RIPTON, Vermont -- At a time when the Trump administration rolled back numerous environmental regulations while global temperatures and U.S.carbon pollution spiked, longtime climate activist Bill McKibben finds hope in something that didn't seem that strong on a recent single-digit-temperature day: the sun.That sun has provided him cheap power for 25 years, and this month he installed his fourth iteration of solar panels on his Vermont home.
In an interview after he set up the new system, he said President Donald Trump's stance against solar and other cheap green energy will hurt the GOP in this year's elections as electricity bills rise.After the Biden and Obama administrations subsidized and championed solar, wind and other green power as answers to fight climate change, Trump has tried to dampen those and turn to older and dirtier fossil fuels.The Trump administration froze five big offshore wind projects last month but judges this week allowed three of the projects to resume.
Federal clean energy tax incentives expired on Dec.31 that include installing home solar panels.
Meanwhile, electricity prices are rising in the United States, and McKibben is counting on that to trigger political change.“I think you’re starting to see that have a big political impact in the U.S.right now.
My prediction would be that electric prices are going to be to the 2026 election what egg prices were to the 2024 election,” said McKibben, an author and founder of multiple environmental and activist groups.Everyday inflation hurt Democrats in the last presidential race, analysts said.The Trump administration and a bipartisan group of governors on Friday tried to step up pressure on the operator of the nation’s largest electric grid to take urgent steps to boost power supplies in the mid-Atlantic and keep electricity bills from rising even higher.“Ensuring the American people have reliable and affordable electricity is one of President Trump’s top priorities,” said Whi...