Over the weekend the Washington Spectator published my essay, Diary of a Transit Miracle, recounting the arduous march of NYC congestion pricing from a gleam in a trio of prominent New Yorkers’ eyes at the end of the 1960s, to the verge of startup at the upcoming stroke of midnight June 30, the startup time announced by the MTA last Friday.
Landing page for this post’s original version.
I’m cross-posting it here — the third post on the subject in this space in the past 12 months (following this in December and this post last June) — because the advent of congestion pricing in the U.S. is “a really big deal,” as a number of friends and colleagues have told me in recent weeks. As my new essay makes clear, charging motorists to drive into the heart of Manhattan isn’t just a rejection of unconstrained motordom, it’s a new beachhead in “externality pricing” — social-cost surcharging — of which carbon taxes are the ultimate form.
The essay features two governors, two mayors — one of whom I served a half-century ago as a lowly but admiring data cruncher — a civic “Walter Cronkite,” a Nobel economist, raucous transit activists, a gridlock guru and yours truly, plus a cameo appearance by Robert Moses. It includes footage of the historic 1969 press conference in which Mayor John Lindsay and two distinguished associates enunciated the core idea of using externality pricing to better balance automobiles and mass transit that animated the arduous but ultimately triumphant congestion pricing campaign.
— C.K., April 29, 2024
Diary of a Transit Miracle
A miracle is coming to New York City. Beginning on July 1, and barring a last-minute hitch, motorists will soon pay a hefty $15 to enter the southern half of Manhattan — the area bounded by the Hudson River, the East River and 60th Street.
An anticipated 15 percent or so of drivers will switch to transit, unsnarling roads within the “congestion zone” and routes leading to it. The other 80 or 90 percent will grumble but continue driving. That is by design. The toll bounty, a billion dollars a year, will finance subway enhancements like station elevators and digital signals that will increase train throughput and lure more car trips onto trains.
The result will be faster, smoother commutes, especially for car drivers and taxicab and Uber passengers, who will pay a modest surcharge of $1.25 to $2.50 per trip. Drivers of for-hire vehicles will benefit as well, as lesser gridlock leads to more fares.1
The miracle is three-fold: Winners will vastly outnumber losers; New York will be made healthier, calmer and more prosperous; and that this salutary measure is happening at all, after a half-century of setbacks.
Obstacles to congestion pricing
Congestion pricing, as the policy is known, faced formidable obstacles even beyond the difficulty inherent in asking a group of people to start forking over a billion dollars a year for something that’s always been free.
Congestion pricing also had to contend with: an ingrained pro-motoring ideology that casts any restraint on driving as a betrayal of the American Dream; a general aversion to social-cost surcharges (what economists call “externality pricing”); exasperation over the region’s balkanized and convoluted toll and transit regimes; and, of late, a decline in social solidarity and appeals to the common good.
The advent of congestion pricing in New York is, thus, cause not just for celebration but wonderment. How did this wonky yet radical idea advance to the verge of enactment?
Origins
The trail begins in the waning days of 1969, when newly re-elected mayor John Lindsay recruited two well-regarded New Yorkers to devise a plan to fend off a 50 percent rise in subway and bus fares.
William Vickrey, a Canadian transplant teaching at Columbia and a future Nobel economics laureate, was a protean theorist of externality pricing. New York-bred mediator Theodore Kheel was admired as a civic Walter Cronkite for his plain-spoken common sense.
Lindsay, too often dismissed as a lightweight, understood mass transit as key to loosening automobiles’ spreading chokehold over the city. He had made combating air pollution a pillar of his first term and was fast becoming an exemplar of urban environmentalism. From his municipal engineers, Lindsay knew that technology to clean up tailpipes still lay in the future. A transit fare hike that would add yet more vehicles to city streets imperiled his clean-air agenda.
The triumvirate proposed a suite of motorist fees to preserve the fare. Their program ― higher registration fees and gasoline taxes, a parking garage tax, doubled tolls ― though mild in today’s terms, threatened powerful bureaucracies and their auto allies. Newly dethroned “master-builder” Robert Moses opined that Kheel, in his zeal to save the fare, had “gone berserk over bridge and tunnel tolls.”2 The program went nowhere.
