2025 was a horrible yr for local weather politics. The vitality transition nonetheless had an excellent one.

[ad_1] It’s been a tough yr for those who care about local weather change coverage in the USA.

In Washington, the second Trump administration has moved rapidly to dismantle the scaffolding of federal local weather motion: pulling the US out of the Paris Settlement ( again ), freezing or clawing back clear vitality funding, fast-tracking fossil gasoline initiatives, and even threatening the legal foundation of federal climate regulation itself .

With the assistance of Elon Musk’s so-called Division of Authorities Effectivity, whole climate, science, and conservation programs have been gutted, public servants fired, and climate language scrubbed from federal websites . And simply final week, the administration moved to dismantle the Nationwide Middle for Atmospheric Analysis — arguably the world’s most vital climate-science analysis establishment that touches almost each nook of US climate and local weather forecasting, from wildfire modeling to the computational spine universities depend on.

So after we revealed Escape Velocity again in April — a mission arguing that the clear vitality transition had gathered sufficient financial and technological momentum to develop into successfully unstoppable — it was honest to wonder if that thesis may survive this onslaught.

The previous eight months recommend it may.

Wanting again on the interval since we revealed the mission, what’s stunned me most isn’t how a lot went mistaken — it’s how a lot progress stored occurring anyway. Listed below are seven developments from 2025 which have me feeling looking forward to our future.

• Even with the Trump-era rollbacks, clear vitality continued to develop as a result of it’s now cheaper, sooner, and structurally tough to cease.

• World wide, photo voltaic, wind, batteries, and EVs are profitable on value — which implies adoption not will depend on local weather advantage or pleasant governments.

• The world isn’t ready for the US. China, Europe, and rising markets are driving the transition ahead, whether or not Washington participates or not.

• However even within the US, pink and blue states alike have stored increasing clear energy — typically for purely financial causes.

• This shift is sticky. Initiatives breaking floor now will form the grid for many years, locking in progress that future administrations can’t simply undo.

1) Renewables formally eclipsed fossil fuels globally

In 2025, the clear vitality transition crossed a line that can be exhausting to uncross. For the primary time, renewables overtook coal because the world’s main supply of electrical energy. Within the first half of the yr, photo voltaic, wind, and hydropower generated 34.3 % of worldwide electrical energy, edging previous coal’s 33.1 % — a quiet however historic turning level. Simply as placing, photo voltaic and wind didn’t merely develop alongside rising demand — they met it entirely . As world electrical energy use rose about 3 %, photo voltaic and wind growth covered 100 percent of that improve, with photo voltaic alone supplying greater than 80 %.

The tempo of change has been startling. The world added 380 gigawatts of latest photo voltaic capability in just six months — a 64 % bounce from the identical interval in 2024 — placing 2025 on observe to shatter data but once more. What as soon as felt like “various vitality” is now the most affordable, quickest energy humanity has ever constructed.

Invoice McKibben captures this inflection level in his 2025 guide Here Comes the Sun , arguing that the actual breakthrough isn’t a brand new know-how, however the realization that the vitality transition is lastly operating on economics, not idealism. The solar, it seems, is doing precisely what it all the time has — and finally, we’re prepared to make use of it.

If Purpose 1 is that the transition crossed a threshold, Purpose 2 is who pushed it there: China has turned clear vitality into the default world possibility.

China is now the single most important force within the world clear vitality transition. It's putting in huge quantities of photo voltaic, wind, and battery storage at residence — however simply as importantly, it has pushed manufacturing prices so low that clear vitality is affordable almost everywhere else . (Let’s even be clear that that is all occurring as China continues to take extra of an all-of-the-above strategy — boosting coal and natural gas capacity, too. )

That’s why rooftop photo voltaic is spreading quickly throughout Europe, South Asia, and the World South. It’s why batteries are getting cheaper. And it’s why many nations not face a stark alternative between local weather motion and vitality entry.

3) Coal is shedding — even the place it as soon as appeared untouchable

A world transition solely issues if it exhibits up within the hardest locations. In 2025, it did.

Poland, one in every of Europe’s most coal-dependent nations, generated more electricity from renewables than from coal for the primary time in June. Coal additionally fell under 50 % of Poland’s electrical energy combine for a whole quarter — a symbolic and materials break from the previous.

In the meantime, within the UK, coal has all but disappeared from the grid, whereas wind has develop into the nation’s single largest energy supply. Sadly, within the US, nonetheless, the Trump administration is making an attempt something it may to avoid wasting coal, which is starting to modestly slow down its rate of decline here .

Coal demand nonetheless reached a document excessive in 2025, nevertheless it’s clear that we're at or nearing the peak . The long run prognosis is terminal: Coal is dying just because it’s shedding the maths.

4) With out Trump actually noticing, the states turned the spine of US local weather motion

Regardless of aggressive rhetorical and coverage attacks on renewables, photo voltaic continues to dominate new electrical energy technology in the USA. And photo voltaic vitality is the star of 2025: By early December, photo voltaic accounted for roughly 75 percent of all new generation put in this yr, far outpacing wind, fuel, and nuclear.

We are able to thank the states for that.

In 2025, states handed clear vitality affordability legal guidelines, modernized grids, invested in transit, expanded photo voltaic entry, repealed coal bailouts, launched heat-pump rebates, and defended initiatives beneath federal assault.

From Illinois and Maine to Nebraska, Ohio, and Oregon, progress got here not from sweeping nationwide laws however from dozens of smaller — and arguably extra sturdy wins.

