Another solid post from The Eco-Revolution. The title is “Stop Talking About Net Zero: How the right wing is weaponizing climate costs to scare voters and how to combat them.”

Definitely worth the read.

The Net Zero argument is an aspirational one, but from a practical perspective it raises a lot of questions and, as the above-referenced post points out, net-zero has been weaponized as an attack point on the affordability issue. “If only you didn’t have a net-zero mandate,” the argument goes, “things would be less expensive.”

Of course, we want to get to the point where we have far lower GHG emissions. The point is, as this post argues, that the energy generation and use sectors can be shifted to clean energy today to stop producing GHG emissions. This is the obvious and most direct solution to addressing climate change. By the way, we can expect continuing progress on the hard-to-mitigate industrial sectors, too. All the other approaches—carbon capture and offsets and other schemes—are sleight of hand maneuvers and surprisingly expensive ones at that.

Shifting to Clean Energy is an Investment

But here’s what we climate progress/clean energy proponents don’t talk about: the shift to a new energy system is expensive. Sure, in the longer-term, clean energy is the least expensive energy production system human’s have come up with, and less expensive by an impressive margin. For example, capital costs—the money needed to build—is similar for a solar farm to the cost of building an equivalent electricity output natural gas generator plant, but gas plants represent much higher operation costs, mainly because you have to keep buying natural gas fuel over the plant’s operational lifetime, plus other operational costs are higher, since gas generators have higher maintenance and operational personnel costs.

What isn’t more expensive, from a capital cost basis, is an existing gas generator plant versus building a clean energy electricity plant, because, of course, the capital money for the existing plant is already spent. The problem of costs comes to the fore when building new clean energy production systems (i.e., solar, wind, BESS, digital grid and demand and DER management, etc.) to replace existing (and global-warming producing emissions) fossil fuel energy production systems. Long term, clearly, renewables are the better deal in all sorts of ways, including reducing the amounts of direct subsidies to fossil fuel corporations by governments around the world through tax, accounting, and other legal mechanisms, along with outright grants. The bigger hidden costs addressed by replacing fossil fuel generation systems, however, are fossil fuel externalities, which is all the money spent each year to address fossil fuel pollution health consequences and climate change consequences caused by the production and use of fossil fuels. These externalities, according to the International Monetary Fund, have the world paying to address the negative consequences of the production and use of fossil fuels, and, together with the direct fossil fuel subsidies, reaches somewhere in the $5-7 trillion range, every year. These “indirect” subsidies are costs largely hidden from the public understanding, mainly through long-standing industry and special interest efforts keeping these costs from public knowledge and political debate.

Still, most people intuitively understand that building out new energy production systems to replace fossil fuel-based energy production systems represents additional costs, at least over a relatively short time, although replacement clean energy production systems prove cheaper over time since we stop the ongoing purchase of fossil fuels and have lower spending addressing externalities because of lowered emissions. But most people think of costs on short-term bases. The future investment argument, while very compelling, isn’t what most of us think about when faced with higher costs upfront.

The effort to establish the Electrotech Revolution means gaining the public’s interest and support for the Electrotech Revolution and that means we need to own the argument that this is a great investment, with lower costs over time, as one outcome. But we also need to be clear that the transition will impose short-term higher costs as we replace the dangerous and expensive fossil fuel energy production systems with more buildout of solar, wind, BESS, etc., as we decommission the polluting old systems as soon as possible.

These days, the best argument is to keep from building new fossil fuel energy production systems and only build renewables-based energy production facilities and to exploit the digital management technologies that expand the efficiency and capacity of our current electrical grids and distribution infrastructure. I imagine that once these clean energy systems are more ubiquitous the lower-cost arguments will be more widely understood as advantageous mainly through lower energy bills, but this takes time.

I’d love to see much of the cost of decommissioning fossil fuel energy production placed upon the fossil fuel corporations and their shareholders, but, of course, that presents the challenge of stranded assets for the companies themselves and the institutional investors such as retirement funds. I’d love to see this burden placed on the fossil fuel corporations, but I’m guessing that if people’s retirement funds take a sharp hit because of lost value due to stranded assets, this very active voting bloc will be made unhappy. Therefore, the more compelling argument to large investment funds is for these institutional investors to move away from new fossil fuel investments such as fossil fuel generators. This is the real threat of net-zero mandates to Big Oil: if a new gas plant violates a net-zero mandate, then the likelihood of the new gas plant being build fades.

