Why John Curtis says the Senate should reconsider rolling back green energy tax credits

ERDA, Tooele County — As the Senate prepares to take up President Donald Trump’s tax and budget bill, Utah Sen. John Curtis says he would like to see changes to rollbacks of green energy credits included in the version that passed the House last week.

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The Republican said he isn’t alone in wanting to see changes. In fact, some of his colleagues in the House told Curtis that they are “counting” on him to address some of those cuts, he told reporters after touring the manufacturing floor at Fluence Energy, Inc. in Erda, Tooele County, on Tuesday.

Curtis called the proposed repeal of energy tax credits “a problem for the future — and I’ll say not just to clean energy, but of energy,” noting that credits supporting the sequestration of carbon emissions are a “big deal” for fossil fuel companies.

“I have been an advocate … not necessarily that we should take it all at face value but that we should carefully evaluate every one and make sure that it’s a good decision for our country, for our energy future,” Curtis said. “The House did pass a bill that dramatically curtailed those.”

“My friends in the House kind of called me up and say, ‘Listen, we’re counting on you to fix it,'” he added. “So, I think even many of them knew that what they sent over did need some work, and that’s now our job in the Senate to put our stamp on that and have it speak for our will.”

Most of the credits slated for rollback were initiated through the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, a Biden-era policy that Curtis said continues to draw conservative opposition because of a lack of Republican input on the bill.

“A lot of Republicans don’t like it because we weren’t included in it. We didn’t get a chance to vote for it,” he said. “And one of my missions right now in Washington is to point out that there are a lot of Utah slash Republican slash conservative principles in that that we want to make sure that we make good decisions on.”

Those tax credits have benefited Utah businesses, but Curtis argued that supporting various forms of energy is also strategically important on the world stage. He recalled living through oil embargoes in the 1970s that led to a push for more energy independence and said Europe has had a similar realization after relying, in part, on Russia for energy.

“Some people wonder why I’m such an advocate … for all the choices of energy that we make here in the United States,” he said. “And it’s because I believe passionately that our nation’s prosperity, that our nation’s freedom, all depend on our ability to produce our own energy and actually produce more energy so other people are dependent on us.”