Buck Jordan here, and today I want to write about one of the biggest topics of our time – going green.

By now you’ve seen the same points repeated over and over again by news channels, newspapers, websites, and social media.

Our planet is getting hotter. Water is getting scarcer. Extreme weather events are getting bigger and badder. Billions and billions of dollars in costs are building up every year.

Just look at the freak floods currently underway in Pakistan (to help, donate here). A shocking third of the country is underwater after a monsoon season 10X the normal level.

That’s 95,000 square miles underwater, roughly the size of the state of Michigan. More than 30 million Pakistanis have been displaced by the flooding, and massive damage has been done to homes and infrastructure.

Of course, these extreme weather events are not just happening in places like Pakistan, they are happening close to home.

I’ve been living in Southern California for years and will never forget being choked by smoke in the city during California’s record wildfires in 2018 that caused $400 billion in damage.

We’re starting to see what kind of damage climate change can inflict on us. The good news is technologists, entrepreneurs, and policymakers are all shifting into action to combat climate change and go green.

In the last few weeks, we’ve seen policymakers in the U.S. come out swinging to protect the climate.

You probably heard the news that the Biden administration passed a big bill recently – the Inflation Reduction Act. The bill has a lot of different things in it, including reforms to tax codes, drug price reform, and much more. But the most interesting thing in the bill was the significant focus on clean energy reform.

The Inflation Reduction Act made several key changes:

  1. Expanded tax credits for energy-efficient buildings, homes, and electric vehicles.
  2. For the first time, the Act establishes “Make It In America” provisions for the use of American-made equipment for clean energy production.
  3. The law provides expanded clean energy tax credits for wind, solar, nuclear, clean hydrogen, clean fuels, and carbon capture, including bonus credits for businesses that pay workers a prevailing wage and use registered apprenticeship programs.
  4. Facilitate the construction of 950 million solar panels, 120,000 wind turbines, and 2,300 grid-scale battery plants by 2030
  5. Reduce greenhouse gas emissions by about 1 gigaton by 2030, or a billion metric tons – 10X more climate impact than any other piece of legislation ever enacted.

Like I said – they came out swinging.

What is clear is that the U.S. government is at the beginning of a concerted effort to decarbonize the US economy. But, perhaps more impactful is that it is using its resources in partnership with American businesses to achieve these goals.


 

So why should this matter as an investor? Well, as the graphic above shows, it’s estimated the government will spend nearly $370 billion throughout the next 10 years on climate and energy projects, and that is just from this one bill.

There will be more.

Huge amounts of money are flowing toward clean energy and green technologies, and this is going to unlock a tsunami of opportunity for smart entrepreneurs and great startups to capture a bit of this huge honeypot.

The tailwinds for green startups are enormous, so keep your eyes peeled for the best ones. I know I will.

Until next week.


Buck Jordan