And the place it will get actually fascinating is in Trump country . This yr, 80 % of US photo voltaic manufacturing funding went to Republican-held districts, and many of the high solar-installing states now vote pink. Texas leads as photo voltaic growth within the state is on observe to produce more electricity on the state’s power grid than coal for the primary time. Florida, Georgia, Arkansas, and others are close behind . Of the 20 states that put in probably the most photo voltaic capability since 2024, 14 of them voted for President Donald Trump final yr, and there is now more solar capacity put in in Trump states than in states that voted for former Vice President Kamala Harris.

All of which means that, mockingly, we’re really within the midst of a growth dash.

States across the country are racing to fast-track wind and solar projects earlier than Trump’s rollback of federal clear vitality tax credit takes full impact. The credit, created beneath the Inflation Discount Act, minimize mission prices by 30 to 50 %, making them “the monetary spine of almost each renewable vitality mission presently within the pipeline,” stated Patty O’Keefe of Vote Photo voltaic.

Since Trump ended the credit in July, states together with Colorado, Maine, California, New York, Oregon, and Minnesota have accelerated allowing, procurement, and grid connections to assist builders break floor earlier than the July 4, 2026, construction deadline .

These initiatives will preserve producing energy for many years, that means immediately’s scramble will completely tilt the vitality system barely extra towards renewables, no matter what occurs in Washington subsequent.

5) Electrical autos are gaining traction. Sure, actually.

This yr, a couple of in 4 new vehicles bought globally was at the very least partially powered by an electrical motor.

That surge wasn’t led by the USA and even Europe, however by rising markets — particularly in Southeast Asia — the place EVs have gotten the plain alternative for brand new consumers. Globally, more than 25 percent of latest vehicles bought thus far this yr have been both an EV or plug-in hybrid.

In keeping with a brand new report revealed this week by world vitality assume tank Ember, which analysed out there month-to-month knowledge for 60 nations, new markets are making a fast change to plug-in autos, placing to mattress the speculation that EV adoption would stall outdoors of Europe and China.

Within the US, the story is messier, with coverage uncertainty slowing adoption of extra environment friendly vehicles. However globally, the course is evident: automakers are designing for an electric future as a result of that’s the place the shoppers are.

For years, critics dismissed wind and photo voltaic as unreliable. In 2025, battery storage lastly made that argument really feel outdated.

The US hit record-breaking storage installations this yr, with utility-scale batteries strengthening grids and absorbing low-cost renewable energy when it’s considerable — then delivering it when it’s wanted. Growing applied sciences are already extending lifespans and chopping prices; photo voltaic mixed with battery storage and wind with battery storage as a combo deal are even on observe to undercut fossil fuels in value worldwide earlier than the top of the last decade.

That is what makes renewables infrastructure, not simply vitality sources.

7 ) The Knowledge Middle elephant within the room

Okay, okay — by this level within the story, I do know what you’re considering: What about knowledge facilities???? Isn’t the insatiable buildout of AI going to derail any constructive developments?

It’s true that knowledge facilities are sprouting up throughout the American panorama like weeds. As of November 2025, the US had constructed 5,427 data centers — with capability up by more than 40 percent for the reason that begin of 2025 — making it the world’s largest knowledge heart market by a major margin. As knowledge heart demand explodes, corporations more and more depend on renewables like photo voltaic and wind by energy buy agreements — however as a result of these sources are intermittent, builders are pairing them with battery storage and, extra typically, natural gas plants to provide round-the-clock reliability . In apply, which means knowledge facilities are pulling closely on clear vitality the place out there, whereas leaning on fossil fuels, particularly fuel, to ensure fixed energy as grids and storage wrestle to maintain up.

However there’s even a silver lining right here: Because the grid wants an increasing number of vitality, grid operators are more and more seeking to construct out general capability with renewable vitality sources as a result of they're so low-cost.

After which there’s additionally one thing fascinating occurring that makes me really feel hopeful about local weather activism: As AI-driven knowledge facilities unfold throughout the U.S., group backlash is rising — and quick. This seems like a objective that the environmental motion, which has appeared unmoored for fairly a while now, may glom onto. In locations like suburban Philadelphia, Michigan, Georgia, and Virginia, residents are organizing against massive data centers over issues about rising electrical energy payments, air pollution, and noise.

Power prices are already spiking for American consumers , and group opposition has delayed or canceled almost $100 billion in initiatives thus far. What’s placing is how bipartisan and native the resistance is — and the way politically potent it’s turning into. Knowledge facilities are turning summary local weather and vitality points into tangible, neighborhood-level fights , providing local weather activism a brand new, concrete goal with broad public enchantment.

And simply final week, Bernie Sanders, the impartial senator from Vermont, proposed a moratorium on new data centers as a result of he says synthetic intelligence is coming alongside too rapidly and we want time for “democracy to catch up.”

The larger story is hopeful — nevertheless it’s not over but

None of this implies the local weather battle is gained. Clear vitality is rising quick, however not but quick sufficient to keep away from critical hurt. Infrastructure bottlenecks stay. Inequities persist. And US political sabotage carries actual prices.

However the clear vitality transition not will depend on a single election, a single nation, or a single president. It’s being pushed by economics, know-how, and world demand — forces which can be far tougher to reverse than a regulation.

The USA could also be selecting to surrender its head begin. The remainder of the world isn’t ready.

And each megawatt we construct anyway nonetheless issues — as a result of each fraction of a level we keep away from is lives saved, futures preserved, and disasters that by no means occur.