Your Daily Dose of Climate Hope: June 25, 2025
The U.S. battery boom builds grid resilience!
The U.S. battery boom is keeping the grid stable during extreme heat.
Tell Congress to save U.S. battery industries!
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Reasons For Hope
As a new report from the leading Ember think tank finds that batteries have become so cheap and effective that they can store and dispatch enough solar energy to provide consistent power almost every hour of the year, the ongoing U.S. battery boom is keeping the national grid stable during extreme weather. From April 2024 through April 2025, U.S. grid-scale battery capacity increased by 40%, with about 180 new facilities coming online. In 2024, U.S. residential home battery storage increased by 64%.
Bloomberg reports that batteries’ ability to match supply to demand by arbitraging electrons across time is already preventing power outages during extreme heatwaves. It was likely a primary reason why there were no major blackouts in the U.S. in summer 2024, and when temperatures crossed 100°F in Texas on May 14, 2025, a day when many fossil gas plants were offline for maintenance, grid-scale batteries stepped up to keep the electricity flowing and the air conditioners on. As extreme heat continues to strike American communities, the unheralded workhorse that is grid-scale batteries will be more important than ever.
This is yet another case of abundant clean energy building resilience and directly benefiting U.S. households! We’re getting a big battery boom right when we need it most — but current federal policy is attempting to sabotage this win-win security-boosting innovation. Chaotic tariffs are projected to increase the cost of battery projects by 12% to 50%, and proposed cuts to clean energy tax credits would senselessly hobble the strategically vital and fast-advancing domestic battery manufacturing industry.
One recent report calculated that the House proposed budget’s attacks on clean energy would decrease U.S. GDP by $1.1 trillion through 2034 — and another report finds that it would put two million jobs at risk! A third report forecast that this budget will slash clean energy build-out across America from the previous “with tax credits” projection of nearly 1,000 GW by 2035 to only about 342 GW by 2035.
If this bill passes, the U.S. will self-sabotage on an unprecedented scale, deliberately choosing to have a less abundant electricity supply (meaning higher prices for consumers across the nation, a self-imposed disadvantage in the AI race, and more) and less domestic battery manufacturing capacity (a serious national security issue in a world where battery-powered drones are increasingly dominating modern battlefields).
Congress must stand up to defend American industry, prosperity, and security from this reckless and senseless budget.
