Clean energy didn’t collapse in 2025. It adapted.

24 snips

Feb 27, 2026

They unpack how capital flowed selectively in 2025 amid shifting tariffs, FIAC guidance, and policy whiplash. They highlight why renewables and batteries captured most investment while manufacturing stalled. They explore evolving deal structures, tax-credit safe harbors, and how storage is stacking value to outcompete gas for reliability.

Ask episode

AI Snips

Chapters

Transcript

Episode notes

INSIGHT

Capital Flowed Selectively In 2025

Capital flowed selectively in 2025 with project finance and batteries taking ~80% of activity while manufacturing investment fell ~20% and $22B of projects cancelled.
Crux data shows developers front-loaded safe-harbor projects in H1 to lock tax credits, creating a build pipeline but squeezing new entrants who face higher capital costs.

INSIGHT

Policy Whiplash Raises Financing Hurdles

Policy uncertainty raises cost of capital and elongates due diligence, which favors sponsors with balance sheets and hurts new entrants.
Caroline Golan warned that ambiguity around tariffs and FIAC drives up financing costs and can remove gigawatts of projects that no longer pencil.

ADVICE

Stress Test Tax Credit And FIAC Risks

Stress-test balance sheets and tax-compliance risk when pricing tax-credit trades or taking FIAC exposure.
Jigar says buyers now demand strong sponsor balance sheets or insurance because FIAC adds a six-year compliance liability.

Get the Snipd Podcast app to discover more snips from this episode

Get the app

When President Trump kicked off an aggressive trade war, a lot of people predicted economic doom. But it didn’t happen.

We’re seeing something similar in clean energy right now with ever-shifting tariffs, half-written rules on foreign sourcing, and the weaponization of permitting. But capital hasn’t fled. In fact, it increased last year. So what is happening here?

According to new market intelligence from the clean energy finance platform Crux, project finance, construction lending, and bridge lending all grew at a modest rate – with renewable electricity and batteries accounting for 80% of activity.

This week, we’re going to take a look at where capital is leaning in, where it’s pulling back, and how new changes to tariffs and foreign sourcing rules will influence the market.

And then we’ll turn to solar and batteries, which are weathering the storm of uncertainty, but still facing plenty of turbulence. What’s driving that resilience?

Want to watch this episode? Subscribe to our YouTube channel.

Ready to accelerate your career in clean energy? Yale’s Financing and Deploying Clean Energy Certificate is a fully online, 10-month program built for working professionals. It delivers real-world skills in clean energy policy, technology, project finance, and innovation — all in just five hours a week. Enroll here and use the discount code OpenCircuit26 on your application to save $500 on tuition. Applications close April 20, 2026.

Explore the new era of AI innovation in the fifth season of Where the Internet Lives, an award-winning podcast from Google and Latitude Studios. Follow and listen to Where the Internet Lives on Apple, Spotify, Google, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Join Latitude Media on April 13-14, in San Francisco for Transition-AI 2026, a two-day, in-person conference on the digital and energy infrastructure buildout needed to support AI load growth. Our podcast listeners get a 10% discount on this year’s conference using the code PODS10. ⁠Register today here⁠!