Republicans Rebel Against Trump’s Renewables Crusade

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THE TOP FIVE

1. Two Republican senators push back on Trump’s renewables assault

Two top GOP senators are pushing back on President Donald Trump’s executive order aimed at severely restricting access to tax credits for renewables before a phaseout begins next year. Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley and Utah Senator John Curtis placed holds on three Trump nominees to the Treasury Department, the agency in charge of writing the rules and guidance for the tax provisions of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

Grassley had negotiated a “glidepath for an orderly phaseout” of tax credits for wind and solar, he said in placing the hold, giving developers until next July to start construction on projects. But in an apparent concession to hard-line Republicans in the House of Representatives, Trump signed an executive order days after the bill became law calling for a new guidance to restrict what it means to start construction. As my colleague Matthew Zeitlin wrote yesterday, the executive order “has generated understandable concern within the renewables industry” ahead of the deadline in two weeks for the Internal Revenue Service to issue its new guidance. A more restrictive interpretation of what “begin construction” means “could turn the tax credit language into a dead letter,” Matthew reported. Grassley warned that, “until I can be certain that such rules and regulations adhere to the law and congressional intent, I intend to continue to object to the consideration of these Treasury nominees.”

2. New Jersey makes history with PFAS payout win

Chemicals giants Chemours, DuPont, and Corteva agreed Monday to pay out $875 million over the next 25 years to support communities affected by pollution from “forever chemicals,” The New York Times reported. New Jersey officials called this the biggest environmental settlement ever achieved by a single state. As part of the deal, the companies are required to fund the cleanup of four former industrial sites, create a remediation fund of up to $1.2 billion, and put $475 million aside to guarantee the remediation goes forward even if any of the companies go bankrupt. Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, typically shortened to PFAS, are called “forever chemicals” because they accumulate in water and in human bodies and never leave. They are linked to all kinds of kidneys and testicular cancer, high cholesterol, and liver damage. “PFAS are particularly insidious,” New Jersey Attorney General Matthew J. Platkin said in a statement. “These dangerous chemicals build up and accumulate everywhere, and New Jersey has some of the highest levels of PFAS in the country.”

As my colleague Jeva Lange has written, “The United States Geological Survey estimates that as much as 20% of Americans drink, bathe, and brush their teeth with PFAS-contaminated water.” During his first administration, Trump promised to crack down on PFAS. But in May, his Environmental Protection Agency delayed enforcement of federal drinking water limits until 2031, and said it would reconsider rules completed under the Biden administration.

3. Trump’s landmark law could halve residential solar installations

Just 7.5% of suitable owner-occupied residential homes in the United States had installed rooftop solar panels as of the end of 2024. With tax credits and support from the Biden administration’s policies, that segment would have grown by 9% per year over the next five years to reach an adoption rate of 13% nationwide by 2030. But of course, Trump won the election and passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Now new data from the consultancy Wood Mackenzie show that residential solar capacity could fall by 46% below those previous projections. That’s due in part to the new federal policies directly, but it also takes into account the potential for no interest rate cuts over the next five years thanks to Trump’s larger economic agenda.

4. Tesla’s brand loyalty nosedives

For years, Tesla has cultivated a fandom akin to the cultish following around Apple products in the early 2010s. But since CEO Elon Musk entered the political sphere as a top surrogate for Trump last summer, brand loyalty for the electric automaker has plunged, according to new data the research firm S&P Global Mobility shared with Reuters. Using data gleaned from vehicle registrations in all 50 states, the report shows that Tesla’s customer loyalty peaked in June 2024, the month before Musk endorsed Trump. At that point, 73% of Tesla-owning households in the market for a new car bought another Tesla. By March, the rate had nosedived to 49.9%, just below the automotive industry average.

5. Brazil fights to keep deforestation protections as Big Oil eyes a win

Dead trees in the Brazilian Amazon. Mario Tama/Getty Images

During his first stretch in office in the early 2000s, Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva oversaw a miracle few developing countries had ever accomplished: He slashed deforestation while riding the global commodities boom to grow South America’s largest economy and lift millions out of poverty. Since returning to office in 2022, the left-wing leader better known as Lula sought once again to crack down on the destruction of the Amazon while expanding Brazil’s oil and gas production.

His government now faces an uncomfortable pivot point. His environment minister, Marina Silva, is battling legislation that would gut conservation rules in what the Financial Times called “the biggest potential setback to environmental protection in Brazil in four decades.” At the same time, British oil giant BP announced Monday its biggest oil and gas discovery in 25 years off the coast of Brazil. Striking the right balance is more important than ever as the 79-year-old Lula prepares for a tough reelection campaign next amid ratcheting tensions with Trump. Brazil is also the site of the next United Nations climate conference, COP30, which will take place in Belém in November.

THE KICKER

The global economic losses associated with the health costs of plastics pollution now top $1.5 trillion annually, according to a new paper in The Lancet. But the esteemed medical journal notes that the “continued worsening of plastics’ harms is not inevitable. Similar to air pollution and lead, plastics’ harms can be mitigated cost-effectively by evidence-based, transparently tracked, effectively implemented, and adequately financed laws and policies.”