David M. Hart

The FY 2023 budget request signals America’s commitment to sustaining bipartisan momentum for clean energy innovation. Congress should seize this opportunity to accelerate domestic clean energy industries and shape the U.S. response to climate change.

Technologies to capture and store carbon must be part of the arsenal to fight climate change. To deploy them at scale, policymakers should expand federal incentives, increase RD&D for traditional and novel technologies, and expedite permitting and siting of requisite infrastructure.

The U.S. Department of Energy’s new Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations is a tremendous step forward for innovation and must become a permanent fixture in the federal structure. DOE needs time right now to build up the new office systematically, and over the next few years its funding must grow rapidly, so that it can drive a steady stream of innovations ready to be scaled up nationally and globally.

The Biden administration and Congress should adopt innovation uptake policies to ensure that the remarkable products of federal investment and American ingenuity are not left moldering on the shelf.

The Biden administration entered office in January 2021 with soaring ambitions.

Allies and partners like the United States, the EU, the United Kingdom, and Canada should avoid destabilizing trade frictions that threaten to derail much-needed climate progress and instead work toward a collaborative climate innovation club.

Technological innovation is essential for fighting climate change, but the global clean energy innovation system is not healthy enough to drive it as quickly as it is needed.

To meet growing global demand for energy services while averting the worst consequences of climate change, the world must accelerate clean energy innovation. Western Europe contributes most to this global process. The United States has faltered. And China has a long way to go.

The bipartisan infrastructure package is consistent with recommendations that ITIF and Columbia University’s Center for Global Energy Policy co-published a year ago—providing a significant boost for critical technology areas such as carbon capture, carbon removal, and industrial decarbonization.

Levying carbon tariffs is a difficult and counterproductive way for nations with ambitious climate policies to create a level playing field for their higher-cost industrial sectors. A more workable solution would be to design a flexible open-trade club for climate innovators.

An integrated clean manufacturing strategy will pay dividends for both the economy and the global environment.

The United States needs an integrated national strategy to address the twin challenges of bolstering its manufacturing sector and averting climate change. Timely federal RD&D and deployment policies targeted to specific manufacturing industries could create comparative advantage, expanding domestic investment and employment.