How to build the next wave of clean energy | Jennifer Granholm, Ryan Panchadsaram

Jennifer Granholm says the clean-energy transition has moved from an era of invention to one of construction: building projects and manufacturing technologies at scale. She says the U.S. added 50 gigawatts of clean power to the grid by the end of 2024, an amount she compares to 25 Hoover dams, while the Energy Information Administration projected 70 gigawatts of additions that year. Deployment is continuing despite reduced federal support for wind and solar, with private-sector investment leading. Tax credits remain for geothermal, batteries, hydroelectric power and nuclear energy.

Granholm points to the Inflation Reduction Act as an industrial strategy that combined support for supply and demand to create a clean-technology ecosystem. By the end of 2024, she says, it had prompted announcements of 950 factories coming to or expanding in the U.S., 400,000 jobs and more than $400 billion in investment; 450 factory announcements involved electric vehicles, batteries or EV assembly. Those figures are announcements, not proof that all the projects have been completed. She argues that policy must help projects get built quickly enough for communities to experience the benefits, and notes that some IRA rules were not written until December 2024. A possible Inflation Reduction Act 2.0, she says, could incorporate lessons from the first law.

For U.S. competitiveness, Granholm emphasizes public-private partnership, domestic production of next-generation clean-energy technologies, and stronger links between manufacturing, innovation and research and development. She also argues that communities left behind must share in the resulting prosperity. Supply chains should be diversified rather than dependent on a single source, she says, recalling dependence on oil moving through the Strait of Hormuz, natural gas after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and technology. In her view, clean-energy manufacturing can support both economic opportunity and greater security.

The reduction in electric-vehicle tax credits has changed the earlier projection that EVs would reach 50% of new U.S. vehicle sales by 2030, Granholm says. Automakers need policy partnership and certainty rather than repeated reversals. She notes that some responded to the removal of credits by converting EV-battery production to long-duration energy storage batteries. Among the technologies she is watching are long-duration storage, advanced solar, virtual power plants that aggregate distributed energy resources, and fusion. She says AI and focused execution might allow the U.S. to build faster than China, but she is uncertain whether it can build more cheaply. Buyers might accept a security premium to avoid relying on one supplier, she says, while cost and continuous improvement remain important.

Granholm expects the U.S. to have an opportunity to rejoin the Paris Agreement in January 2029 and rebuild relationships with allies. She says allies are uncomfortable with the possibility of China dominating clean technology while the U.S. is absent, and calls for clean-energy cooperation through buyers’ clubs and trusted supply chains. On data centers, she says about 150 moratoria have been passed across the country, many to allow time to establish guardrails. Those should address clean-energy or capacity provision, who pays for grid upgrades, the risk of stranded assets, and local impacts such as water use and noise. Host communities should also receive tangible benefits, potentially including home batteries, EV subsidies, attractive site design or help with energy bills.

Granholm’s emphasis on local benefits reflects her concern for places that have lost factories, including a Michigan refrigerator factory that moved to Mexico. She cites 50,000 communities that lost factories in the first part of the century and says the country failed them by walking away. Investment in clean-energy manufacturing, AI-related opportunities and retraining can help, she argues. She also calls for AI governance that includes testing, independent validation, crisis shutdown scenarios, international safety arrangements and congressional action. The International Atomic Energy Agency’s treaties, inspections, validation and safety measures offer lessons, she says, while acknowledging that AI differs from nuclear power.