Do Green Energy Subsidies Work?

 Like the Jeopardy! game show, green energy subsidies have been Congress' answer to every energy policy question.

Congress has not been the only institution shoveling subsidies to green energy.

Enacting subsidies required to offset the distortions caused by other subsidies is surely one definition of economic insanity.

The economic costs of these subsidies are borne by taxpayers, who must finance the additional deficit spending; electric ratepayers who, despite claims that renewable energy resources are less costly than traditional generating resources, have seen their electric rates soar; and drivers, who pay more for gasoline and diesel fuel as refineries have closed or been modified to produce subsidized biofuels.

As for green energy subsidies spurring the development of new, lower-cost clean technologies, there is nothing new about wind and solar generation that receives the lion's share of subsidies.

The overwhelming majority of green energy subsidies reward politically powerful constituencies and businesses whose primary purpose is not to build better energy mousetraps but to build only ones that qualify for the largest subsidies.

With the country deeply in debt, wasting hundreds of billions of dollars on subsidies for green energy, as the Inflation Reduction Act calls for, is an idea whose time is long past.

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2024/09/04/do-green-energy-subsidies-work/