Externalities ‘R Us

There is also the very real issue of fossil fuel externalities being put back on the fossil fuel corporations as public awareness grows about how much nations—and us, through taxes and assumed personal household costs—cover these businesses’ avoided expenses, whether through these corporations’ sweetheart leasing deals, extraction shortcuts (just the methane leaks alone!), plethora of deregulations, intrinsic refinery-related pollution, court battles against being named liable parties, and all the other forms of externalities.

Unfortunately, the clean energy movement has been largely unable even to get the issue of the cost of externalities to be part of the public discourse. I wrote a post about this issue titled “The Challenge of Conveying Climate Change Information in Climate Fiction,” which starts this way:

I think this is the exact quote: “You have thirty mentions of externalities! Cut that by at least half!”

I will keep the name of this beta-reader to myself, so to avoid an uncomfortable paparazzi-crushing lifestyle change for him, thank you very much. He was talking with me about Dear Josephine, my second book in the literary climate fiction series The Steep Climes Quartet. He was referring to the number of times the term that stands in for all the external costs the use of fossil fuel shifts to the public and thus not counted among the producers’ costs in fossil fuel production.

Externalities: You know, things like health problems that are attributed to pollution and particulates.

The post goes on to define externalities and discuss fossil fuel subsides and then the issue of conveying climate change facts within climate fiction.

Let’s Take Ownership of the Arguments on Energy Affordability

We’ve been letting the fossil fuel industry—Big Oil—dictate the terms of discussion, including their attempted ownership of the affordability issue, even while clean energy actually owns the argument of more affordable electricity. Substackers like The Eco-Revolution, Bill McKibben, Sam Matey-Coste, and David Roberts continue to educate us on this larger discussion.

The remaining problem to address is the short-term costs for clean energy investment. It’s a challenging argument because most people are worried about next month’s rent, not the promise that energy costs will indeed come down in a year or two or three. Most of us have difficulty with long-term investments for the future.

But no one is saying that the clean energy transition is easy, as far as I know.

A lot of people are saying its goddam important, though, and my hand is up, too.

The post The Short-term Costs of Clean Energy and the Long-term Affordability Advantages first appeared on David Guenette.

There are many Americans who are retired or approaching retirement who have been fortunate enough to have accrued healthy retirement savings. Unfortunately, there are many more Americans who have only very meager retirement savings or none at all, but that is another story; these are not the people being discussed in this post.

I’m talking about the group of people who understand that the world needs to radically reduce carbon emissions as quickly as possible in order to keep climate change consequences from being worse. I’m talking about people who have retirement funds in investment instruments beyond their Social Security or pension. In other words, I’m talking about the “money-where-the-mouth-is” group. I’ve gotten curious about what’s out there financial-instrument-wise for such a person, mythological or otherwise.

Yes, god help me, I’ve decided to look into this.

The “Date of Death” Metric

I’m at that stage of life where retirement fund amounts and performance stand in as the “date of death” metric, where one adds up all assets and subtracts liabilities to determine how many years a person can live at their previously fixed level of annual spending. For example, if a person has $500,000 in retirement funds and $21,000 is Social Security, and has an annual budget of $42,000, then one would have 23.8 years to afford to live, as follows:

• $42,000 (overall annual spending budget) minus $21,000 (annual income through Social Security) equals $21,000, which is the annual addition annual income needed beyond Social Security to meet the living budget.
• $500,000 (retirement assets) divided by $21,000 (annual income needed beyond Social Security to meet the spending budget) equals 23.8.
• Add 23.8 to your current age (example, 70) and 93.8 years of age is when you’ll no longer be able to afford to live, hence “date of death.”

I’m not a financial planner, but I know how to make a budget that subtracts expenses from income (e.g., Social Security), which then tells me how much supplemental money I require from my retirement assets. I’m not a financial planner, and I know that some people have more complicated sources of income than just Social Security (e.g., pensions and annuities); I also know that most common retirement funds are based in markets that have returns that rise and drop, whether equity stocks or mutual funds or other investment arrangements (I’m leaving the issue of bonds out of this because, well, I’m not a financial planner). If, in the above example, the $500,000 in retirement mutual funds drops by half–because, say, of an alien invasion or AI bubble collapse—then the “date of death” for the proverbial 70-year-old would be 81.9 years of age. Eighty-two years of age doesn’t feel all that old to me or my peers. I’m reminded of the “Bring out your Dead” scene in Monty Python and the Holy Grail: “I’m not dead yet.”

