Despite aggressive federal rollbacks in the United States, the clean‑energy transition demonstrated surprising resilience in 2025. Renewables (solar, wind, hydro) surpassed coal globally and solar alone supplied the majority of new electricity demand, aided by a record six‑month surge of 380 GW of solar capacity. China’s manufacturing scale, state‑level action, rapid EV adoption, and record battery storage installations kept momentum alive — while the data‑center boom created both demand pressures and a new front for local activism.
Seven Reasons to Be Hopeful About the Clean Energy Transition — Despite Rollbacks
Batteries, solar panels and green trees on bocks.
It has been a turbulent year for U.S. climate policy. The recent administration has moved quickly to roll back federal climate action: withdrawing the United States from the Paris Agreement (again), pausing or reclaiming clean‑energy funds, fast‑tracking fossil‑fuel projects, and targeting the legal basis of federal climate regulation. Climate, science, and conservation programs have been cut, staff dismissed, and climate language removed from government websites. Even plans to dismantle major research centers have been advanced.
Yet despite those setbacks, the global clean‑energy transition showed surprising resilience in 2025. The momentum created by cost declines, manufacturing scale, state and local initiatives, and market demand kept deployment on an accelerating path. Below are seven developments from 2025 that make me cautiously optimistic.
Seven Reasons to Feel Hopeful
1. The Transition Crossed a Threshold
For the first time, renewables overtook coal as the world’s largest source of electricity. In H1 2025, solar, wind, and hydropower produced 34.3% of global electricity versus coal’s 33.1% — a quiet but historic inflection point. Even more striking: solar and wind expansion accounted for roughly 100% of a ~3% rise in global electricity demand, with solar alone supplying more than 80% of that added generation.
The pace of deployment has been extraordinary: the world added about 380 gigawatts of new solar capacity in six months — a 64% jump versus the same period in 2024 — putting 2025 on track to set new records. As Bill McKibben argues in Here Comes the Sun (2025), the breakthrough is economic: renewables now compete on cost, not only on principle.
2. China Made Clean Energy the Default Option
China is the single largest force behind the global transition. Massive domestic build‑out and deep manufacturing scale have driven down costs for solar panels, wind turbines, and batteries, making clean energy affordable across regions that previously faced sharp trade‑offs between access and decarbonization. (China continues an "all‑of‑the‑above" approach that also includes coal and gas expansion.)
3. Progress Reached Hard Places
In 2025, some of the most coal‑dependent markets showed major shifts. Poland generated more electricity from renewables than coal for the first time in June and saw coal dip below 50% of its mix for an entire quarter. In the U.K., coal has nearly disappeared while wind is now the country’s largest single power source. Globally, coal demand hit a record in 2025, but multiple indicators suggest we are at or near peak coal because of the economics.
4. U.S. States — Red and Blue — Kept Building
Despite federal rollbacks, state and local action drove substantial clean‑energy growth. By early December 2025, solar accounted for roughly 75% of new U.S. generation added that year. Dozens of states passed affordability laws, modernized grids, expanded solar access, launched heat‑pump rebates, repealed coal bailouts, and defended projects under federal pressure. Many of these wins were durable precisely because they were built locally.
Notably, much of the U.S. growth occurred in Republican‑leaning areas: 80% of recent U.S. solar‑manufacturing investment flowed to Republican‑held districts, and 14 of the 20 states that added the most solar capacity since 2024 voted for President Trump. Texas is forecast to produce more electricity from solar than coal for the first time.
5. A Development Sprint Locked In Long‑Term Gains
With federal tax incentives from the Inflation Reduction Act effectively ended in July, states accelerated permitting, procurement, and grid connections to capture benefits before the July 4, 2026 construction deadline. Colorado, Maine, California, New York, Oregon, Minnesota and others fast‑tracked projects so developers could break ground under the old rules. Those projects will generate power for decades and permanently tilt the system toward renewables regardless of near‑term federal policy.
6. Electrification And Storage Are No Longer Theoretical
Electrification of transport advanced rapidly: globally, more than one in four new cars sold in 2025 was an EV or plug‑in hybrid, led not by the U.S. but by emerging markets, especially in Southeast Asia. Automakers are designing for an electric future because demand has shifted.
Battery storage also matured into a grid‑strengthening technology. The U.S. set record installations of utility‑scale batteries in 2025: systems now store excess renewable energy and deliver it on demand. Continued cost and lifetime improvements put solar‑plus‑storage and wind‑plus‑storage on a path to undercut fossil fuels in many markets before the decade’s end — transforming renewables into durable infrastructure, not just intermittent supply.
7. Data Centers Create Pressure — And Opportunity
The AI boom has driven a rapid build‑out of data centers in the U.S. As of November 2025 there were 5,427 data centers and capacity had risen more than 40% since the start of the year. Companies increasingly pair renewables through power‑purchase agreements with batteries and, where necessary, natural‑gas plants to ensure 24/7 power. The result: data centers draw on clean power where possible but still rely on fossil fuels where grid and storage capacity lag.
Still, the surge in electricity demand is prompting grid expansion — and because renewables are so cost‑competitive, much of that new capacity favors wind and solar. Community opposition to large data centers has become a bipartisan, local phenomenon, delaying or canceling roughly $100 billion in projects and giving climate and energy advocates a concrete organizing focus. Even proposals such as a temporary moratorium on new data centers reflect how this debate has entered mainstream politics.
What This Means
None of this implies the climate challenge is solved. Deployment is not yet fast enough to avoid severe harms; infrastructure bottlenecks, equity gaps, and political sabotage still matter. But the clean‑energy transition no longer depends on a single election, country, or regulation. It is now driven by economics, technology, and global demand — forces that are harder to reverse. The United States may be ceding its lead, but the world is not waiting. Every megawatt added still reduces risk: each fraction of a degree avoided represents lives saved and disasters averted.
