What is the reasoning behind such a move? Is it just pure corruption (ie: Qatari plane and base) or is it something else?
> "Conservation advocates, local government leaders and nearby residents have expressed concerns about the cumulative environmental impacts of the proposed Esmeralda 7 project, which in addition to covering a huge swath of desert lands would have also included miles of roads and associated transmission lines."
> "They have argued for placing onshore utility-scale projects on previously disturbed sites and expanding the use of rooftop solar."
> "The Esmeralda 7 project “would have destroyed significant archaeology sites, rare plants, bighorn sheep habitat and wilderness quality lands,” said Kevin Emmerich, a co-founder of Nevada-based Basin and Range Watch."
> "The cancellation of the project “will give us a chance to protect the tremendous resources of the area, including beautiful and wild mountain ranges and valleys, rare plant populations, and bighorn sheep,” said Laura Cunningham, a biologist with Western Watersheds Project."
> "“Paleontological fossil beds [the Esmeralda Formation] here were formative to understanding the geological history of the Great Basin,” Cunningham added. “This is good news for recreationists and for conservation efforts of an amazing landscape.”"
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/10/10/trump-interior-depa...
Thats rich.
Nevada regulators just killed rooftop solar, through a first-in-the-nation implementation of a demand charge for residential customers. People who put solar on their roofs will still get hit with demand charges when the sun goes down and in the summer it’ll be $30-70/mo. Negating a significant portion of their anticipated solar savings.
The reasoning appears to be forcing politically-connected projects to be subject to the same environmental reviews as every other project, including other clean energy projects that are not politically connected. As a matter of principle I agree the rules should be uniformly applied.
If the environmental review process is that onerous, which it is, then we should reform the process for everyone rather than allow politically connected people buy waivers.
but we can hope
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/trump-pr...
I assume incumbents have been demanding compensation for their "stranded assets". eg All their "known" reserves of oil, heavily inflated, propping up their market caps.
Biden Admin's IRA had boondoggles (for incumbents) like carbon capture, hydrogen fuel, and e-fuels. I assume it was mostly plausibly deniable pork.
I know that you already know:
Yes, we need to massively to fund R&D for All The Things, for the draw down. Even the moonshots.
No, none of that moonshot nascent stuff will be mature enough to help us reach net-zero. It takes decades to progress from research to industrial build out. (Govt now has a technology readiness model to better guide investment. Sorry, I forget its official name.)
What the skeptics (eg of the rainbow colors of hydrogen) didn't grok is that climate crisis is a hostage negotiation. Pretending these unproven techs were mature is just laundering the extortion payouts.
Hilariously, IMHO, the incumbents were getting a better deal under the Biden Admin. All those execs have gone full Gordon Gecko, snatching a better (short-term) deal for themselves, to the detriment of shareholders.
Oh, the irony.
Assume we get another Democratic Admin. Prospects for another hostage release deal are much dimmer. Renewable will be that much further along. And after the incumbents burned all their goodwill by sabotaging the prior payout deal, methinks the Dems will want some scalps.
Coal will be fully dead. Accelerating deployment of solar + battery, despite the roadblocks, will moot grid related permitting reform. Consumers will demand much cheaper and better electrified products. Etc, etc.
Today, only natural gas generation is cheaper than solar + battery, and only because of subsidies and tariffs. At best, the current Admin is just delaying the inevitable. At worst, they've completely obliterated USA economy, manufacturing, GDP, etc for a generation.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/decl...
But they don't believe in solar which means they accidentally are making their claimed emergency worse and helping their fossil donors to make more money. Like Trump expressly promised to do in return for their donations.