British Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt has said US President Joe Biden’s inflation-reduction bill is an attempt to “catch up” on clean energy investment.
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British Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt said on Friday that the US deflationary bill was US President Joe Biden’s attempt to “catch up” on clean energy investment after years of neglect by his predecessor Donald Trump.
Hunt told CNBC that the U.S. under climate change skeptic Trump has significantly underinvested in the green transition and is only now implementing programs that are already in place in the U.K.
“We have to recognize that the United States is coming from behind,” Tanvir Gill told CNBC at the G-20 meeting in Bengaluru, India.
They used to have a president who was very skeptical… and so there is some catching up going on in the US
Jeremy Hunt
Chancellor of the Exchequer, United Kingdom
“Before, they had a president who was very skeptical of anything to do with climate change, so there’s some catching up going on in the US,” he said.
Trump has been a very vocal climate change denier during his time in office, often dismissing warnings from climate scientists and famously withdrawing from the Paris Climate Agreement during his first months in office.
When asked whether the UK was motivated to unveil new trade incentives to compete with the US The $369 billion package on climate and energy action, the chancellor said the UK would do things “its way”.
“We will make sure that the UK continues to be a very attractive place for all clean energy investment, but we will do it in a different way, our own way,” he said.
In 2022, around 40% of the UK’s energy will be produced from renewable energy sources, up from 35% in 2021, according to message by academics at Imperial College London for Drax Electric Insights.
“They don’t have things that we’ve had for many years, like carbon pricing,” Hunt said, referring to a mechanism that charges organizations for their carbon emissions and offers incentives to produce less.
“We are very proud of the progress we have made and will continue to lead the way,” he added.
Hunt’s comments come as pressure mounts on Europe to improve its competitiveness in green technology sectors.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Saturday that the European Union is working on a subsidy package for European cleantech companies to “level the planning playing field” with the US.
“For us, the task now is to balance the subsidies of the United States also in the European Union, because we should not forget that we all need a clean technology sector,” von der Leyen told CNBC at the Munich Security Conference.
