The Daily Caller hosted its first live event Tuesday with ClearPath Action, and leading experts discussed “The Future of American Energy.”
Kenny Stein, Vice President for Policy at Institute for Energy Research, discussed the history of renewable energy subsidies with Daily Wire News Foundation Associate Editor Nick Pope.
Tuesday’s discussion centered around the origin of renewable energy subsidies and the “Big Beautiful Bill’s” potential impact on American energy. (RELATED: Experts Discuss Urgent State Of American Energy In Daily Caller Live Event)
Stein specializes in domestic and international energy policy, environmental regulation and policy, the electric grid and various other topics, according to his IER bio.
The subsidies were meant to last for a short period of time when they were first implemented, Stein said. But like many government programs, they have remained intact, he added.
While Stein said the “argument for subsidies has long since passed,” he noted the government has continued to approve arguments for their extension since 2015.
In 2022, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) was signed into law by former President Joe Biden to codify the benefits.
Stein said it would be ideal for the subsidies to be repealed, but today’s political landscape makes that goal difficult to attain.
“Unfortunately, energy policy has become extremely partisan and extremely polarized, and there is not a lot of agreement, even in the margins on both sides,” he said.
Stein said the subsidies have set back progress in America, specifically when it comes to infrastructure and growth in urban areas. He said a change in energy laws could improve this problem.
“It takes way too long to build things in this country, and that’s not just energy infrastructure — that’s roads, housing, dams, everything,” Stein said. “But that requires a pretty fundamental restructuring of environmental laws.”
Stein pointed to European nations which previously turned to “clean” energy sources to power their nations, but now must depend on countries like France that operate on nuclear power.
Drawing on that example, Stein said it is important for individual states to manage how they produce energy, rather than depending on the federal government for regulation. (RELATED: Democrats Blame Grid Operator For Energy Crisis Of Their Own Making)
“It’s important that the investment structure is based on what makes the most sense for a given place, not based on what a state government is mandating or subsidizing, and not what the federal government is subsidizing,” Stein said. “Too much of our energy investment right now is subsidy harvesting rather than planning for the future.”
While Stein said changes to the grid plan could make prices higher in the short term, he said prices would likely decrease as energy reliability becomes more stable in the long term.
“There’s been a lot of technological development, just in the last couple of years, and even in things like AI and the cloud, there’s a lot of opportunity there to improve the function of the grid in a way that would improve reliability.”
The Institute for Energy Research (IER) is a non-profit organization that researches energy operations in domestic and foreign governments.
