During his 2024 campaign, President-elect Donald Trump talked about repealing the Inflation Reduction Act, but local environmental advocates expect much of the funding that was part of the act to be protected.
The 2022 legislation represents the largest single federal investment in clean energy in U.S. history. It set aside more than $300 billion dollars for projects, tax credits and subsides across the country.
Two-thirds of Inflation Reduction Act money has been spent, but it’s hard to predict what will happen to the rest under the new Trump administration, said Dana Kuhnline, program director of Reimagine Appalachia, an economic and environmental coalition focused on the Ohio River Valley.
"I could see some of them want climate smart agriculture, but they don't want urban reform or urban tree planting to help a through cavity canopy and prevent urban communities from becoming dangerously hot," she said.
According to the U.S. EPA, Ohio has benefitted from nearly 300 million dollarsin clean energy investments, and in Northeast Ohio, the Inflation Reduction Act supported investments in solar energy, gas appliance replacement programs and more.
"The money that is out can't be taken back," Kuhnline aid. "A lot of those impacts of those historic bills is going to be safe because the funds have been distributed."
Though the remaining federal dollars set to be handed out, either through the Inflation Reduction Act or the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, will be harder to predict, Kuhnline said.
In 2023, 109,000 families in Ohio have benefited from more than $150 million in tax credits that lower the cost of clean energy upgrades at home, according to the U.S Department of the Treasury.
Clean energy investments will likely continue, since they benefit the country’s economy, Kuhnline said, but the community-first approach under the Biden administration may change under the new Trump administration and Republican-controlled U.S. Senate.
"I really worry about communities and workers just getting completely cut out of the equation and having any say in … their lives and their livelihoods and what comes next," she said.
Kuhnline said she’s also concerned about worker safety and fair wages as clean energy development continues and how that relationship might change with the defeat of Sen. Sherrod Brown on Tuesday.
He really understood Ohio communities, Ohio economy, all of the really complex things that come when you have a region that has been hit hard by the coal industry downturn [and] by our manufacturing downturn," she said. "It's really heartbreaking to see a person who is such a champion with such a deep understanding and commitment to working class people, to workers, loses his seat."
Reimagine Appalachia is prepared to work with Sen.-elect Bernie Moreno and other representatives, Kuhnline said, first on the Farm Bill, then on issues like climate resilience and worker safety.
