US DOE claims ‘green agenda’ risks ‘100 times’ more blackouts – industry disagrees

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Reddit
Email
Grid infrastructure in the US.
According to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA), 7.5GW of fossil fuel generation capacity was retired from the US grid in 2024. Image: ERCOT.

A report published by the US Department of Energy (DOE) this week claims that the previous government’s support for renewable energy could cause blackouts to “increase by 100 times” by 2030.

Renewable energy advocates and some members of Congress have disputed this and said that the Republican party’s decision to gut incentives for new solar and wind generation in its budget reconciliation bill, passed last week, will create power supply shortages and hamper US competitiveness in future industries.

This article requires Premium SubscriptionBasic (FREE) Subscription

Unlock unlimited access for 12 whole months of distinctive global analysis

Photovoltaics International is now included.

  • Regular insight and analysis of the industry’s biggest developments
  • In-depth interviews with the industry’s leading figures
  • Unlimited digital access to the PV Tech Power journal catalogue
  • Unlimited digital access to the Photovoltaics International journal catalogue
  • Access to more than 1,000 technical papers
  • Discounts on Solar Media’s portfolio of events, in-person and virtual

Or continue reading this article for free

‘Radical green agenda’

The DOE report was commissioned in response to an April executive order from president Donald Trump, which built on claims that the previous administration had created a “national emergency” in the US electricity grid.

The report claims that the US needs to expand coal and natural gas generation to avoid “a surge in power outages and a growing mismatch between electricity demand and supply”.

It says the “radical green agenda” of the Biden administration, which introduced tax credits for building and buying renewable energy and broadly incentivised clean power while beginning to phase out fossil fuels, will cause “unacceptable reliability risks” across the US.

“DOE’s analysis shows that, if current retirement schedules and incremental additions remain unchanged, most regions will face unacceptable reliability risks within five years and the nation’s electrical power grid will be unable to meet expected demand for AI, data centres, manufacturing and industrialisation,” the report said.

According to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA), 7.5GW of fossil fuel generation capacity was retired from the US grid in 2024. In the same year, solar PV alone added 50GW of new power supply, over six times the amount that was retired. A further 10.4GW of energy storage capacity was added, according to the EIA.

Last week, Congress passed the “One, Big, Beautiful Bill” act, which dramatically slashed federal support for renewable energy. CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), Abigail Ross Hopper, said; “In the face of rising energy costs, global instability, and growing demand for power, Congress has turned its back on the very industries that are adding the majority of the new electricity generating capacity to the grid.”

The DOE claimed: “Allowing 104GW of firm generation to retire by 2030—without timely replacement—could lead to significant outages when weather conditions do not accommodate wind and solar generation.”

The DEO report assumes 104GW of energy capacity retirements by 2030, to be replaced by 210GW of new generation, only 22GW of which will be “firm, reliable, dispatchable generation”.

Big, beautiful bill and AI demand

The tax reconciliation bill – known as the “One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act” and closely associated with the president’s agenda –  broadly dismantled the incentives for new renewable energy deployments.

The DOE’s report says that the US will fail to meet the demand from AI data centres without expanding its “firm generation” – by which it means coal and gas.  

Kristina Costa, an energy and climate policy expert in Washington DC and former White House advisor, disagrees. Speaking to reporters last month, Costa said that imposing red tape and limitations on renewable energy technologies “is going to crater investment in the electricity sector right when we need it the most.”

She said that data centres will represent a “large part” of US electricity demand growth over the next five years.

“What can we build a lot of in that time frame? Solar, wind and batteries. What can we not build a lot of in a five-year time frame? Natural gas. Which is seeing seven-year-long wait times for new turbines and rising costs across the board.”

She continued: “Geothermal takes 5-10 years. Nuclear takes 10-15.”

Costa said it was a “fallacy” that the US doesn’t need investment in “intermittent” generation like renewables and only needs “base-load” fossil fuels to power the AI boom. “This is a false choice and a false narrative. It ignores the reality of not only how long it takes to build new generation, [but also] the reality of how the grid operates today. Grids across the country have successfully integrated increasing shares of renewables which have actually increased reliability.

“And let’s be clear, the tech companies building AI understand this, too. With this legislation they know they’re not going to be able to build out AI at the scale they’re hoping for in the US, because they’re not going to be able to power it.”

