US renewable energy investment plummets in H1 2025: BNEF

There was a spending blitz on renewable energy in the US at the end of last year, followed by plummeting funding during the first half of 2025, according to a recent report from BloombergNEF. And that dropoff was significant: Committed spending on renewables fell $20.5 billion (or 36%) compared to the second half of 2024.

“This reflects a rush of construction toward the end of last year as developers sought to lock in lucrative tax credits, followed by a sharp drop this year as policy conditions worsened,” the report said.

Those conditions included the phasing out of clean energy tax credits for solar and wind, and the Trump administration’s moratorium on offshore wind, which was later followed by the cancellation of a major offshore wind project in Rhode Island and possibly others to come.

Earlier this year, Tech Brew reported that US offshore wind stakeholders said that Europe would take up the mantle, which BNEF’s report showed is proving correct: In the first half of this year, European investment in renewables grew by nearly $30 billion, or 63%, “driven by onshore and offshore wind,” with Poland alone making up 36% of global offshore wind investments.

Onshore wind in the US suffered similarly: Investment fell by 80% compared to the second half of 2024, when “developers sought to safe harbor access to tax credits ahead of President Donald Trump’s return to the White House,” BNEF said.

But the data wasn’t bleak for every renewable energy sector: The report shouted out investment in Fervo Energy’s Cape Station geothermal development in Utah as a driver for geothermal’s “strong start to 2025.” As Tech Brew reported, the geothermal industry retained its energy investment and production tax credits, and Dawn Owens, Fervo’s head of project development and commercial markets, told us that the technology is ready to take advantage of the moment.

“While geothermal’s potential has always been there,” she said, “we’ve shown people that it actually is ready.”