What Has All This Back-and-Forth Climate Legislating Bought Us?

About this episode

The episode discusses the impacts of the Inflation Reduction Act and the One Big Beautiful Bill Act on U.S. carbon emissions.

When Congress passed the Inflation Reduction Act in 2022, researchers estimated it would cut U.S. carbon pollution by more than 40% by the mid-2030s. Then President Trump and a GOP majority partially repealed the law, and many of those emissions declines looked doubtful. What will U.S. carbon emissions look like after the One Big Beautiful Bill Act? We’re starting to get a sense. On this week’s episode of Shift Key, Rob talks with  John Bistline  and  Ryna Cui  about a new paper they coauthored modeling the Inflation Reduction Act and One Big Beautiful Bill Act’s combined effects. Bistline is the head of science at  Watershed  and a former researcher at the Electric Power Research Institute. Cui is a professor at the University of Maryland School of Public Policy and the research director for its Center for Global Sustainability. Shift Key is hosted by Robinson Meyer, the founding executive editor of Heatmap News. You can find a full transcript of the episode here . Mentioned: The new paper:  Impacts of the Inflation Reduction Act and One Big Beautiful Bill Act on the US energy system A  cheat sheet  on the energy policy changes in the…

People in this episode

Host: Robinson Meyer

Guests: John Bistline, Ryna Cui

Topics covered

• climate legislation
• carbon emissions
• Inflation Reduction Act
• energy policy
• sustainability

Keywords

• climate change
• carbon pollution
• U.S. emissions
• energy system
• policy analysis

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Watershed, Electric Power Research Institute, University of Maryland School of Public Policy, Center for Global Sustainability, Heatmap News

Books & works: Impacts of the Inflation Reduction Act and One Big Beautiful Bill Act on the US energy system, One Big Beautiful Bill Act

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