L to R: Kheel, Lindsay, Vickrey. Click arrow to view (please excuse two brief garbled passages toward end).
Moses was right to be alarmed. From a City Hall podium on Dec. 16, 1969, Mayor Lindsay showcased Kheel’s and Vickrey’s respective reports, “A Balanced System of Transportation is a Must” and “A Transit Fare Increase is Costly Revenue.” (Click link in still photo above to view 27-minute video.) The trio propounded a new urban doctrine rebalancing automobiles and public transportation: “Automobiles are strangling our cities… Starving mass transit imposes costs that are difficult to measure, yet real… Correcting the fiscal imbalance between transit and the automobile is key to enhancing our environment and quality of life…”
Their remarks set generations of urbanists on course toward congestion pricing.
Setbacks
Quantifying those precepts became my research agenda 40 years later. In the interim, two creditable attempts to enact congestion pricing crashed and burned.
The central element of Lindsay’s 1973 “transportation control plan” was tolls on the city’s East River bridges, a measure designed to eliminate enough traffic to satisfy federal clean-air standards. Though the plan’s formal demise didn’t come until 1977, in legislation written by liberal lawmakers from Brooklyn and Queens, the toll idea never stood a chance. Electronic tolling was 20 years away, and adding stop-and-go toll booths seemed more likely to compound vehicular exhaust than to cut it.
Three decades later, in 2007, Mayor Michael Bloomberg asked Albany to toll not just the same East River bridges but also the more-trafficked 60th Street “portal” to mid-Manhattan. Predictably, faux-populist legislators saw Bloomberg’s billionaire wealth as an invitation to denounce the congestion fee as an affront to the little guy.
The mayor may have hurt his cause by presenting congestion pricing primarily as a climate and pollution measure. The pollution rationale was no longer compelling in the way it had been in Lindsay’s day, as automotive engineers had slashed rates of toxic vehicle exhaust ten-fold. Appeals tied to global warming also fell flat; remember, congestion pricing contemplated that most drivers would stay in their fossil-fuel burning cars.
This isn’t to say that congestion pricing confers no climate benefits. Rather, the benefits are subtler ones that can be hard to convey to voters, such as making climate-friendly urban living more attractive. A further benefit may come as congestion pricing demonstrates the unique power of externality pricing, as explained below.
From the Rubble
Even as Bloomberg’s toll plan was faltering in Albany, new loci of support were germinating in the city.
Changing times demanded not just the intellectual leadership of think-tanks like the Regional Plan Association and the good-government Straphangers Campaign, but gritty, grassroots transit organizing. Enter the newly-minted Riders Alliance.
2017 subway handbill exemplified new militancy targeting Gov. Andrew Cuomo for failing transit.
As subway service began cratering in 2015, the inevitable result of budget-raiding by a skein of governors, the Alliance posted crowd-sourced photos of stalled trains and jammed platforms alongside demands for improved service from “#CuomosMTA.” Before long, the papers were pointing the finger at the governor not just in “Why Your Commute Is Bad” explainers but in tear-jerkers like the Times’ May 2017 classic, “Money Out of Your Pocket”: New Yorkers Tell of Subway Delay Woes.
The drumbeat was deafening. Cuomo finally blinked. On a Sunday in August 2017, he phoned the Times’ Albany bureau chief and handed him a scoop for the next day’s front page: Cuomo Calls Manhattan Traffic Plan an Idea ‘Whose Time Has Come’.
The “traffic plan” was congestion pricing.
Data Cruncher
Two months later, Cuomo’s staff summoned me to the midtown office of the consulting firm they had retained to “scope” congestion pricing ― essentially, to compute how much revenue tolls could generate. They wanted to see if an Excel spreadsheet model I had constructed and refined over the prior decade could aid their scoping process.
The model was called the Balanced Transportation Analyzer, a name bestowed in 2007 by Ted Kheel.
Ted, in his nineties, had recruited me to determine whether a large enough congestion toll could pay to make city transit free. The idea worked on paper but foundered politically. Nevertheless, Ted saw in my Excel modeling a way to capture phenomena like “rebound effects” (motorists driving more as road space frees up) and “mode switching” between cars, trains, buses and taxicabs, that he and Prof. Vickrey had identified in their 1969 work but lacked the computing ability to quantify.
