| The Inflation Reduction Act’s (IRA) impacts may be stickier than we thought. The next must-have policies: permitting reform and building clean firm power. |
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| | CLIMATE PROGRESS POWERS THROUGH: When the Trump administration moved to clip the wings of the landmark Inflation Reduction Act, many feared that its climate benefits would be mostly wiped out. But based on a new report from MIT’s Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research, the IRA’s decarbonizing impact remains substantially intact, at least in the power sector. According to Lily Bermel, the report’s author, the glass “is substantially full…like three-quarters full.”
What does the new data tell us?
Bermel used Energy Innovation’s models to calculate that 74 percent of renewables’ overall capacity gains under the IRA would be preserved under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act through 2035. The same goes for 71 percent of new clean power generation and 67 percent of fossil fuel pollution cuts–despite the OBBBA’s repeal of solar and wind tax credits and the EPA’s move to weaken power plant rules. Utility-scale solar keeps 80 percent of its IRA capacity gains under the OBBBA; battery storage, 83 percent; distributed solar, 95 percent; and offshore wind, 100 percent. The category hit hardest is credit-sensitive onshore wind, which preserves only 47 percent of its IRA boost.
That sounds like pretty good news–but is there a catch?
One reason the gap is so narrow is that both clean energy scenarios are constrained by long permitting queues and a lack of transmission infrastructure. In Bermel’s analysis, these supply-side factors are slowing the transition more than the loss of tax incentives.
What’s the author’s prescription? To unleash clean energy supply and cover new demand, policymakers must advance permitting reform and transmission buildout. To close the emissions gap and retire coal and gas, we’ll need more direct procurement (both public and private) of clean “firm” energy: geothermal, nuclear, and hydro, for starters. (And as Bill McKibben recently observed, advances in battery technology are making sun or wind plus storage “firmer” all the time, “quickly turning night into day.”)
This strategy aligns with the recent open letter from Speed & Scale Founder John Doerr, which urged us to build more “affordable, durable, and sustainable energy” to displace fossil fuels–and to go further and faster to reach net zero in time. |
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| | | 🚗 1.0 – Electrify Transportation Battery Belief: After five years on the road, the average EV still delivers up to 95 percent of its original range, and battery replacements in post-2022 models remain rare. Even so, the public’s concerns over battery longevity persist–a significant factor in the used EV market, where consumer confidence and resale values shape adoption (Wall Street Journal). Grid Recess: As summer drives up U.S. electricity demand, the grid is drawing 8 megawatt-hours of power from 200-plus idle electric school buses. While the vehicle-to-grid scale remains tiny as compared to peak power needs, it’s an early test case for how EV batteries could shore up fragile power systems in extreme weather (Reuters). Pedal Push: The COP31 Bike Ride is carrying a banner from Brazil to Antalya, Turkey, the site of November’s UN climate summit. Organizers are using the event to prod more countries to integrate cycling into their climate action plans. A “realistic shift” from driving to walking, cycling, and public transport could cut the sector’s emissions by half (Forbes).
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| 💡 2.0 – Decarbonize the Grid Cool Runnings: Pushing the AC thermostat higher when out of your home can be more efficient than turning it off and forcing the system to handle higher temperatures and humidity later. Recent tests show that setting your AC unit’s temperature to 77 or 78 degrees Fahrenheit and leaving it on can optimize the cost/comfort equation (New York Times). Server Pressure: As AI-driven data center growth accelerated In 2025, Amazon’s emissions rose 16 percent, to roughly 81 million metric tons of CO2e, while Google’s emissions climbed 18 percent. The challenge for hyperscalers with climate ambitions isn’t just about buying clean power. It’s about building carbon-free supply chains, grid capacity, and hardware fast enough to keep AI demand from outrunning corporate climate targets (Bloomberg).
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🐄 3.0 – Fix Food Waste Date: California became the first U.S. state to standardize food date labels, removing “sell by” language and mandating clearer quality and freezing labels. The low-cost policy targets a surprisingly large emissions lever: unnecessary food waste that goes into methane-producing landfills (New York Times). Methane Manager: New Zealand is close to approving a slow-release capsule that might cut methane emissions per animal by as much as 70 percent. With cattle and sheep digestion responsible for more than 40 percent of the country’s greenhouse gases, the next steps are to get the new treatment approved and subsidized to gain farmer acceptance (Bloomberg).
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🌳 4.0 – Protect Nature Burn Rate: Severe heat, strong winds, and a historic drought are driving explosive wildfire growth across Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico. The western fire season has already killed three federal firefighters and is stretching crews to the breaking point before the season’s peak (Washington Post). Road Roast: Temperatures approaching 104 degrees Fahrenheit buckled sections of Germany’s Autobahn, forcing highway closures and train cancellations. The disruptions show the latest European heat dome’s impact on infrastructure across the region (Fortune). Degrees of Damage: A new study shows that climate change made Europe’s latest heat wave hotter by 2 to 4 degrees Celsius, in line with a trend that has seen the continent warm at roughly twice the global average. The health impacts of these heat waves are dire. In 2022, the hottest European summer on record at the time, there were more than 60,000 deaths across 35 countries (The Economist).
