Inside a Last-Ditch Battle to Save (or Kill) Clean-Energy Tax Credits

As Senate Republicans scramble to pass President Trump’s far-reaching domestic policy bill, climate activists and energy companies are lobbying to salvage tax credits for wind, solar and other climate-friendly technologies.

But they are running into formidable obstacles. Conservative activists, fossil-fuel lobbyists and Mr. Trump are demanding that lawmakers enact even deeper cuts to clean-energy subsidies, or even scrap them entirely.

At stake are hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of tax incentives put in place by the Biden administration, the vast majority of which are flowing to Republican congressional districts.

Some are aimed at encouraging Americans to buy electric vehicles or put solar panels on their roofs. Others are intended to spur manufacturing of wind turbines, solar-panel components and other technologies that would help reduce planet-warming greenhouse gases. All the tax credits were greatly expanded as part of the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, the Biden administration’s signature climate law.

“What is being proposed now will hurt businesses, and it will risk significant job loss,” said Lisa Jacobson, president of the Business Council for Sustainable Energy, a trade group. Her organization was one of several on Capitol Hill this week mounting a last-ditch effort to remind lawmakers of the jobs the law had created and what states stood to lose.

An initial draft of the Senate bill would phase out the tax credits for wind and solar power and electric vehicles starting next year, while incentives for nuclear and geothermal power would stay in place for another decade. The draft would also impose new restrictions on domestic manufacturers that rely on components from China.