Ted’s philanthropy enabled me over the next decade to expand, test and update my transportation modeling. With a hundred “tabs” and 160,000 equations, the “BTA” can instantly answer almost any conceivable question about New York congestion pricing, as well as these two central ones: how much revenue it will yield, and how much time will travelers save in lightened traffic and better transit.3
The BTA model aced its 2017 audition and became the computational engine for the congestion pricing legislation the governor’s team enacted into law in 2019. Its impact has been even broader.4 “Having the model helped make the case with the public, journalists, elected officials and others,” Eric McClure, director of the livable-streets advocacy group StreetsPAC, wrote recently, in part by helping congestion pricing proponents push back on opponents’ exaggerated claims of disastrous outcomes and their incessant demands for special treatment. The model may also have influenced the detailed toll design adopted by the MTA board earlier this year, which hewed close to the toll design I had recommended last summer.5
The BTA also provided sustenance during congestion pricing’s seven lean years ― the 2009-2016 period in which the torch was kept lit by a new triumvirate known as “Move NY” ― traffic guru “Gridlock” Sam Schwartz, the very able campaign strategist Alex Matthiessen, and myself. The model helped our team evangelize congestion pricing’s transformative benefits to elected officials and the public. This, I believe, was a key element in mustering the critical mass of support that ultimately swayed not one but two governors.
The Hochul Factor
New York Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul’s ascension to governor in August 2021 could have been congestion pricing’s death knell. The toll plan was adrift in the federal bureaucracy, and its latter-day champion Andrew Cuomo had exited in “me-too” disgrace. His successor, from distant Buffalo, wasn’t beholden to New York or congestion pricing.
Hochul, who as governor controls city and regional transit, could have disowned congestion pricing as convoluted, bureaucratic and tainted. Instead, she became a resolute and enthusiastic backer. Her spirited support, both in public and behind the scenes, became the decisive ingredient in shepherding congestion pricing to safety.
Why the new governor went all-in on congestion pricing awaits a future journalist or historian. Had she spurned it, the opprobrium from downstate transit advocates would have been intense; but there doubtless would have been cries of “good riddance” as well. Vickrey, Kheel and Riders Alliance notwithstanding, it’s not clear how closely New Yorkers — including transit users — connect congestion tolls to improved travel and a better city.
What makes Hochul’s embrace especially impressive is that congestion pricing is, in a real sense, an attack on a jealously guarded entitlement: the right to inconvenience others by usurping public space for one’s vehicle. The classic lament about entitlements’ iron grip is that “losers cry louder than winners sing.”6 Yet in this case, it seems, potential losers — actual and aspiring zone-bound drivers — are being out-sung by transit interests seeking, in Kheel’s 1969 words, a better balance between public transportation and automobiles.
Credits and Prospects
Let us now praise Andrew Cuomo’s crafting of the legislation that teed up congestion pricing’s successful run.
Rather than specifying a dollar price for the tolls, or a precise traffic reduction, his 2019 bill established a revenue target: sufficient earnings to bond $15 billion in transit investment — which equates to $1 billion a year to cover debt service. This device trained the public’s focus on the gain from congestion pricing (better transit) instead of the pain (the toll). Equally important, with this deft stroke, any toll exemption that a vocal minority might seek would mathematically trigger higher tolls for everyone else. The effect was vastly heightened scrutiny of requests for carve-outs.
Which cities will follow on New York’s heels? No U.S. urban area comes close to our trifecta of gridlock, transit and wealth. Sprawling Los Angeles or Houston, or even Chicago for that matter, might be better served by more granulated traffic tolls than New York’s all-or-none model.
Perhaps Asia’s megalopolises will be swept up in our wake. In the meantime, my focus will be on the holy grail of externality pricing: taxing carbon emissions. Every economist knows that the surest and fastest way to cut down on a “bad” is by taxing it rather than subsidizing possible alternatives. Yet that approach remains counter-intuitive and even anathema to nearly everyone else.
A huge and important legacy that New York congestion pricing could provide is to prove that intelligently taxing societal harms need not be electoral suicide. This proof could help unlock a treasure-trove of prosperity-enhancing pricing reforms including, most prominently, robust carbon taxing.
