbes) U.S. energy industry trade groups have launched a last-minute lobbying blitz to urge Congress members to spare a slew of former President Joe Biden's clean energy tax credits from the chopping block in the Republican budget plan (Reuters) Texas is failing to fix the grid (again). For more than 25 years, the Texas Legislature has done nothing to address ERCOT's fatal design flaw (Forbes)
