Resource Library of Subsidy Documents

The vast majority of federal subsidies for fossil fuels and renewable energy supported energy sources that emit high levels of greenhouse gases when used as fuel.

• The federal government provided substantially larger subsidies to fossil fuels than to renewables. Subsidies to fossil fuels—a mature…

Adding up lending and underwriting from 33 global banks to the fossil fuel industry as a whole reveals stark findings: Canadian, Chinese, European, Japanese, and U.S. banks have financed fossil fuels with $1.9 trillion since the Paris Agreement was adopted (2016 to 2018), with financing on the rise…

This report is one of a series of analyses of public incentives directed toward energy resources. The purpose of the series is to gain insights into the kinds and amounts of public incentives that could be required to induce 20% of the nation's energy budget from renewable resources by the year 2000…

This issue brief takes a detailed look at why such a large share of coal power is struggling today and the
structural drivers—including subsidies—that may cause similar crises to rear their heads in future. In
light of this, it sets out some broad proposals from international literature on the topic…

This report builds on the OECD’s longstanding work measuring government support in agriculture, fossil fuels,and fisheries in order to estimate support and related market distortions in the aluminum value chain. Results show that non-market forces, and government support in particular, appear to…

For many years, policy discussions have focused on strategies to bring down greenhouse gas emissions using taxes, permits and other regulatory or statutory limits.  Yet fossil fuel markets across the world remain littered with government programs subsidizing these emissions.  The subsidies are large…

In its proposed tariffs to remove potential distortions caused by subsidies in capacity markets, PJM includes a number of limitations and exclusions that appear to result in unequal evaluation of subsidies across different fuel cycles. This will likely impede PJM’s core objective of ensuring…

This review assesses the House and Senate tax reform proposals as they relate to the energy sector. Three main areas are examined: cross-cutting changes to tax rates or baselines and whether some of them will have disproportionate or distortionary impacts on particular fuels; specific energy tax…

Countries in the G20 have committed to phase out ‘inefficient’ fossil fuel subsidies. However, there remains a limited understanding of how subsidy removal would affect fossil fuel investment returns and production, particularly for subsidies to producers. Here, we assess the impact of major federal…

Presentation at the NPEC Public Policy Fellowship Retreat in March 2017.  The meeting was convened and hosted by the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center.  The slides evaluates many of the arguments people make to support increased subsidies to nuclear and finds them wanting.

All 14 current rationales for mandating or subsidizing uncompetitive coal and nuclear plants lack technical merit or would favor competitors instead. Subsidizing distressed nuclear plants typically saves less carbon than closing them and reinvesting their saved operating cost into severalfold…

The best available science shows an urgent need to keep global temperature increases below 1.5°C to avoid severe disruptions to people and ecosystems. Recent analysis shows that burning the reserves in already operating oil and gas fields alone, even if coal mining is completely phased out, would…

Existing trade agreements have strict rules, some enforcement mechanisms, and the majority of the world's nations already as signatories.  They offer a potentially powerful leverage point to address a wide array of subsidies to energy, including those flowing to fossil fuels.  In practice, the trade…

PJM Interconnection is the regional transmission operator (RTO) serving more than 60 million customers in 13 states and the District of Columbia, mostly in the mid-Atlantic region of the United States.  Incumbent base load generators have complained that subsidies to renewable resources have been…

The federal government of the United States remains custodian and manager of a large amount of fossil fuels on public lands.  While sales of minerals do bring in some revenue to the government, there are many elements of federal management that result in artificially low realized revenues for…

Subsidies to coal in 10 countries responsible for 84% of Europe’s energy-related greenhouse gas emissions remain extensive.  These include France, the Czech Republic, Germany, Greece, Italy, Hungary, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain and the United Kingdom (UK).

Despite significant commitments to…

Within the United States, the cost of energy subsidies to taxpayers is both substantial and often not properly documented.  Regular review to evaluate the fiscal costs of these policies; their impact on market structure, competiveness, and environmental quality; and their ability to achieve stated…

This presentation provides an overview of the long history of fossil fuel subsidies in the United States, key milestones in reporting transparency, and remaining data challenges in assessing and quantifying the many pathways that continue to subsidize fossil fuel extraction and consumption today.

T…

This book proposes a simple framework for understanding the political economy of subsidy reform and applies it to four in-depth country studies covering more than 30 distinct episodes of reform. Five key lessons emerge. First, energy subsidies often follow a life cycle, beginning as a way to…