The author, a policy analyst based in New York City, worked in Mayor Lindsay’s Environmental Protection Administration in 1972-1974. He met Bill Vickrey in 1991 and worked closely with Ted Kheel from 2007 to 2010.
Endnotes
- The new passenger surcharges of $1.25 for taxicabs and $2.50 for “ride-hails” (principally Ubers) apply to trips touching the congestion zone. These will be partially offset by lower fares owing to shorter wait-time charges due to faster travel speeds.
- Quote is from Moses’ August 23, 1969 guest essay in Newsday, “Is Rubber to Pay for Rails?” (not digitally available).
- The current version of the BTA is publicly available at this link: (18 MB Excel file).
- See Fix NYC Advisory Panel Report, Appendix B, 2019.
- A Congestion Toll New York Can Live With, July 2023, by Charles Komanoff, co-authored with Columbia Business School economist Gernot Wagner.
- As pronounced by University of Michigan economist Joel Slemrod, in Goodbye, My Sweet Deduction, New York Times, by Eduardo Porter and David Leonhardt, Nov. 3, 2005.
The U.S. nuclear sector just received another strong signal of federal backing.
On February 21, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) finalized a $303 million Technology Investment Agreement with Kairos Power to advance its Hermes demonstration reactor in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. The deal supports the company’s selection under the Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program (ARDP), first announced in December 2020.
But this is not a traditional federal grant. Instead, DOE structured the agreement as a performance-based, fixed-price milestone contract. Kairos will only receive payments once it achieves clearly defined technical milestones.
This funding model was previously used by the Department of Defense and NASA’s Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program. It aims to accelerate innovation while protecting public funds. Now, DOE is applying that same discipline to advanced nuclear technology.
Hermes: The First Gen IV Reactor Approved in Decades
At the center of the agreement is Hermes — a low-power demonstration reactor based on Kairos Power’s fluoride salt-cooled high-temperature reactor (KP-FHR) design.
In December 2023, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) granted Hermes a construction permit. That approval marked a historic milestone. Hermes became the first non-light-water reactor approved for construction in the United States in more than 50 years. It is also the first Generation IV reactor cleared for building.
The reactor is expected to be operational in 2027. While it will not generate commercial electricity, it serves a critical role. Hermes will demonstrate Kairos Power’s ability to safely deliver low-cost nuclear heat and operate a fully integrated advanced nuclear system.
Its design combines two established technologies that originated in Oak Ridge: TRISO-coated particle fuel and Flibe molten fluoride salt coolant. Together, these systems enhance safety and simplify operations.
The molten salt coolant improves heat transfer and stability, while TRISO fuel provides strong containment of radioactive materials. The result is a reactor design that emphasizes inherent safety without relying on overly complex backup systems.
Significantly, Hermes represents Kairos Power’s first nuclear build, and it acts as a stepping stone toward commercial deployment.
Mike Laufer, Kairos Power co-founder and CEO, said:
“With the use of fixed-price milestone payments, this innovative contract provides real benefits to both Kairos Power and DOE to ensure the successful completion of the Hermes reactor. It allows us to remain focused on achieving the most important goals of the project while retaining agility and flexibility to move quickly as we learn key lessons through our iterative development approach.”
Risk Reduction and Private Capital Alignment
The DOE’s investment complements significant private funding already committed by Kairos Power. Since its ARDP selection, the company has built extensive testing facilities and manufacturing infrastructure to support its Engineering Test Unit series. It has also advanced its fuel development and molten salt coolant systems.
Unlike traditional large-scale nuclear projects that often suffer cost overruns, Kairos is pursuing an iterative development pathway. This approach allows the company to test, refine, and improve reactor components before full commercial rollout.
Fuel manufacturing plays a key role in that strategy. Kairos Power is working in partnership with Los Alamos National Laboratory to produce fuel for Hermes. Through its Low Enriched Fuel Fabrication Facility (LEFFF), the company aims to control quality, reduce delays, and manage costs more effectively.
Vertical integration is central to its business model. By managing more of the supply chain internally, Kairos hopes to deliver greater cost certainty for future commercial reactors — an area where traditional nuclear projects have struggled.
