How clean energy tax credits can lower your energy bills
by Elissa Tennant
One of President Donald Trump’s first actions in office was to declare a “national energy emergency” in the U.S. In the executive order outlining this declaration, the White House stated high energy prices are a result of America’s reliance on foreign energy and hostility from outside nations, and that these high prices indicated an energy emergency.
But in reality, are we actually in an energy crisis?
An energy crisis typically involves supply shortages, high prices, or threats to infrastructure. It’s usually driven by grid instability, coal plant closures, fuel shortages, and growing power demand. Both sides of the political aisle have argued for and against the term “energy crisis” with no clear conclusion.
At the very least, Americans agree there is a real and growing demand for electricity that we need to meet to avoid rising electricity rates and destabilized power supply. We need to build energy that is affordable, fast to deploy, and pushes toward energy independence while lowering household expenses for everyday people. So, how do we do that?
Why is my electric bill so high?
The national energy emergency declaration is correct in stating that energy prices are rising. Homeowners (and renters) are seeing record-high electricity bills. Causes of these price spikes include:
- Rising fuel costs (especially natural gas).
- Rising costs to build energy infrastructure, stemming from inflation, tariffs, and high interest rates.
- Increased demand due to extreme weather events, especially heatwaves.
Regional causes are also contributing to high prices. For example, in California, measures to harden against and recover from climate-worsened wildfires are also driving up electricity rates. Frustration from rising prices is driving many people to seek out and consider new energy solutions.
The best solution to encourage energy independence and lower prices? It’s simple: Encourage more clean energy and efficiency upgrades. Clean energy tax credits make green upgrades more affordable while supporting the fight against climate change.
Clean energy is the cheapest source of energy
The cost of clean energy has come down dramatically over the last decade. As clean energy deployment grows, companies learn how to bring down costs through efficiencies and technological advancements.
Solar and wind are now the lowest-cost sources of new electricity generation in many parts of the U.S., even beating out natural gas and coal. These renewable energy sources are good for the climate, air, water, and the health of American citizens. Once installed, they have zero fuel costs, which means zero surprise price hikes.
Federal and state incentives (mainly tax credits) are encouraging people and companies to invest in renewable energies. As a result, the economics of energy now favor clean energy, which can generally be deployed faster than fossil fuel-based energy systems. With these credits in place, grid operators and companies are now incentivized to choose clean energy sources that are cheaper and faster to build.
Clean energy tax credits are critical to getting new clean energy solutions implemented at the speed and scale we need. Implementing these sources of energy benefit us individually and collectively, both economically and climate-wise.
Clean energy solutions that could lower your energy bills
While it’s important that companies invest in clean energy on a larger scale, there are steps individuals can take as well. There are clean energy tax credits available that make it cheaper for people to buy the clean energy upgrades they need (like heat pumps, induction stoves, and electric vehicles). The following options, backed by incentives, help put America on the path to a full transition to clean energy while avoiding future energy emergencies.
Invest in home solar panels
Home solar panels reduce or even eliminate electricity bills over time. And with net energy metering, households have the option to sell excess power back to the grid at a profit.
Install an electric heat pump
Heat pumps use less energy to heat and cool your home. They are an ideal solution for areas with extreme temperatures. Heat pumps do some of their best work in very hot summers and freezing cold winters.
Weatherize your home
“Weatherizing” your home is an umbrella term for small upgrades that can improve your home’s energy efficiency. It includes activities like getting an energy efficiency assessment, improving insulation, upgrading windows and doors, and just adjusting ventilations systems.
For more clean energy incentives available in your state, check out DSIRE’s Database of State Incentives for Renewables & Efficiency®.
Tax credits make clean energy affordable for everyone
Clean electricity tax credits aren’t just for homeowners. While they help everyday people afford energy upgrades, they also promote the supply of clean energy in general.
Recall that, unlike fossil fuels, solar and wind power have no fuel costs. Once they’re built, the energy they produce is much cheaper. Tax credits make it easier for developers to build critical large-scale wind and solar projects, which lower electricity rates.
The more clean energy we build, the less we rely on volatile fossil fuel markets — which means fewer price spikes during global crises or extreme weather. According to energy analysts, regions with more renewables on the grid often experience more stable (and lower) electricity prices over time.
Expanding the supply of clean energy on the grid also helps push down wholesale electricity prices, which can lower the rates utilities charge consumers. Utilities can pass on the savings from cheaper clean electricity to ratepayers, especially in states where regulatory bodies require cost-based pricing.