Of course, if markets drop precipitously and significantly, there are larger problems afoot, so the example above is less a real-world scare tactic than an effort to keep the example’s math easy. I’m not a financial planner, but even I know that the simple math above doesn’t take into account various complicating factors such as taxes. The example above also assumes little rise in the cost of living (ha!) or whether the market will see neutral growth, negative growth, or positive investment growth. Obviously, market performance or alternative financial instruments for retirement funds that better buffer the retiree from market volatility, and a whole bunch more considerations exist, which is why one pays for a financial planner’s service and doesn’t consult me. Nevertheless, none of this is exactly rocket science, and the general argument outlined in this post holds.

How Many Well-off Retirees Are There?

Who are well-off retirees? I am talking about the modest chunk of American retirees who have $500,000 or $250,000 or $1,000,000. Here’s what Google’s AI Overview reports:

Approximately 7% to 9% of Americans have saved $500,000 or more for retirement. While this figure is higher among older age groups, it remains relatively rare, as 58.4% of Americans have less than $10,000 saved, and the median retirement savings for those aged 55–64 is only $185,000. 

Retirement Savings Breakdown

• • $500,000+ Range:About 4% of Americans have $500,000–$999,999, while roughly 3% to 4.6% have $1 million or more.
  • Households with Savings:Among U.S. households with any retirement account assets, roughly 9% have hit the $500,000 mark.
  • Median vs. Average:While average balances might look higher, the median (middle) value is much lower, indicating many people have far less
  • Age Factor:According to this Federal Reserve data analysis from NerdWallet, median savings for ages 65–74 is $200,000, while the average savings is over $600,000, highlighting that a large portion of the wealth is held by a minority of savers. 

While $500,000 is a significant milestone, it falls below the estimated $1.28 million to $1.46 million many Americans believe they need for a comfortable retirement. 

More specifically, I’m talking about the subset of retirees with such resources who might consider doing something with those retirement funds to support, speed up, and otherwise make it more likely that the transition to clean energy happens sooner and better. If I use the more modest 7% of Americans with median retirement savings of $500,000 or more, the number is 23.9 million people. Is there a percentage of this percentage who are interested in shifting their savings into investment instruments that support the clean energy transition? I’m not talking donations, but putting their retirement savings to work in financial instruments (e.g., IRA mutual funds) doing the important work of combatting climate change and building a smarter world of energy.

What kind of money are we talking about? Google AI does what it is good at (although not infallible), which is finding and aggregating information it’s prompted to collect. Here’s the Google Search AI Summary for the query “What is the size of investment instruments of Americans in 2025?”

As of late 2025, U.S. retirement assets totaled $49.1 trillion, with $19.2 trillion in IRAs and $14.2 trillion in defined contribution plans (like 401(k)s). Households favored stocks (25%), mutual funds (13%), crypto (10%), and bonds (8%), with 64% of Americans likely to invest and 56.4% owning mutual funds/ETFs.

Size and Composition of Investment Instruments (2025)

• • Retirement Assets: Totaled $49.1 trillion in Q4 2025.
  • Individual Retirement Accounts (IRAs): $19.2 trillion.
  • Defined Contribution Plans (401k/403b/457/TSP): $14.2 trillion.
  • Mutual Funds: Represent $14.7 trillion in IRAs and DC plans (44% of total).
  • Average Portfolio Composition: Stocks (25%), Mutual Funds (13%), Cryptocurrencies (10%), Bonds (8%), and alternatives like private equity/hedge funds.]

Key Findings on 2025 Investment Landscape

• • Robust Growth: Assets under management for advisors grew to $144.6 trillion in 2024, with continued strong market conditions leading into 2025.
  • Capital Gains: Average net capital gains for applicable tax returns varied by state, with investors seeking high returns in 2025.
  • Commercial Real Estate: 70% of investors planned to buy more assets in 2025, with multifamily and industrial being preferred sectors.

How Much Retirement Money Could Be Invested in Clean Tech?

Here’s the thought experiment (a phrase I love, because it is a pretentious way of saying “thinking”): Let’s say that of these 23.9 million Americans half have no interest in shifting their retirement funds to fossil-fuels-free or clean-tech-focused funds, keeping in mind the highly polarized society we’re living in. That leaves 12 million people. If each of the 12 million people transfer $1000 into non-fossil fuels/clean energy funds, that is $12 billion. Now let’s say these 12 million people shift half of their retirement portfolio ($500,000 medium amount divided by 2=$250,000), that’s $2.75 trillion shifted over to non-fossil-fuels-free clean tech portfolios.

And then there’s the answer, according to Google replying to “How much money got invested in clean tech in 2025?” which resulted in a total of $2.3 trillion:

Global investment in clean energy technology reached a record high of $2.3 trillion in 2025, marking an 8% increase over the previous year despite policy and trade challenges. Key investments included $893 billion in electrified transport, $690 billion in renewable energy, and $483 billion in power grids, according to BloombergNEF.