Key Features
Nuclear’s Return to the Energy Spotlight
The Hermes agreement comes at a time when nuclear energy is regaining political and investor attention.
Federal policy has shifted in favor of accelerating the development of next-generation reactors. In 2025, the U.S. administration introduced measures to shorten licensing timelines and rebuild domestic nuclear fuel supply chains. The Department of Energy has articulated an ambitious goal: expand U.S. nuclear capacity from roughly 100 gigawatts in 2024 to 400 gigawatts by 2050.
Programs such as the Energy Dominance Financing initiative aim to provide additional support for nuclear infrastructure. Once built, reactors can operate for up to 80 years, making them long-term strategic assets.
At the same time, electricity demand is rising. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), U.S. electricity demand grew 2.8% in 2024 and another 2.1% in 2025. The country is projected to add more than 420 terawatt-hours of new demand over the next five years.
Data centers are driving much of that growth. The rapid expansion of artificial intelligence and cloud computing infrastructure could account for nearly half of total demand growth through 2030.
This dynamic is reshaping energy investment decisions. Technology companies require reliable, always-on power. However, they must also meet emissions reduction targets. Nuclear energy provides steady, low-carbon electricity, making it increasingly attractive for both policymakers and corporate buyers.
Small Reactors, Big Strategic Impact
Small modular and advanced reactors are the keys to this renewed momentum. Compared to traditional gigawatt-scale plants, smaller reactors offer shorter construction timelines and lower upfront capital requirements. Developers can deploy them incrementally, reducing financial risk and improving flexibility.
Hermes, although it is a demonstration project, it represents a critical validation step. If successful, it could pave the way for commercial-scale KP-FHR reactors that supply industrial heat and electricity at competitive costs.
Dr. Kathryn Huff, Assistant Secretary, Office of Nuclear Energy, made an important statement, noting:
“The Hermes reactor is an important step toward realizing advanced nuclear energy’s role in ushering forward the nation’s clean energy transition. Partnerships like this one play a significant role in making advanced nuclear technology commercially competitive.”
For investors, this shift signals opportunity. Supportive government policy, rising electricity demand, AI-driven load growth, and decarbonization commitments are converging. Nuclear power, once viewed as a legacy industry, is re-emerging as a strategic solution.
A Measured Step Toward a Nuclear Renaissance
The DOE-Kairos agreement does not guarantee success. Advanced reactor development remains technically complex and capital-intensive. However, the deal’s structure reflects lessons learned from past nuclear projects.
By tying federal funding to performance milestones, DOE is promoting accountability. By combining public and private capital, the government is reducing financial risk while accelerating innovation.
Hermes now stands as one of the most closely watched advanced reactor projects in the United States. If Kairos delivers on schedule, the project could mark a turning point. Not just for one company but for the broader U.S. nuclear renaissance that policymakers increasingly envision.
In a world of rising electricity demand and tightening climate targets, advanced nuclear energy is inevitably essential. And with Hermes moving forward, it is becoming tangible infrastructure.
The post DOE’s $303M Bet on Kairos Power Signals America’s Advanced Nuclear Push appeared first on Carbon Credits.
Amazon, once again, is one of the top corporate buyers of clean and renewable energy in the world. For the fifth year in a row, the company leads global corporate renewable energy procurement. BloombergNEF again recognized Amazon as a top corporate purchaser of carbon-free power, with a portfolio that adds significant new clean energy to grids.
Amazon’s clean energy projects now span more than 700 global initiatives. These include utility-scale solar and wind farms, battery storage, onsite solar, and other carbon-free energy sources across 28 countries.
So far, Amazon has invested in over 40 gigawatts (GW) of carbon-free energy capacity. This amount of power could supply the annual electricity needs of more than 12.1 million U.S. homes if it were used for residential demand.
These investments make Amazon not just a buyer of clean power for itself, but a major driver of new renewable energy build-out around the world.
From First PPA to 40GW Global Portfolio
Amazon’s renewable energy footprint has expanded rapidly over the past decade. The big tech company was the biggest corporate buyer of renewable energy in 2025, based on BloombergNEF data. It signed multiple power purchase agreements (PPAs) and grew its clean energy portfolio.