Indeed, firms like Amazon, Meta and Google have been the biggest corporate buyers of solar energy in the US, to meet their data centre demand and decarbonise their operations.

A statement from the American Council on Renewable Energy (ACORE) on the reconciliation bill said: “We are in a global race – not just for clean energy leadership, but for dominance in the technologies that will define the future, including artificial intelligence. China is aggressively investing in clean energy and digital infrastructure because they understand that energy security and economic competitiveness go hand in hand. This bill should have matched that urgency.”

An executive order issued three days after the bill passed instructed the US Treasury to produce new, stricter rules on the solar and wind power projects which can qualify for tax incentives before they phase out. Sources speaking to PV Tech have suggested the order shows the White House’s ideological opposition to renewable energy.

DOE ‘illegally’ cuts solar, wind funds

The DOE has also suggested that it will cut funds allocated to solar and wind energy research and innovation projects, despite having been approved by Congress.

The DOE announced in a spending plan this week that it would cut solar technology funding by 87%, from US$318 million to US$41.9 million, and wind energy by 78% from US$137 million to US$29.8 million.

Democrat senator Patty Murray and Democrat congresswoman Marcy Kapture issued a joint statement on the DOE’s decision to “Illegally” cut the funding.

“This outrageous, unlawful decision by the Trump administration is a direct attack on our energy independence and American families’ ability to afford their monthly energy bill. By slashing congressionally mandated investments in cutting-edge technologies, President Trump is driving up energy costs and ceding ground to our global competitors, who certainly aren’t throwing in the towel on the energy solutions of the future. This isn’t a bureaucratic misstep—it’s a deliberate, partisan effort to sabotage bipartisan law and redirect funding to the energy sources favoured by Secretary Wright and his allies. We demand the Department immediately reverse this reckless decision and honour the funding levels Congress enacted and the President himself signed into law,” the statement read.

7 October 2025
San Francisco Bay Area, USA
PV Tech has been running an annual PV CellTech Conference since 2016. PV CellTech USA, on 7-8 October 2025 is our third PV CellTech conference dedicated to the U.S. manufacturing sector. The events in 2023 and 2024 were a sell out success and 2025 will once again gather the key stakeholders from PV manufacturing, equipment/materials, policy-making and strategy, capital equipment investment and all interested downstream channels and third-party entities. The goal is simple: to map out PV manufacturing in the U.S. out to 2030 and beyond.
21 October 2025
New York, USA
Returning for its 12th edition, Solar and Storage Finance USA Summit remains the annual event where decision-makers at the forefront of solar and storage projects across the United States and capital converge. Featuring the most active solar and storage transactors, join us for a packed two-days of deal-making, learning and networking.
16 June 2026
Napa, USA
PV Tech has been running PV ModuleTech Conferences since 2017. PV ModuleTech USA, on 16-17 June 2026, will be our fifth PV ModulelTech conference dedicated to the U.S. utility scale solar sector. The event will gather the key stakeholders from solar developers, solar asset owners and investors, PV manufacturing, policy-making and and all interested downstream channels and third-party entities. The goal is simple: to map out the PV module supply channels to the U.S. out to 2027 and beyond.

Read Next

July 10, 2025
German renewables company BayWa r.e. has secured a €3 billion (US$3.5 billion) loan for 'operational initiatives and pipeline expansion.'
July 10, 2025
US renewables developer Invenergy has launched commercial operations of 250MW Fairbanks Solar Energy Center in Sullivan County, Indiana. 
July 10, 2025
UbiQD has signed a supply agreement with First Solar to supply its fluorescent quantum dot technology for use in the latter’s PV panels.
July 10, 2025
The Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) has announced a new AU$60 million (US$39.4 million) funding round to bolster R&D efforts to achieve ultra-low-cost solar.
July 9, 2025
Caelux has finished the first sale of its perovskite glass, which will be paired with a silicon module developed by a 'reputable manufacturer'.
Premium
July 9, 2025
PV Talk: Jon Previtali of VDE Americas explains the hard science behind managing hail risk, one of the costliest sources of damage to PV projects.

Subscribe to Newsletter

Upcoming Events

Media Partners, Solar Media Events
September 2, 2025
Mexico City, Mexico
Solar Media Events
September 16, 2025
Athens, Greece
Solar Media Events
September 22, 2025
Bilbao, Spain
Solar Media Events
September 30, 2025
Seattle, USA
Solar Media Events
October 1, 2025
London, UK