Climate policies are expensive. They limit consumer choices in cars, appliances, and how we heat and cool our homes. They were unnecessary from the start. Net-zero mandates, state renewable portfolio standards, and dozens of other climate laws were built on a worst-case emissions scenario that climate scientists have ruled implausible and officially retired. The entire regulatory regime rests on a foundation that its own authors have disowned.
That scenario is called RCP 8.5. For fifteen years, it was treated as the "business as usual" future. Model after model, regulation after regulation, and cost-benefit study after cost-benefit study used it as the baseline. The predictions of climate doom that justified trillions in mandates driving up the prices of everything were built on this now-retired high-end scenario.
This summer, the scientific committee overseeing these models under the IPCC framework formally retired RCP 8.5 along with two related high-end scenarios.
New Zealand's government has directed local councils to stop defaulting to it in planning decisions. Officials called out the "unnecessary costs on ratepayers, businesses, and communities." If leaders in one of the world's greenest countries are rejecting the model, American policymakers should too.
One of the lead Dutch scientists involved in designing RCP 8.5 in 2011 has highlighted real-world trends; coal use not quintupling, lower population growth, and solar costs falling 85% made it a poor description of a no-policy future. Climate realists flagged this for years even as they were mocked and dismissed.
It is time for our policymakers, in Washington and state capitals, to reexamine net-zero laws, renewable portfolio standards, and the rest of the climate policy stack built on that foundation. These policies cost American families real money every single month.
A new analysis from Always On Energy Research and the Institute for Energy Research found that states with aggressive renewable mandates and net-zero commitments have significantly higher electricity rates. Institute for Energy Research points to federal data showing electricity prices rose 27% between 2021 and 2025, then another 11% through September 2025. These increases are no accident; climate policies are a major driver.
What do we get for that money? More expensive everything.
China alone emits more CO2 than the entire developed world combined, and it keeps building coal plants. India is right behind it, expanding the use of coal, oil, and natural gas every year. Nothing we do here changes what happens in Beijing or New Delhi.
We are imposing austerity on ourselves while the world's largest emitters build as fast as they can. That is not leadership. That is unilateral economic disarmament.
Meanwhile, China dominates the manufacturing of the wind turbines, solar panels, and batteries our climate policies mandate we buy. Every subsidy dollar sends more of our money to Chinese factories. We are paying to enrich our chief geopolitical rival while doing nothing to change global emissions. While making energy and everything it touches more expensive.
There is another side to this story that rarely gets told. More CO2 in the atmosphere has been helping plant life. A NASA study found that rising CO2 levels have greened the Earth by roughly twice the area of the continental United States over the past several decades, with CO2 fertilization responsible for 70% of that growth.
Longer growing seasons and more vigorous plant growth have also supported rising crop yields and larger harvests worldwide. These are real, measurable benefits that get left out of the conversation entirely because they don’t fit the narrative.
None of this means abandoning energy innovation. It means we stop pretending expensive climate mandates built on canceled doomsday scenarios are still justified. The model that scared everyone into accepting these policies has been officially retired by the same scientific body that created it. The justification is gone. The costs remain.
States control their own electricity generation portfolios and retail pricing under the Federal Power Act. That gives governors and state legislators both the power and the responsibility to revisit these policies now, not in 2030, before more damage to household budgets and grid reliability.
The high-end model that underpinned the most alarming projections has been retired. The policies built on it deserve an honest re-examination. Americans deserve affordable, abundant, and reliable energy, not continued higher costs for a scenario even its architects say isn’t realistic.
The model is dead. The policies built on it should follow. It is time for a serious re-look at every climate law and regulation built on a foundation that no longer exists.
Editor's Note: Do you enjoy PJ Media's conservative reporting that takes on the radical left and woke media? Support our work so that we can continue to bring you the truth.
Join PJ Media VIP and use promo code FIGHT to receive 60% off your membership.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member