- Amazon has backed over 700 wind and solar projects around the world. This clean energy can power more than 12.1 million U.S. homes each year.
This expansion includes utility-scale wind and solar farms. It also covers renewable energy bought through PPAs. Additionally, it features on-site rooftop and ground-mount solar projects at Amazon facilities.
Over time, these efforts have helped the tech giant use more clean energy for its electricity, which is a key part of its climate strategy.
Solar, Wind, Storage — and Next-Gen Power
Amazon’s clean energy portfolio includes a broad mix of technologies:
- Solar power: 300+ utility-scale solar and wind farms and 300+ onsite solar projects.
- Wind energy: Large wind farms in multiple countries, with 6 offshore wind farms in Europe.
- Energy storage: Battery storage projects that help balance intermittent renewable output. It has 11 utility-scale battery storage projects.
- Emerging technologies: Amazon has invested in advanced options like nuclear small modular reactors (SMRs), with 4 nuclear power agreements. These help provide firm, low-carbon baseload power.
These investments help replace fossil fuel generation on local grids. They also support grid reliability and reduce electricity costs over the long term.
In Mississippi, for example, Amazon worked with a utility to enable 650 megawatts (MW) of new renewable energy on the grid. Once operational, this capacity will serve the equivalent of over 150,000 homes and improve grid reliability.
Moreover, the company’s 253 MW Amazon Wind Farm Texas contributes around 1,000 GWh of clean power annually. Meanwhile, its European solar and wind assets alone total about 4,600 MW of capacity.
All these efforts form part of the e-commerce’ push for its 2040 net zero targets.
Powering the Path to Net Zero 2040
Amazon has set multiple climate and sustainability targets. The company aims to reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2040 — a goal it committed to early as part of The Climate Pledge.
To work toward that long-term target, Amazon set a goal to match its electricity use with renewable energy. It reached 100% renewable electricity for its operations ahead of schedule, well before its original 2030 goal.
This means Amazon is purchasing an amount of renewable electricity equal to its total annual consumption. Clean power comes from renewable projects connected to the grid. These projects are supported by long-term PPAs and other contracts.
The renewable energy purchases lower Amazon’s Scope 2 emissions, which come from the electricity it buys. They also help decarbonize the grids where the company operates.
Corporate Buyers Now Rival National Grids
Amazon’s clean energy efforts are part of a larger shift across the corporate world.
Since 2008, companies have bought almost 200 GW of renewable energy worldwide through corporate PPAs and other agreements. This capacity exceeds the total electricity generation of some countries, like France or the United Kingdom.
In 2023, companies revealed a record 46 GW of clean energy deals. These renewable power commitments support new solar and wind farms.
Large tech companies, including Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and Meta, are some of the most active buyers. Those tech firms accounted for a significant share of corporate clean energy procurement over the last decade.
This trend shows that corporate demand can speed up the clean energy shift by providing renewable power developers with long-term revenue certainty.
Jobs, Grid Stability, and Market Transformation
Corporate clean energy procurement, though slowed down in 2025, has broader economic and energy-system impacts. Investments in renewable projects contribute to job creation, local economic growth, and grid resilience.
Amazon’s solar and wind farms create many construction and operation jobs. They also boost the economy in rural areas. For example, the Great Prairie Wind Farm in Texas has 350 wind turbines. These turbines provide over 1,000 MW of capacity and are one of the largest assets in Amazon’s portfolio.
Also, Amazon’s clean energy deals boost renewable capacity. These projects are in Brazil, India, China, Australia, and Europe, which support markets with different grid mixes. These projects can cut down on fossil fuel-based electricity. They also help local grids stay cleaner and stronger.
Permitting, Policy, and the Next Growth Wave
Despite strong progress, corporate clean energy procurement still faces challenges.
Renewable projects often depend on grid capacity, permitting, and supportive policy frameworks. In some regions, complex regulations or limited grid access can slow project development and clean energy adoption.
Nevertheless, the trend of corporate power purchasing is expected to grow. Data from the Clean Energy Buyers Association (CEBA) shows that U.S. businesses have signed contracts for 100 GW of clean energy. This milestone highlights how important companies are in today’s energy landscape.
