Earlier today, National Public Radio’s Morning Edition ran a special feature on the Breakthrough Institute and our work on climate and energy policy. In case you missed it, you can listen to the story and read the article here:
Listen to NPR’s feature on the Breakthrough Institute
Since its founding, the Breakthrough Institute has worked to advance a progressive politics and policy agenda capable of overcoming climate change and unleashing a new era of prosperity and opportunity. For NPR listeners new to Breakthrough, we’ve posted a welcome page for you here.
NPR’s story comes at a critical moment for climate and energy policy. This Friday, the House will vote on the American Clean Energy & Security Act (ACES). Over the past month, the Breakthrough Institute has released 14 quantitative analyses of ACES. Our research shows that ACES would:
- Establish a non-binding emissions reduction target, not a binding cap, that would not require any emission reductions below the Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) business-as-usual (BAU) baseline for future emissions;
- Create an incentive for firms to use offsets rather than reduce their own emissions, which could keep U.S. emissions on the BAU trajectory — a conclusion also reached by EPA and CBO analyses;
- Establish a Renewable Electricity Standard that will not require greater renewables deployment in the U.S. and could allow renewable deployment to decrease against the BAU baseline — a conclusion confirmed by analysis from the Union of Concerned Scientists, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, and National Renewable Energy Laboratory;
- Invest roughly $1 billion annually in clean energy R&D — only one-fifteenth of the amount promised by President Obama and one-thirtieth of what energy scientists called for in an open letter to the President and Congress in 2007.
The prosperity and security of America and the world in the 21st century will depend in large part on the course of action we take now on climate change. Unfortunately, ACES is far too weak and creates too many incentives that could hinder future progress on climate mitigation. Breakthrough is committed to continually advancing a new policy framework based on direct public investments to make clean energy cheap — a strategy capable of achieving the clean energy revolution we need.
