Granholm: Climate Law Repeal Would Be ‘malpractice’

Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said Wednesday that the U.S. is “not going to stand by” and allow China to fully dominate production of technologies such as solar panels, electric vehicles and low-carbon steel.

“It’s a fight and we’re in it,” she said about competition with China, speaking at the POLITICO Energy Summit in Washington. Federal incentives and tax credits for clean energy will help U.S. industry compete, she said.

The Biden administration is racing to get billions of dollars out the door from the Inflation Reduction Act and the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law before the November election and a potential return of President Donald Trump to the White House. POLITICO reported in April that the Biden administration had disbursed less than 20 percent of new climate, energy, and infrastructure funding authorized by Congress in four massive laws during his presidency.

The IRA’s hundreds of billions of dollars in energy tax breaks have also unleashed a flood of private investments in projects such as electric car and battery factories, though many of those plans are also proceeding slowly.

“We may have gone to a few groundbreakings, but we haven’t gone to a huge number of ribbon cuttings yet because it takes a while to build the actual factories,” Granholm said. At the same time, she said that progress is being made. The Department of Energy, for example, is providing technical assistance to states that have applied for energy rebates, with announcements coming this summer, she said.

She said it would be “political malpractice” for Republicans to repeal the climate law, which is producing jobs in GOP-dominated states districts.

The Biden energy agenda has spurred $120 billion in clean energy investments, creating more than 100,000 jobs, according to clean energy group E2. At DOE, nearly $100 billion is expected to subsidize projects on hydrogen energy, carbon capture and sequestration, battery storage and a range of other technologies.

At the summit, Granholm urged congressional action to speed up permitting for energy projects, which would address needs such as a vast expansion of the electric grid required to accommodate new technologies.

But she also said forecasts of surging electricity demand have been a “little overhyped. “We have the tools to be able to address this,” she said, referring to technologies such as so-called virtual power plants.

Granholm also reiterated that DOE plans to wrap up a contested pause on new liquified natural gas exports by early next year.

In late January, DOE froze approvals of new LNG export permits — a move that was praised by environmentalists and condemned by fossil fuel supporters. DOE is now conducting an economic and climate analysis on LNG that will help inform future decisions to approve or deny exports.

Granholm said that review would be complete likely by the end of the year. The total process will be done in the first quarter, she said.

In 2023, U.S. gas exports averaged 11.9 billion cubic feet per day — a 12 percent increase over 2022, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Granholm also lauded the increase of electric vehicles on U.S. roads, despite polling data this week showing a majority of Americans do not support EV incentives.

“We are very bullish,” she said. “We think we’re going to have 50 percent of new cars sold by 2030 to be electric vehicles.”