Through the Inflation Reduction Act, the U.S. has Started to Tackle the Climate Crisis
Two years ago, Vice President Kamala Harris cast the tie-breaking vote in favor of passing the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), and President Joe Biden signed into law one of the signature achievements of their administration. Among its key provisions, the IRA contains the greatest investments in history for tackling the climate crisis through financing America’s transition to a clean energy economy.
We are now seeing the first two years of results from those historic investments, including these milestones:
- Last year, 3.4 million Americans benefited from $8.4 billion in Inflation Reduction Act tax credits to lower the cost of clean energy and energy efficiency upgrades in their homes – significantly outpacing projections of the popularity of the tax credits in just the first year they were available.
- Since January 2024, more than 250,000 Americans have claimed the IRA’s electric vehicle tax credit, saving these buyers about $1.5 billion in total.
- Since the IRA was enacted, companies have announced more than $265 billion in clean energy investments in the United States. Economically distressed areas will benefit the most, with 75% of those investments planned for counties with lower than median household incomes.
- Clean energy investments under the Biden-Harris Administration are creating more than 330,000 new jobs.
“While taking on the climate crisis and lowering utility bills for families, [the IRA] is helping us to rebuild American manufacturing and drive American innovation,” said Vice President Harris. She noted that the IRA is creating well-paying union jobs, “furthering economic opportunity, and contributing to the nearly $900 billion of private-sector investment since President Biden and I took office.”
Tackling the Climate Crisis in NC
Just last week, the North Carolina League of Conservation Voters Foundation (NCLCVF) joined national, state, and local leaders in Chatham County to celebrate some of these investments benefiting local homeowners, in a “front porch ribbon cutting” hosted by Rewiring America, Energy Funds for All, and Climate Power. Climate advocates gathered at the home of Vickie Atkinson and Ped Frazier in Chatham County for the event.
The Chatham County family are among the “more than 3.4 million American families [who] benefitted from $8.4 billion in tax credits to lower the costs of clean energy and energy efficiency upgrades to their homes during 2023.”
“I am very concerned about the extreme weather that climate change is causing. The heat waves we’ve had this summer have just been brutal,” said Atkinson. “I worry about heat exhaustion every time Ped goes out to the garden, and gardening is his favorite thing to do.”
Frazier calculated that their new Ford Escape plug-in hybrid will save nearly a thousand dollars every 2 years. “Saving money is nice,” he said, “but if you ask why we did this, I would tell you it’s because of my grandchildren. The newest one, Henry, is here right now, 4 months old. I feel immense sadness when I think about what Henry’s life could be like if we don’t get climate change under control.”
Still a Long Way to Go
Despite these concrete, quantified clean energy economy results, the Trump-Vance ticket continues to falsely claim that the IRA is “shipping jobs to China”—when it is actually creating jobs in the United States. For spreading this whopper of a false claim, the Washington Post Fact-Checker awarded Trump’s vice-presidential running mate, JD (Junior Deceiver) Vance, its dreaded “Four Pinocchios” falsehood rating.
Climate action is on the ballot this November. Let’s turn out and elect local and national leaders who will continue to tackle the climate crisis.
