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THE ASTORIAN • SATURDAY, AUGUST 13, 2022
Sweeping climate bill pushes American energy to go green
By SETH BORENSTEIN,
MATTHEW DALY and
MICHAEL PHILLIS
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — After
decades of inaction in the face
of escalating natural disasters
and sustained global warm-
ing, Congress hopes to make
clean energy so cheap in all
aspects of life that it’s nearly
irresistible.
The transformative legis-
lation would provide the most
spending to fi ght climate
change by any one nation ever
in a single push.
The action comes 34 years
after a top scientist grabbed
headlines warning Congress
about the dangers of global
warming. In the decades
since, there have been 308
weather disasters that have
each cost the nation at least
$1 billion, the record for the
hottest year has been broken
10 times and wildfi res have
burned an area larger than
Texas.
The crux of the long-de-
layed bill, singularly pushed
by Democrats in a closely
divided Congress, is to use
incentives to spur investors
to accelerate the expansion
of clean energy such as wind
and solar power, speeding the
transition away from the oil,
coal and gas that largely cause
climate change.
The United States has put
the most heat-trapping gases
into the air, burning more
inexpensive dirty fuels than
any other country. But the
nearly $375 billion in climate
incentives in the Infl ation
Reduction Act are designed
to make the already plummet-
ing costs of renewable energy
substantially lower at home,
on the highways and in the
factory. Together these could
help shrink U.S. carbon emis-
sions by about two-fi fths by
2030 and should chop emis-
sions from electricity by as
much as 80%.
Experts say it isn’t enough,
but it’s a big start.
“This legislation is a true
game changer. It will create
jobs, lower costs, increase
U.S. competitiveness, reduce
air pollution,” said former
Vice President Al Gore, who
held his fi rst global warming
hearing 40 years ago. “The
momentum that will come out
of this legislation, cannot be
underestimated.”
The U.S. action could spur
other nations to do more —
especially China and India,
the two largest carbon emit-
ters along with the U.S. That
in turn could lower prices for
renewable energy globally,
experts said.
Because of the specifi c
legislative process in which
this compromise was formed,
Rick Bowmer/AP Photo
A workman from Power Shift Solar installs a solar panel in Salt
Lake City in August.
which limits it to budget-re-
lated actions, the bill does
not regulate greenhouse gas
emissions, but deals mainly in
spending, most of it through
tax credits as well as rebates
to industry, consumers and
utilities.
Investments work better
at fostering clean energy than
regulations, said Leah Stokes,
an environmental policy pro-
fessor at the University of Cal-
ifornia, Santa Barbara. The
climate bill is likely to spur
billions in private investment,
she said: “That’s what’s going
to be so transformative.”
The bill promotes vital
technologies such as battery
storage. Clean energy manu-
facturing gets a big boost. It
will be cheaper for consum-
ers to make climate-friendly
purchasing decisions. There
are tax credits to make electric
cars more aff ordable, help for
low-income people making
energy-effi ciency upgrades
and incentives for rooftop
solar and heat pumps.
There are also incentives
for nuclear power and proj-
ects that aim to capture and
remove carbon from the
atmosphere.
The bill moves to ensure
that poor and minority com-
munities that have borne the
brunt of pollution benefi t
from climate spending. Farm-
ers will receive help switching
to climate-friendly practices
and there’s money for energy
research and to encourage
electric heavy-duty trucks in
place of diesel.
The Superfund program,
used to pay for cleanup of the
nation’s most heavily-pol-
luted industrial sites, will
receive more revenue from a
bigger tax on oil.
The Rhodium Group
research fi rm estimates the bill
would dramatically change
the arc of future U.S. green-
house gas emissions, cut-
ting them by 31% to 44% in
2030, compared to what had
been shaping up to be 24% to
35% by 2005 without the bill,
said Rhodium partner John
Larsen. Clean power on the
grid, an upcoming Rhodium
report says, would jump from
under 40% now to between
60% and 81% by 2030, he
said.
“It’s not as big as I want,
but it’s also bigger than any-
thing we’ve ever done,″ said
U.S. Sen. Brian Schatz, a
Hawaii Democrat who leads
the Senate climate caucus.
“A 40% emissions reduction
is nothing the U.S. has ever
come close to before.″
As decisive a change as it
is for U.S. policy and emis-
sions, it still does not reach
the offi cial U.S. goal of cut-
ting carbon pollution roughly
in half by 2030 to achieve net-
zero carbon emissions across
the economy by 2050.
Not everyone is impressed.
“This law is big for the
U.S. but in global terms long
overdue,” said Niklas Hohne,
co-founder of the New Cli-
mate Institute in Germany.
“The U.S. has a long way to
go on climate change and is
starting from a very, very high
emission level.”
When U.S. historic car-
bon emissions are factored
in, U.S. spending still lags
behind Italy, France, South
Korea, Japan and Canada,
according to Brian O’Cal-
laghan, lead researcher at the
Oxford Economic Recovery
Project at the University of
Oxford. He noted the bill has
nothing to fulfi ll America’s
broken promise of billions of
dollars in climate aid for poor
nations.
President Joe Biden has
frequently said America is
back in the fi ght against cli-
mate change, but other leaders
have been skeptical with no
legislation to back his claim.
And there may be disap-
pointment. Americans hop-
ing to buy an electric car may
fi nd many models ineligible
for rebates until more com-
ponents are made in the U.S.
Local fi ghts over siting new
renewable energy projects
could also hamper the pace
of the buildout, some experts
said. Environmental justice
communities are concerned
they’ll be asked to accept new
carbon capture projects.
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