A National Green Bank

The "green new deal" is a cliche. Now we hear of a national green bank. As if Alexander Hamilton had hooked up with Rachel Carson.

The Biden administration's long talk of a "national green bank" came into focus last week with the announcement that the administration is providing $27 billion in climate finance funds to coalitions of nonprofit lenders.

The funding comes out of funds already appropriated by last year's Inflation Reduction Act. Formally, the "bank" is known as the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund.

The hope is that the GGRF will evolve into something like a true bank, borrowing from private capital on the one hand what it lends out to private enterprises on the other, and making enough back from its debtors to pay its creditors.

The hope, furthermore, is that this will truly be a NATIONAL bank in a Hamiltonian sense, the center of a network of private banks that will end up financing everything from community solar projects to EV charging.

The idea is not to crowd out private capital but to crowd in private capital.

It is possible that you heard this here first. In that case, I am honored to have been the bearer of green news.

Republicans in the House of course call it the "green slush fund." But they are too busy trying to decide whether they need a third Speaker of the House to do anything about repeal.

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