Saving money while saving the planet
Clean energy is a smart, long-term investment, allowing us to save money while saving the environment. An abundant supply of renewable energy increases supply on the energy grid, reduces air pollution, and creates less of the carbon pollution that is overtaking the planet. At the same time, it increases our energy supply and reduces demand, saving you money on your energy bills.
With the right policies in place, any discussion of a “national energy emergency” can become a thing of the past. America has the potential for plenty of affordable wind, solar, geothermal, and nuclear power—we just need to build the political will to create and deploy this energy.
How to take action on climate change NOW
To move the U.S. to a clean energy economy, individuals, businesses, and policymakers collectively must work together and invest in and support clean energy initiatives.
These long-term solutions are what will truly protect the health of our climate, but you can also take action right now:
Volunteer for the environment locally
Talk to your friends and family about climate change
Electrify your home with clean energy
Write or Call Congress and let them know which clean energy policies you support
Attend one of our climate change conferences this year
Spread the word on social media
Support candidates and policies that advocate for clean energy infrastructure and permitting reform
Share this blog
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The post How clean energy tax credits can lower your energy bills appeared first on Citizens' Climate Lobby.
Drought and heatwaves occurring together – known as “compound” events – have “surged” across the world since the early 2000s, a new study shows.
Compound drought and heat events (CDHEs) can have devastating effects, creating the ideal conditions for intense wildfires, such as Australia’s “Black Summer” of 2019-20 where bushfires burned 24m hectares and killed 33 people.
The research, published in Science Advances, finds that the increase in CDHEs is predominantly being driven by events that start with a heatwave.
The global area affected by such “heatwave-led” compound events has more than doubled between 1980-2001 and 2002-23, the study says.
The rapid increase in these events over the last 23 years cannot be explained solely by global warming, the authors note.
Since the late 1990s, feedbacks between the land and the atmosphere have become stronger, making heatwaves more likely to trigger drought conditions, they explain.
One of the study authors tells Carbon Brief that societies must pay greater attention to compound events, which can “cause severe impacts on ecosystems, agriculture and society”.
Compound events
CDHEs are extreme weather events where drought and heatwave conditions occur simultaneously – or shortly after each other – in the same region.
These events are often triggered by large-scale weather patterns, such as “blocking” highs, which can produce “prolonged” hot and dry conditions, according to the study.
Prof Sang-Wook Yeh is one of the study authors and a professor at the Ewha Womans University in South Korea. He tells Carbon Brief:
“When heatwaves and droughts occur together, the two hazards reinforce each other through land-atmosphere interactions. This amplifies surface heating and soil moisture deficits, making compound events more intense and damaging than single hazards.”
CDHEs can begin with either a heatwave or a drought.
The sequence of these extremes is important, the study says, as they have different drivers and impacts.
For example, in a CDHE where the heatwave was the precursor, increased direct sunshine causes more moisture loss from soils and plants, leading to a drought.
Conversely, in an event where the drought was the precursor, the lack of soil moisture means that less of the sun’s energy goes into evaporation and more goes into warming the Earth’s surface. This produces favourable conditions for heatwaves.
The study shows that the majority of CDHEs globally start out as a drought.
In recent years, there has been increasing focus on these events due to the devastating impact they have on agriculture, ecosystems and public health.
In Russia in the summer of 2010, a compound drought-heatwave event – and the associated wildfires – caused the death of nearly 55,000 people, the study notes.
The record-breaking Pacific north-west “heat dome” in 2021 triggered extreme drought conditions that caused “significant declines” in wheat yields, as well as in barley, canola and fruit production in British Columbia and Alberta, Canada, says the study.
Increasing events
To assess how CDHEs are changing, the researchers use daily reanalysis data to identify droughts and heatwaves events. (Reanalysis data combines past observations with climate models to create a historical climate record.) Then, using an algorithm, they analyse how these events overlap in both time and space.
The study covers the period from 1980 to 2023 and the world’s land surface, excluding polar regions where CDHEs are rare.
The research finds that the area of land affected by CDHEs has “increased substantially” since the early 2000s.
Heatwave-led events have been the main contributor to this increase, the study says, with their spatial extent rising 110% between 1980-2001 and 2002-23, compared to a 59% increase for drought-led events.
