Wind energy projects boom as developers race to meet shorter deadlines for federal tax credits

Orders for wind turbines were at their highest level in three years between April and June of this year, according to the energy analytics company Wood Mackenzie.

Solar and battery storage installations are surging, too, because federal tax credits for wind and solar are set to expire next year.

Biden-era tax credits for wind and solar were supposed to be available through 2032. Then, last year Republicans passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which limited tax credits’ availability to projects that started by this past July.

Everything needs to be done in the next few years, so wind and solar developers are working fast.

“This is called ‘safe harboring,’” said Leah Stokes, an associate professor of environmental politics at UC Santa Barbara.

It’s not just a tax credit rush that’s leading to what BloombergNEF says could be a record year for companies installing clean energy.

“They're of course doing this during a time period when demand for electricity is growing so much,” Stokes said — primarily from data centers powering AI.

The problem for the solar and wind industries is what happens if AI companies slow down their build-out of data centers, said David Victor, distinguished professor of innovation and public policy at the School of Global Policy and Strategy at UC San Diego.

“And when that bubble bursts, as many people expect will happen, that's going to create a lot of chaos, and frankly a lot of projects are probably going to be postponed, if not outright canceled,” he said.

That, plus the expiration of tax credits, Victor said, means the outlook for solar and wind after next year is pretty uncertain.