Investments in Clean Energy Take a Turn as Trump Takes Over
Since Trump gained power in the U.S., really there have been mixed feelings among citizens, as there would be after any presidential election. And, yes, Trump may have some different ways of dealing with things than that of what we are used to, much…
Since Trump gained power in the U.S., really there have been mixed feelings among citizens, as there would be after any presidential election. And, yes, Trump may have some different ways of dealing with things than that of what we are used to, much of what he has said has been blown out of proportion.
Many companies are increasing their investments in renewable energy projects. This includes retail giant, Walmart with its pledge to power half its operations by the wind, solar, and other renewables by 2025, and Microsoft with its biggest wind-power purchase agreement ever. But, Trump appears to be on the opposing end of the renewable energy scale and has vowed to cut all the attention from renewable energy policies such as the one’s previous president, Obama put in place. He also mentioned he would like to bring back coal mining. But, those companies dedicated to providing renewable energy solutions, will still continue to do so and there is very little Trump can do.
Thomas Emmons is a partner at Pegasus Capital Advisors and he says, “I think fears of a negative impact of Trump on renewable energy are really overblown.” One reason for this is because the best economic incentives come in the form of federal tax credits for the wind and solar projects and many companies rushed to get in before the expiry date at the end of last year. But then, Congress surprisingly extended the deals until 2021 for solar and 2019 for the wind. Renewable energy is big business and for Trump to simply dismiss it would be almost impossible.
Current signed purchase agreements for the wind and solar amount to more than $10 billion since 2008, and that will only increase over the next few years. Nathan Serota is a clean-energy analyst at BNEF (Bloomberg New Energy Finance), and he says, “With the government providing less support, more businesses may decide the best way to ensure clean-power projects get built to sign long-term purchase agreements. That way, renewable developers have a guaranteed customer, ensuring they can finance new projects.” So, it’s unlikely Trump will have as much as an effect as people may have first thought and that renewable energy programs won’t be going anywhere for a while
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Rachel Kowalski
Rachel Kowalski is the Cybersecurity Analyst at TrendinTech, where she covers vulnerabilities, ransomware, supply chain attacks, nation-state operations and the security rules shaping organizations in the United States and Europe. Before moving into journalism she worked as a threat intelligence analyst at a security vendor and later reported for CyberScoop and the security desk at Wired, covering the SolarWinds compromise and the ransomware wave that hit hospitals and pipelines. Rachel holds a Master of Science in Cybersecurity from the Georgia Institute of Technology and attends Black Hat and DEF CON in Las Vegas each year, where she follows research from the security community. She writes to make risks and countermeasures understandable to people who are not specialists.
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