The U.S. economy kicked into high gear in 2018, and the results were evident in nearly every energy sector including overall demand, power generation, energy prices and carbon emissions. So, what does this mean for the movement to sustainable energy?
In this edition of the Columbia Energy Exchange, host Bill Loveless talks to Lisa Jacobson, the president of the Business Council for Sustainable Energy, a coalition of companies and trade associations representing the energy efficiency, natural gas and renewable energy sectors.
Every year, the council along with Bloomberg New Energy Finance puts out “Sustainable Energy in America Factbook,” providing annual information on key trends in the U.S. energy sectors. The 2019 edition of the report, the seventh compiled, illustrates the extent to which the U.S. energy picture is changing and what it indicates for the nation’s economy.
Lisa has headed the Business Council for Sustainable Energy for about 15 years, after having worked on Capitol Hill as a congressional aide. She is a member of the Department of Energy’s State Energy Efficiency Steering Committee, the U.S. Trade Representative’s Trade and Environment Policy Advisory Committee, and the Gas Technology Institute’s Public Interest Advisory Committee.
She has represented energy industries before the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and testified before Congress. In fact, she had just appeared before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee regarding the 2019 factbook when she and Bill spoke at her office in Washington.
They talked about the latest findings in the various energy sectors as well as a couple of questions the report raises about energy productivity in the U.S. and the absence of federal policy on climate change.
This week host Bill Loveless talks with author and journalist Jeff Goodell about his new book “The Heat Will Kill You First: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet”.
It has now been just over a year since the US signed into law the Inflation Reduction Act and already, it has been followed by more than US $110 billion in clean energy investments.
Rising debt levels and the ravages wrought by climate change present acute threats to achieving sustainable development goals in emerging market and developing economies.
As the world races to transition to cleaner energy sources, there exists a substantial gap between the financing required for this transition and the actual investments being made.