The map below shows the global distribution of CDHEs over 1980-2023. The charts show the percentage of the land surface affected by a heatwave-led CDHE (red) or a drought-led CDHE (yellow) in a given year (left) and relative increase in each CDHE type (right).
The study finds that CDHEs have occurred most frequently in northern South America, the southern US, eastern Europe, central Africa and south Asia.
Threshold passed
The authors explain that the increase in heatwave-led CDHEs is related to rising global temperatures, but that this does not tell the whole story.
In the earlier 22-year period of 1980-2001, the study finds that the spatial extent of heatwave-led CDHEs rises by 1.6% per 1C of global temperature rise. For the more-recent period of 2022-23, this increases “nearly eightfold” to 13.1%.
The change suggests that the rapid increase in the heatwave-led CDHEs occurred after the global average temperature “surpasse[d] a certain temperature threshold”, the paper says.
This threshold is an absolute global average temperature of 14.3C, the authors estimate (based on an 11-year average), which the world passed around the year 2000.
Investigating the recent surge in heatwave-leading CDHEs further, the researchers find a “regime shift” in land-atmosphere dynamics “toward a persistently intensified state after the late 1990s”.
In other words, the way that drier soils drive higher surface temperatures, and vice versa, is becoming stronger, resulting in more heatwave-led compound events.
Daily data
The research has some advantages over other previous studies, Yeh says. For instance, the new work uses daily estimations of CDHEs, compared to monthly data used in past research. This is “important for capturing the detailed occurrence” of these events, says Yeh.
He adds that another advantage of their study is that it distinguishes the sequence of droughts and heatwaves, which allows them to “better understand the differences” in the characteristics of CDHEs.
Dr Meryem Tanarhte is a climate scientist at the University Hassan II in Morocco, and Dr Ruth Cerezo Mota is a climatologist and a researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. Both scientists, who were not involved in the study, agree that the daily estimations give a clearer picture of how CDHEs are changing.
Cerezo-Mota adds that another major contribution of the study is its global focus. She tells Carbon Brief that in some regions, such as Mexico and Africa, there is a lack of studies on CDHEs:
“Not because the events do not occur, but perhaps because [these regions] do not have all the data or the expertise to do so.”
However, she notes that the reanalysis data used by the study does have limitations with how it represents rainfall in some parts of the world.
Compound impacts
The study notes that if CDHEs continue to intensify – particularly events where heatwaves are the precursors – they could drive declining crop productivity, increased wildfire frequency and severe public health crises.
These impacts could be “much more rapid and severe as global warming continues”, Yeh tells Carbon Brief.
Tanarhte notes that these events can be forecasted up to 10 days ahead in many regions. Furthermore, she says, the strongest impacts can be prevented “through preparedness and adaptation”, including through “water management for agriculture, heatwave mitigation measures and wildfire mitigation”.
The study recommends reassessing current risk management strategies for these compound events. It also suggests incorporating the sequences of drought and heatwaves into compound event analysis frameworks “to enhance climate risk management”.
Cerezo-Mota says that it is clear that the world needs to be prepared for the increased occurrence of these events. She tells Carbon Brief:
“These [risk assessments and strategies] need to be carried out at the local level to understand the complexities of each region.”
The post Heatwaves driving recent ‘surge’ in compound drought and heat extremes appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Heatwaves driving recent ‘surge’ in compound drought and heat extremes
Greenhouse Gases
DeBriefed 6 March 2026: Iran energy crisis | China climate plan | Bristol’s ‘pioneering’ wind turbine
Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.
This week
Energy crisis
ENERGY SPIKE: US-Israeli attacks on Iran and subsequent counterattacks across the Middle East have sent energy prices “soaring”, according to Reuters. The newswire reported that the region “accounts for just under a third of global oil production and almost a fifth of gas”. The Guardian noted that shipping traffic through the strait of Hormuz, which normally ferries 20% of the world’s oil, “all but ground to a halt”. The Financial Times reported that attacks by Iran on Middle East energy facilities – notably in Qatar – triggered the “biggest rise in gas prices since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine”.
‘RISK’ AND ‘BENEFITS’: Bloomberg reported on increases in diesel prices in Europe and the US, speculating that rising fuel costs could be “a risk for president Donald Trump”. US gas producers are “poised to benefit from the big disruption in global supply”, according to CNBC. Indian government sources told the Economic Times that Russia is prepared to “fulfil India’s energy demands”. China Daily quoted experts who said “China’s energy security remains fundamentally unshaken”, thanks to “emergency stockpiles and a wide array of import channels”.