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| 🧱 5.0 – Clean Up Industry Soot Suit: A federal appeals court rejected the EPA’s attempt to loosen the Biden-era soot standard, leaving in place an annual fine-particle limit of 9 micrograms per cubic meter. Under Biden, the EPA estimated the tighter limits would prevent more than 800,000 cases of asthma symptoms, 2,000 hospital visits, and 4,500 premature deaths (The Guardian). Permit Pause: The EU is weighing slower CO2 cuts and more free allowances for industry as it prepares a carbon-market overhaul to ease pressure on manufacturers. While the added flexibility may protect industrial competitiveness in the short run, it also tests the impact of political stress on Europe’s flagship emissions market (Reuters).
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| 🧹 6.0 – Remove Carbon Shrub Hub: Amazon agreed to buy nearly 2 million metric tons of carbon removal credits from a South African restoration project that will plant 180 million spekboom shrubs. The project is expected to create 11,000 jobs and inject more than $500 million into surrounding communities, tying ecosystem recovery to local economic development (ESG Today). Sky’s the Limit: Canada’s Deep Sky delivered North America’s first verified carbon removal credits from direct air capture at a pilot facility in Alberta, with Microsoft and Royal Bank of Canada among the credit recipients. While the initial delivery totaled just 14 tons of CO2, the facility is designed to capture 3,000 metric tons annually (Reuters).
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| 🏛️ 7.0 – Win Politics And Policy Permit Partners: Quebec and the states of Washington and California signed an agreement to link up next year in their move to create the largest carbon market in North America. In the face of new political pushback against carbon pricing, the deal covers joint sales of pollution permits and tracking credits across borders (E&E News). Carbon Order: Europe’s carbon tariff system, CBAM, is pushing China to build stronger carbon accounting and market architecture as exporters prepare for stricter product-level emissions rules. Even though covered goods made up less than one percent of China’s EU exports in 2025, CBAM’s expected 2028 expansion into more steel- and aluminum-intensive products may make China’s coal-heavy industrial base an even bigger liability (CSIS).
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| 🏃 8.0 – Turn Movements Into Action Climate Turnabout: Back in 2007, when former Republican Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist left Congress, he had a 7 percent lifetime environmental voting score. But now, as chair of The Nature Conservancy’s global board, Frist publicly ties climate change and air pollution to biodiversity and human health. His pitch to the center-right avoids culture-war language and focuses instead on how rising temperatures have increased the costs of healthcare (New York Times). Forest Fine Print: The UK’s annual consumption of rainforest commodities is linked to more than 100 square miles of global deforestation and nearly 10 million tons of carbon emissions. This year, the government plans to require companies trading in soy, palm oil, cocoa, and rubber to align with the EU’s deforestation regulation and lower the risk of supply chain ties to illegal land clearing (ESG Today).
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| ⚡ 9.0 – Innovate! Proxima Power: German fusion startup Proxima Fusion raised €400 million at a €2.4 billion valuation, with Google joining as a strategic investor and XTX Markets leading the round. Proxima wants to build a €2 billion demonstration facility by 2031, as tech companies double down on nuclear fusion as a potential solution for carbon-free power for AI data centers (Financial Times). Rare Export Reality: Rare earths from U.S. mines backed by the Trump administration are still flowing to Japan and South Korea because of lagging domestic magnet demand and underbuilt processing capacity. The sales expose the gap between Washington’s domestic supply-chain ambitions and today’s manufacturing reality (Financial Times).
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| MEETING THE MOMENT: In response to a growing global emissions gap and gathering policy headwinds, climate philanthropy is stepping up to the plate. According to ClimateWorks’ new analysis, mitigation funding by foundations hit the $6 billion mark for the first time in 2024, the latest data available–up 30 percent from 2023 and more than double the amount of foundation giving in 2020. For the first time, mitigation funding by foundations and individuals combined exceeded 2 percent of total philanthropy worldwide, to as much as $18 billion.
Clean electricity continued to be the top-funded climate sector in 2024, while food and agriculture showed the fastest rate of funding growth. Geographically, giving became more concentrated, with more than two thirds of the total going to the U.S. and Europe. Outlook for 2025: Based on preliminary data, ClimateWorks sees the momentum for climate philanthropy holding–or even accelerating. While this renewed commitment is encouraging, we’ll need further progress to meet the bar of Speed & Scale’s OKR 10.5, which calls for $30 billion of annual climate giving.
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| | 💰 10.0 – Invest! Climate Target Retired: The World Bank is abandoning its goal to direct 45 percent of annual lending resources to projects with climate co-benefits, a policy adopted during the Biden administration in 2023. While the Bank says it will extend its Climate Change Action Plan and keep tracking emissions and resilience outcomes, the move reflects pressure from the Trump administration to shift away from climate lending targets (Reuters).
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