Solar and wind power surging, while US doubles down on fossil fuels
The world has finally reached the point where clean renewable energy is cheaper on average than fossil fuels. In early 2025, for the first time ever, renewable energy sources generated more electricity than fossil fuels on a global scale, easily meeting or exceeding demand growth in most places.
As a result, total carbon emissions have plateaued. Solar and wind are leading the way. Spain and Austria are rapidly growing their hydroelectric production, and others such as India, Brazil, and Indonesia have been making substantial progress in replacing fossil fuels with biofuels. In Norway, 97% of new cars in 2025 were electric vehicles. Even wave and geothermal energy are emerging as viable options.
Despite this progress, the U.S. refuses to move away from fossil fuels in favor of greener forms of energy. In Trump’s new budget, the U.S. investment in clean energy has been drastically reduced. Tax credits for electric vehicles and for development of solar and wind power are being eliminated. The administration is gutting Environmental Protection Agency staffing, revoking crucial environmental regulations, and quitting dozens of international climate-saving pacts.
These regressive moves are a major blow to U.S. energy growth as domestic demand for electricity continues to rise and strain the existing system. Working-class consumers are already burdened with vulnerable and dangerous energy grids which they must pay ever higher rates to use. As a result, the International Energy Agency lowered their projection of U.S. renewable capacity growth by 50% compared to 2024.
Meanwhile, many U.S. corporations are following the federal government’s lead and retreating on their commitments to reduce environmental harm while increasing their green-washing propaganda. On Oct. 28, the very same day that Hurricane Melissa ripped through Jamaica with record-breaking wind speeds produced by atmospheric and oceanic warming, Bill Gates declared that climate change should be downgraded in importance. The hurricane caused an estimated $8.8 billion in damages and untold suffering.
Fossil fuel use kills
Burning coal pumps copious amounts of CO2 and other greenhouse gases directly into the atmosphere, causing temperature rise and generating acid rain, smog, and other forms of toxic air pollution. These emissions have very severe impacts on human health.
About nine million people worldwide are killed every year by the noxious emissions of carbon combustion (approximately 1 in 5 total deaths). Out of the five million schoolchildren in New Delhi, about half are believed to have permanent irreversible lung damage from growing up immersed in this noxious pollution.
For a long time, natural gas was touted as cleaner and greener than coal, but more recent research proves it is actually just as dangerous. Although natural gas combustion doesn’t release quite as much CO2 as coal, its extraction, processing, and transport are all prone to leaking methane (CH4), which traps heat about 80 times more effectively than CO2 — a huge impact on Earth’s warming.
Oil drives imperialism
Reliance on fossil fuels enriches some of the world’s richest capitalists and perpetuates nonstop war and genocide. There are already too many historic examples to cover here and the list keeps growing. The U.S. is now waging violent “interventions” in oil-rich Venezuela and Nigeria. Access to offshore oil is one of the main economic motivations of Israel’s U.S.-funded destruction and occupation of Gaza.
The U.S. doubling down on its addiction to fossil fuels spells nothing but disaster. Despite the overall gains being made internationally, the U.S. is still deliberately holding progress back solely in the interest of protecting and promoting the profits of the dirty energy industry.
While the positive advances on a global scale are encouraging, the climate situation remains extremely dire. The U.S. must stop backpedaling and take a much more aggressive shift away from fossil fuels. Instead of eliminating funding for the Navajo and Hopi Nations’ successful solar programs, scale that up for the whole U.S.!
Avoiding an eventual profit-driven climate apocalypse requires the U.S. to reverse course ASAP, heavily invest in cleaner sources of power, and put consumers and scientists in charge of energy decisions. In 2026 there is absolutely no valid reason not to. Literally the only thing standing in the way is the greedy American capitalist oil-industrial complex.