electric vehicles
State Climate Programs Under Trump – Little Drama, Steady Progress
Ignoring Trump, state have continued work on achieving their climate targets.
Despite all the drama in D.C., state governments have continued to make quiet progress in their efforts to expand clean energy and phase out fossil fuels. These states are focused on tangible steps forward, not on capturing online clicks, so their efforts may escape notice. But the cumulative effect of these month-by-month, smaller-scale initiatives is significant.
CONTINUE READING“What We Do Matters:” UCLA’s Charging Ahead Symposium
States and cities have a lot of tools to cut vehicle pollution. It’s time to break them out.
Trump is a bump. A nasty one, but a bump nonetheless, because the world is on the road to zero-emission fuels and vehicles no matter what. That was one takeaway from “Charging Ahead,” the UCLA Emmett Institute’s annual symposium held on April 9 — devoted this year to cutting vehicle pollution during the next four …
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CONTINUE READINGLocal EV Leadership During Federal Withdrawal
The clean mobility transition is in local hands.
The federal landscape for electric vehicle (EV) investment is laden with pause and uncertainty. High-profile program discontinuations–both planned and executed–threaten to disrupt EV deployment efforts, while unpredictable tariffs interfere with drivers’ ability to afford vehicles. As local leaders work to reconcile ambitious transport decarbonization goals with the current lapse in federal climate leadership, public planners, …
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CONTINUE READINGShould Blue States Punish Tesla?
The political economy implications of how EV tax credits are distributed
In the wake of Elon Musk’s role in the new administration and its efforts to fire large numbers of federal employees, some Democratic state elected officials have called for rethinking EV subsidies to cut out Tesla. There is also evidence that Democratic state legislators have become much more hostile to Tesla lobbying. Matthew Yglesias, a …
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CONTINUE READINGWhy I Still ♥ IRA
Biden’s climate law has already had a dramatic impact.
With over a half-trillion dollars in clean tech investment to date, the Inflation Reduction Act has left an indelible mark on U.S. climate policy. It’s unlikely that Congress will vote to repeal the whole law, given massive investments in GOP congressional districts. But even if they did, there’s no undoing the investments already made.
CONTINUE READINGTariffs and Clean Energy: What You Need to Know
The effect of tariffs on energy markets is complex, and a lot depends on the details.
International trade economics is complicated, and we can’t be certain of how tariffs will work out, particularly in the long term when economies have fully adjusted to them. Trump’s hope is that the tariffs will cause a boom in U.S. production, although there is also evidence that protected industries are less efficient and innovative, resulting in higher consumer prices. Impacts on clean energy could be negative, The same is true for impacts on fossil fuels.
CONTINUE READINGTesla’s Trajectory
What do recent developments teach us about the world?
Recent news about Tesla sheds light on the company’s future, the global EV market, crony capitalism, not to mention the state of American democracy. It may also say something about Elon Musk’s role in the company. That’s a lot of information wrapped up in Tesla’s stock prices and related developments. Overall, this is good news for the environment but bad news for democracy.
CONTINUE READINGWhat does the election mean for the EV transition?
Slower, less certain, and less equitable–with a new focus on local leadership
The election of Donald Trump and a Republican Congress poses a direct threat to environmental protection and climate policy across the board, including destructive agency heads, reduced clean energy funding, abandoned international agreements, and more federal judges openly hostile to science-based regulation in service of public and environmental health. It’s a bleak outlook from any …
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CONTINUE READINGCalifornia’s Electric Car Culture
The state has been pushing EVs for over thirty years, with huge progress in the past five years.
California has been a leader in clean cars — the result of a long history of regulatory efforts. Here’s how we got where we are, and what will need to happen going forward.
CONTINUE READINGChina, Climate, and Clean Energy
China seems to have leap-frogged the U.S. on clean energy. We need to catch up.
In 2023, China accounted for about 60% of the world’s additions of solar and wind power, and of electric vehicles. The U.S. will need to make a major effort to catch up. Otherwise, we risk being shut out of important global markets and giving China an opening to influence developing countries.
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