Given America's political environment, you would be forgiven for thinking the country has slipped into a dark age of energy recidivism; burning oil, gas and coal left and right; and tossing wind and solar farms on the scrap heap.
In reality, this is looking a lot like a golden age for renewable energy in the
The country is on track to install nearly 85 gigawatts (GW) of electrical generating capacity in the next 12 months, according
to preliminary
Despite President Donald Trump's vigorous efforts to revive coal, the antiquated fuel will make up exactly 0% of the new capacity. In fact, the renewables boom is happening despite Trump's whole-of-government approach to pretending climate change doesn't exist, squashing clean energy and boosting fossil fuels (until they start to become too profitable for political comfort, anyway).
And between Trump's on-again, off-again attacks on
Fossil gas is still relatively plentiful, cheap and popular. But demand for gas turbines has stretched wait times out for
years. And a recent study by
It's little wonder, then, that solar and batteries made up 80% of the 53 GW of capacity the
This is all more evidence for the growing sense that renewables, contrary to what skeptics often claim, can stand on their
own without government support. In fact, the green businesses so derided by Trump and his fellow conservatives, including
clean energy, efficiency and water management, are now a $10 trillion global industry, according to a recent
Investors noticed long ago. Green stock market gauges like the S&P Global Clean Energy Transition Index consistently trounce the broader market. And cleantech companies pulled in $60 billion in equity funding in the first half of 2026, according to BloombergNEF, the best six months since the good old Inflation Reduction Act days of 2022.
Much of this enthusiasm comes from the AI boom and is therefore vulnerable to an AI bust. Planet-heating fossil fuels are still a dangerously large share of America's energy mix. But every new solar array or wind farm that gets built today might prevent another coal plant or gas turbine from being built next year. Time is money, and both are on the side of renewables right now.
Mark Gongloff is a Bloomberg Opinion editor and columnist covering climate change. He previously worked for Fortune.com, the Huffington Post and the Wall Street Journal. (COMMENT, BELOW)
Previously:
• New York's freak 'flash drought' will become less freakish
• U.S. finally taking Milton Friedman's advice
• No, having kids right now doesn't make you a 'moron'
• No, Virginia, your Christmas tree is not a climate crime