The Financial Times, 18 October: Trump, back in the House, wants to cut renewables in favour of fossil fuels. Wind and solar, the “scam of the century”. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, last year, slashed the credits. That is the FT’s frame. It is not a referendum. It is not a ban on panels. It is a tax law. The market, in the figures that followed, did not stop.

For wind and solar, construction had to start before 4 July 2026, or the plant had to be in service by 31 December 2027. Storage has longer dates, to 2033/2037. Deloitte, in August: a year after the act, utility-scale additions 57.3 GW, up 4 per cent. Wind, doubled. Batteries, up 20. Solar, down 22. Clean-tech manufacturing, $8 billion in Q1, down 34, the lowest in three years. That is a mix. It is not a win. It is not a defeat.

Crux, reported by E&E News in August: investment estimated at $180 billion for 2026, a record, even as the credits fade. Capital spending, $74 billion in the first half. 170 GW put into safe harbour before 4 July. Alfred Johnson: the market is resilient, money after the 2025 change. That is a fintech firm. It is not the EIA. The demand, they say, comes from data centres and factories.

The EIA, in the September Short-Term Energy Outlook, taken up by Reuters: power use, records in 2026 and 2027, AI and electrification. Renewables’ share of generation, toward 27 per cent in 2027. Coal, toward 14. In another FT analysis, on the energy mix: in the first half of 2026, coal output down 11 per cent; solar up 21, hydro up 9, wind up 6. Trump talked coal. The half-year figure did not follow the talk.

Offshore is another chapter. Deloitte: in six months, lease buybacks of $2.7 billion, nine projects halted, 17.4 GW on paper. There the White House cut. SEIA and Wood Mackenzie, in March: 43 GW of solar installed in 2025, against nearly 50 in 2024. Installations slowed. Crux’s spending did not. Two clocks. One president.

Until a full year of $180 billion, what remains is 74 and 170 GW. After that, what remains is whether the record is the rush before 4 July or the demand from racks. Between them, an FT headline that says “losing battle” and a solar sector that fell in installations but did not leave the grid.

Image: Sarah Swenty / USFWS, Topaz Solar Farm, California, 24 October 2012, CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons. The photograph is of a solar farm, not a vote on tax credits.

Sources consulted: Trump’s losing battle with green energy — Financial Times; Renewable investments to hit record despite Trump cuts, report says — E&E News / POLITICO; OBBBA and US renewable power — Deloitte Insights.