Recording and comments: Anniversary of the US Inflation Reduction Act

A recording of today’s media briefing on the anniversary of the US Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and the impacts for the US, EU and UK is available to download via this link: https://we.tl/t-ywyFHhaulh

Comments from panellists are also available below. If you have any questions or would like to contact any of the speakers, please do let us know.

Emma Pinchbeck, Chief Executive of Energy UK:

“The IRA has been a game changer for the investment landscape. The UK’s world-leading role in the development of clean energy has given us strengths in terms of expertise and experience - but we have no divine right to this position. With growing global competition for private investment that can choose its location, a failure to respond will see us quickly fall behind and jeopardise ambitious targets for increasing our own sources of clean energy and decarbonising our whole economy. While we can’t necessarily replicate what the US has done, resting on our laurels and successes so far would be a very serious mistake.”

Johanna Lehne, Programme Lead, E3G:

“While the UK watches from the sidelines, the US and EU are ramping up industrial strategy investments in a bid to capture green growth markets and compete with China. The UK government has argued that it lacks the spending power to respond in kind but on this front it can learn from the EU’s response. Beyond scaling up green subsidies, the EU has deployed a set of regulatory levers to back nascent industries, scale up technologies and send strong market signals, all of which are available to the UK.

“The UK has a broad range of tools and valuable assets in the form of its regulatory framework and its expertise on net-zero technologies, through which it could still lead and drive the green transition in key supply chains. But it must act quickly, or risk being left behind, just as the race to net zero gets underway.”

Munir Hassan, Partner and Head, CMS Energy & Climate Change Group:

"One year on from the US passing the Inflation Reduction Act, it is showing results with investment and jobs – particularly, interestingly, in traditionally Republican states. In response, we have seen the EU gearing up their own green industrial policies – albeit building on pre-existing frameworks and so remaining more complex than the uncapped tax incentives offered by the US legislation. One thing that the IRA can be credited with is in spurring investment on both sides of the Atlantic in green energy during an energy crisis that might have otherwise slowed it down. It only remains to be seen whether the UK will step up its recent clean technology investment record, to keep pace with these two huge economies."

Mike Williams, Senior Fellow, Centre for American Progress:

“The Inflation Reduction Act changed everything. It put the U.S. on a path to meeting its commitments, kickstarted massive domestic investments in clean energy, and set the stage for other nations to ramp up their own investment agenda.”

ENDS

For more information or for interview requests:

George Smeeton, Head of Communications, ECIU, Tel: 07894 571 153, email: george.smeeton@eciu.net