Clean Energy Impacts of Big, Beautiful Bill Act
Bisnow Article
The passage of Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBB Act), signed into law on July 4, 2025, is shaking up the U.S. clean energy sector, with some technologies, including nuclear, batteries and geothermal, faring well under the bill, with others like solar and wind facing the phase out of tax credits and incentives that previously fueled their development.
Specifically, solar and wind projects will need to begin construction before July 5, 2026, or be placed in service by December 31, 2027, to qualify for the tax credits before they are eliminated - a narrow window considering the lengthy timelines for permitting, grid interconnection and other development requirements.
Meanwhile, nuclear, geothermal and batteries retain full tax credit eligibility through 2033, under the new law.
These are just some of the provisions of the OBBB Act, which generated much discussion before its passage and will undoubtedly result in even more analysis now that it has become law.
“GOP Tax Bill's Clean Energy Cuts Raise Alarms For Industry Facing Power Crises” published on June 23 by Bisnow.
Jack Backes, Provident Data Center’s Principal Strategist, Weighs In
Jack Backes, was among data center industry members tapped by the media to offer insights on the impact of the OBBB on clean energy incentives and other issues. In the Bisnow article linked above, Backes shared his thoughts on the phasing out of solar and wind tax credits as well as the encouraging signs for the advancement of nuclear power contained in the bill. The following is an excerpt of Jack’s comments that has been edited slightly for length and clarity.
Jack Backes said that while he believes credits for solar and wind are being phased out too quickly in the Senate bill, in the long term the industry’s sustained growth will require carbon-free baseload power like nuclear and geothermal becoming viable at scale.
Intermittent renewables like wind and solar are widely regarded as a poor match for (AI-enabled) data centers, which consume a relatively constant amount of power at all times. Matching (AI) data center demand growth with intermittent renewables can be a recipe for grid instability — a problem grid operators in markets like Texas have been navigating.
While widely deployable carbon-free firm power generation like small modular nuclear reactors and battery storage isn't yet ready for prime time, Backes is hopeful that focusing subsidies on these technologies can help derisk adoption and get them over the hump faster.
“For solar and wind, that risk is already taken out of the equation. We shouldn't have anything that we're just funding forever and giving tax credits to forever,” Backes said. “If we're shifting that over to nuclear, hydropower, geothermal and battery storage by 2028 then that's great, because those are better, less fragile power sources, and that's good for data centers, good for our grid stability and good for everybody.
Read the entire article linked here GOP Tax Bill's Clean Energy Cuts Raise Alarms For Industry Facing Power Crises
Jack Backes shared further insights after the article went live—don’t miss his extended thoughts on LinkedIn here.