Global renewable capacity is also expanding rapidly. According to IRENA, global renewable power capacity reached 4,448 GW at end-2024 after adding a record 585 GW. That’s 15.1% growth with solar leading 75%+ of additions. The 2025 additions are expected to maintain record growth toward the 2030 tripling goal.
Renewables are now growing faster than fossil fuels in new capacity. Looking ahead, strong demand from companies for clean energy will boost growth. Better policies and tech advancements will also help renewable power buying and grid decarbonization.
Private Capital Driving Public Energy Changeaction
Amazon’s clean energy leadership shows how corporate buyers can influence the global energy transition. By securing large portfolios of renewable power, the tech giant and other major corporations are investing in the future of clean electricity. These investments not only help reduce their own emissions but also fund new clean energy capacity that benefits broader society.
As corporate renewable procurement grows, so does the clean energy market. This can lower costs, stimulate innovation, and increase the pace of emission reductions across power systems worldwide.
With more companies setting clean energy goals and signing long-term agreements, the private sector continues to be a powerful force in the shift toward a low-carbon economy.
- READ MORE: Amazon Expands Its Carbon Credit Strategy with Lower-Carbon Fuel and Superpollutant Solutions
The post Amazon Tops Global Clean Energy Rankings With 40GW Renewable Projects Says BNEF appeared first on Carbon Credits.
NVIDIA’s latest earnings report shows the scale of the AI boom. The chipmaker reported record revenue and became the fourth U.S. tech company to exceed $100 billion in annual profit. Alongside financial growth, Nvidia continues to push renewable energy use and efficiency gains. The results highlight the growing link between AI expansion and sustainability challenges.
NVIDIA reported record revenue of $68.1 billion for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2026, ending January 25, 2026. This figure was up 73% from a year earlier and up 20% from the prior quarter. Data center sales, which fuel artificial intelligence (AI) growth, were $62.3 billion, or about 91% of total revenue in the quarter.
For the full fiscal year, NVIDIA posted $215.9 billion in revenue, a jump of 65% from the prior year. Net income reached tens of billions, $120,067 million for the full year and $42,960 for the 4th quarter. Earnings per share also grew significantly.
These results exceeded most analysts’ expectations and underscored NVIDIA’s continued leadership in AI compute hardware. The company also forecast strong revenue for the first quarter of fiscal 2027.
NVIDIA’s Sustainability Commitments at a Glance
NVIDIA has increasingly highlighted its environmental and sustainability goals in recent years. For the fiscal year 2025, the company achieved 100% renewable energy use for all offices and data centers it directly controls.
The renewable supply came from a mix of:
- On-site generation
- Purchased renewable electricity
- Energy attribute certificates (EACs)
- Power purchase agreements (PPAs)
This milestone eliminates the company’s market-based Scope 2 emissions tied to electricity use in those facilities.
While operational emissions from electricity have been addressed, total emissions figures remain complex. NVIDIA reported that its total greenhouse gas emissions increased. This includes Scope 3 emissions linked to its supply chain and purchased goods. Scope 3 emissions accounted for the bulk of its emissions inventory, and they rose significantly year-over-year.
NVIDIA has also incorporated science-based targets and reduction plans into its public disclosures. The company aims to cut direct (Scope 1) and electricity-related (Scope 2) emissions by about 50% by 2030. This is based on its baseline figures. These science-based targets are consistent with internationally recognized climate frameworks.
Beyond energy use, NVIDIA has implemented other environmental actions. Closed-loop liquid cooling systems in data centers help cut water use. Also, there are significant increases in recycling electronic waste each year.
AI Performance Per Watt: NVIDIA’s Efficiency Edge
NVIDIA’s technology can influence emissions well beyond its own operations. The company’s GPUs and systems power AI infrastructure around the world. Many of these systems are designed to be energy efficient.
For example, NVIDIA-based systems dominate rankings of the most energy-efficient supercomputers globally. The Green500 list ranks systems based on energy efficiency.
Many top entries use NVIDIA GPUs, especially the advanced Grace Hopper architecture. These systems deliver high computing performance per watt of power, helping labs and data centers run complex workloads with less energy.
Record Profits, Cautious Market Reaction
Despite the strong financial performance, NVIDIA’s share price movement highlights market nuances. Some reports noted that after an initial uptick in after-hours trading, the stock’s gains flattened or reversed. This response came even as NVIDIA beat revenue and profit expectations.