‘ESSENTIAL’ RENEWABLES: Energy analysts said governments should cut their fossil-fuel reliance by investing in renewables, “rather than just seeking non-Gulf oil and gas suppliers”, reported Climate Home News. This message was echoed by UK business secretary Peter Kyle, who said “doubling down on renewables” was “essential” amid “regional instability”, according to the Daily Telegraph.
China’s climate plan
PEAK COAL?: China has set out its next “five-year plan” at the annual “two sessions” meeting of the National People’s Congress, including its climate strategy out to 2030, according to the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post. The plan called for China to cut its carbon emissions per unit of gross domestic product (GDP) by 17% from 2026 to 2030, which “may allow for continued increase in emissions given the rate of GDP growth”, reported Reuters. The newswire added that the plan also had targets to reach peak coal in the next five years and replace 30m tonnes per year of coal with renewables.
ACTIVE YET PRUDENT: Bloomberg described the new plan as “cautious”, stating that it “frustrat[es] hopes for tighter policy that would drive the nation to peak carbon emissions well before president Xi Jinping’s 2030 deadline”. Carbon Brief has just published an in-depth analysis of the plan. China Daily reported that the strategy “highlights measures to promote the climate targets of peaking carbon dioxide emissions before 2030”, which China said it would work towards “actively yet prudently”.
Around the world
- EU RULES: The European Commission has proposed new “made in Europe” rules to support domestic low-carbon industries, “against fierce competition from China”, reported Agence France-Presse. Carbon Brief examined what it means for climate efforts.
- RECORD HEAT: The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has said there is a 50-60% chance that the El Niño weather pattern could return this year, amplifying the effect of global warming and potentially driving temperatures to “record highs”, according to Euronews.
- FLAGSHIP FUND: The African Development Bank’s “flagship clean energy fund” plans to more than double its financing to $2.5bn for African renewables over the next two years, reported the Associated Press.
- NO WITHDRAWAL: Vanuatu has defied US efforts to force the Pacific-island nation to drop a UN draft resolution calling on the world to implement a landmark International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling on climate, according to the Guardian.
98
The number of nations that submitted their national reports on tackling nature loss to the UN on time – just half of the 196 countries that are part of the UN biodiversity treaty – according to analysis by Carbon Brief.
Latest climate research
- Sea levels are already “much higher than assumed” in most assessments of the threat posed by sea-level rise, due to “inadequate” modelling assumptions | Nature
- Accelerating human-caused global warming could see the Paris Agreement’s 1.5C limit crossed before 2030 | Geophysical Research Letters covered by Carbon Brief
- Future “super El Niño events” could “significantly lower” solar power generation due to a reduction in solar irradiance in key regions, such as California and east China | Communications Earth & Environment
(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)
Captured
UK greenhouse gas emissions in 2025 fell to 54% below 1990 levels, the baseline year for its legally binding climate goals, according to new Carbon Brief analysis. Over the same period, data from the World Bank shows that the UK’s economy has expanded by 95%, meaning that emissions have been decoupling from growth.
Spotlight
Bristol’s ‘pioneering’ community wind turbine
Following the recent launch of the UK government’s local power plan, Carbon Brief visits one of the country’s community-energy success stories.
The Lawrence Weston housing estate is set apart from the main city of Bristol, wedged between the tree-lined grounds of a stately home and a sprawl of warehouses and waste incinerators. It is one of the most deprived areas in the city.
Yet, just across the M5 motorway stands a structure that has brought the spoils of the energy transition directly to this historically forgotten estate – a 4.2 megawatt (MW) wind turbine.
The turbine is owned by local charity Ambition Lawrence Weston and all the profits from its electricity sales – around £100,000 a year – go to the community. In the UK’s local power plan, it was singled out by energy secretary Ed Miliband as a “pioneering” project.
‘Sustainable income’
On a recent visit to the estate by Carbon Brief, Ambition Lawrence Weston’s development manager, Mark Pepper, rattled off the story behind the wind turbine.
In 2012, Pepper and his team were approached by the Bristol Energy Cooperative with a chance to get a slice of the income from a new solar farm. They jumped at the opportunity.
“Austerity measures were kicking in at the time,” Pepper told Carbon Brief. “We needed to generate an income. Our own, sustainable income.”
With the solar farm proving to be a success, the team started to explore other opportunitie