Preston Brashers, Andrew Weiss
While Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency garner most of the media attention, they aren’t the only ones rooting out federal waste and bloat. Currently, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin is fighting to claw back $20 billion the Biden administration allocated to the “Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund.”
This fund essentially operates a “green bank” that lends money to environmental projects unable to attract private funding.
This may sound like a fine program, but as Mr. Zeldin knows, reliable diets of taxpayer subsidies cause companies to develop a dependence, eventually killing their ability to fend for themselves.
Even the best-intentioned programs can render an industry unable to survive without government support. And the $9 trillion in global subsidies for wind and solar over the past 20 years are a prime example of this.
Our Energy Crisis Has a Nuclear Solution
When former President Biden signed into law the Infrastructure and Jobs Act and the Inflation Reduction Act, he allocated hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars to renewable energy. Without such subsidies, wind and solar wouldn’t be commercially viable at anywhere near their current scale.
Normally, competition and price signals establish a balance between energy supply and demand. But subsidies distort price signals, disrupting that natural balance. Ultimately, they drive unsubsidized companies out of business, making the industry less cost-conscious and more focused on chasing subsidies.
Worse, overreliance on so-called renewable energy also makes the grid less reliable. The higher the share of intermittent energy sources on the grid, the harder it becomes to match supply with demand.
Take solar power, for example. It abounds during the day, but is lacking in the evening—the exact time when people typically want to cook, run dishwashers, power up their computers, and take showers.
Relying on a high share of energy from solar power results in an oversupply of power during daylight hours. » Read More
https://www.heritage.org/energy/commentary/trump-administration-puts-subsidized-green-energy-companies-diet