Analysts point to broader concerns about the valuation of high-growth AI stocks. Investors are cautious despite strong earnings. They worry about how fast AI demand will grow and whether valuations show future risks.
In early 2026, NVIDIA’s stock had also seen uneven performance year-to-date. Some analysts believe the trading pattern after earnings shows sector sentiment more than the company’s actual results.
NVIDIA’s profit scale also stands out compared with other major U.S. tech firms. For fiscal year 2026, the tech giant reported $120 billion in net income. This made it the fourth U.S. tech company ever to exceed $100 billion in annual profit, joining Alphabet, Apple, and Microsoft.
- NVIDIA’s result trails only Alphabet’s $132 billion profit in 2025, which remains the largest annual profit ever recorded by a U.S. company.
The speed of NVIDIA’s rise is also notable. Just three years ago, the company’s annual net income was $4.4 billion. In its most recent quarter, the chipmaker generated that amount in less than 10 days.
By comparison, Apple took 18 years to grow from $5 billion in annual profit to $112 billion, beginning around the launch of the iPhone in 2007. Microsoft took 27 years to move from $5 billion to more than $100 billion in annual profit. Alphabet first crossed the $100 billion mark in 2024. NVIDIA hit this milestone in under three years. CEO Jensen Huang pointed out the company’s AI gains in May 2023.
Efficiency Gains vs. Expanding Energy Footprint
NVIDIA’s external ESG ratings are similar to those of other tech companies for environmental and governance metrics. However, the scores vary in social and supply chain areas. These ratings consider things like how well companies disclose information, their plans for cutting emissions, and their governance. They also look at challenges related to wider supply chain emissions.
One sustainability ranking highlighted a “paradox” in NVIDIA’s performance. It noted that NVIDIA’s chips are among the most energy-efficient in the world, which boosts its sustainability profile. The quick rise in total energy use for AI infrastructure is increasing overall environmental impacts. This happens even as per-unit efficiency improves.
NVIDIA’s renewable energy goals and efficiency gains have positioned it as a leader. It combines strong finances with sustainable growth. For instance, in a 2026 list of top firms for sustainable growth, NVIDIA stood out. It achieved 100% renewable energy for its offices and data centers. Plus, its GPU platforms are energy efficient.
Can AI Hypergrowth Align With Climate Targets?
NVIDIA’s sustainability strategy focuses on three key areas:
- Reducing direct and indirect emissions.
- Improving energy use.
- Enhancing reporting transparency.
The company has achieved important goals. It now uses renewable energy for its facilities. It has also improved chip efficiency. These steps show progress toward environmental goals.
Still, rising Scope 3 emissions and the booming demand for AI compute make tackling environmental impacts more complex. NVIDIA’s sustainability reports highlight that energy use in data centers is a major barrier. This limits both digital infrastructure growth and climate progress.
Energy-intensive “AI factories” — large data centers running training and inference workloads — require large power supplies, often on par with traditional industrial factories. This growth in demand puts pressure on energy systems to shift toward low-carbon sources.
NVIDIA’s efforts to work with suppliers on emissions targets and its investments in energy efficiency aim to address parts of this challenge. But the company has not yet announced a full net-zero emissions target with a fixed date.
So, What Comes Next for NVIDIA?
In the near term, NVIDIA will likely continue to be a focal point for both earnings performance and ESG debate. Future earnings releases and sustainability reports will show whether the company’s actions keep pace with its growth.
Investors and stakeholders will watch how NVIDIA manages AI demand, emissions challenges, and energy efficiency together.
On the sustainability side, developing and reporting progress on Scope 3 emissions, supplier engagement, and potential net-zero pathways will shape ESG evaluations. As AI energy use rises worldwide, companies like NVIDIA will face more scrutiny over how they balance growth with their emissions and climate impact.
Overall, NVIDIA’s record earnings and sustainability efforts highlight its role in tech innovation and environmental change. The company balances rapid AI growth with a commitment to lowering its environmental impact.
The post NVIDIA Hits Almost $216 Billion Revenue as AI Boom Tests Its Climate Strategy appeared first on Carbon Credits.
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