Key 2025 Investment Highlights:

• • Top Markets: China remained the largest market with $800 billion invested (despite a 4% dip), followed by the U.S. at $738 billion (up 3.5%), and the EU with $455 billion.
  • Growth Leaders: India experienced rapid growth, with a 46% increase to $101 billion.
  • Sector Breakdown: Electrified transport led total investment, while investment in stationary battery storage grew significantly to $66 billion.
  • Manufacturing Slowdown: Global manufacturing investment in clean tech dropped as a result of domestic overcapacity, particularly in China.

While BloombergNEF reported $2.3 trillion, the Clean Investment Monitor indicated a figure of $1.96 trillion, covering manufacturing and deployment, highlighting a shift toward more moderate growth compared to prior years.

So, if half the retirees with good retirement funds put those funds into clean energy financial investment instruments, there could be a doubling or more of money focused on clean energy. In theory, this cohort could retire themselves into a doubling of market efforts to make clean energy happen. Of course, some number of the 11 million retirement investing Americans may already be involved in non-fossil fuel/clean tech investments. Again, let’s stress that we’re not talking donations, but shifting the retirement savings already in investment instruments to non-fossil fuel/clean tech investment instruments doing the important work of combatting climate change and building a smarter world of energy.

Has the clean tech and climate change world been talking enough about what many of us can be doing to hurry along the better world? Well, I’m not a financial advisor, but I’ll say “No.”

Fossil Free Funds and Clean Tech Funds

How does one go about discovering in a confident manner, what investment funds are likely more effective for encouraging the dual outcomes of investing in clean energy and keeping one’s “date of death” from dwindling close?

Well, you can always ask Google to “Identify the best performing non-fossil fuel mutual funds. Identify the best performing clean tech mutual funds. Base this on returns over the last five years. Include the evaluation of how strict the fossil fuel exclusion is, including with funds that may include financial institutions that fund fossil fuel.” Here’s the answer I got recently (by the way, you’re likely to get different results depending on when you ask, or, possibly, the mood of Google; remember, I am not a financial advisor, nor is Google):

The following funds are identified as the best performers over the last five years (as of May 2026), categorized by strategy.

TOP PERFORMING BROAD MARKET NON-FOSSIL FUEL FUNDS [1]

These funds invest in the broader market (tech, healthcare, finance) while excluding fossil fuel producers. They have generally outperformed pure “clean energy” sector funds over the last five years due to the strength of the broader market. [1, 2, 3, 4]

1. 1. Vanguard FTSE Social Index Fund (VFTAX) [1]

• • 5-Year Annualized Return: ~13.2% (Cumulative ~86%)
  • Performance: This is likely the highest-performing “sustainable” fund accessible to most investors, driven by heavy weightings in large-cap tech stocks like NVIDIA, Apple, and Microsoft.
  • Strictness & Financial Exposure: Low Strictness on Finance. While this fund strictly excludes companies with fossil fuel reserves (like Exxon or Chevron), it does not exclude financial institutions that fund the fossil fuel industry.
    • Evidence: As of 2026, it holds significant stakes in JPMorgan Chase (1.65%) and Bank of America (0.68%), both of which are top funders of fossil fuel expansion. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

1. 2. Green Century Equity Fund (GCEQX)

• • 5-Year Annualized Return: +11.07%
  • Performance: This fund has delivered strong double-digit returns, significantly outperforming its “Balanced” counterpart. It tracks a customized index of sustainable companies.
  • Strictness & Financial Exposure: Highest Strictness. This fund is marketed as a “truly fossil-fuel-free” option. It excludes exploration, extraction, processing, and utilities that burn coal.
    • Differentiation: Unlike Vanguard, Green Century uses shareholder advocacy to pressure companies (including banks) to stop funding climate change. It is the primary option for investors seeking to minimize all association with the industry. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

1. 3. Parnassus Core Equity Fund (PRBLX)

• • 5-Year Annualized Return: +9.66%
  • Performance: A long-time leader in ESG investing, though it has slightly lagged the S&P 500 and Vanguard’s passive index over the last 5 years.
  • Strictness & Financial Exposure: Parnassus excludes companies generating >10% of revenue from fossil fuel extraction. However, it may invest in companies that use fossil fuel energy and does not have a blanket exclusion on diversified banks. [1, 2, 3, 4]

TOP PERFORMING CLEAN TECH/CLEAN ENERGY MUTUAL FUNDS

These funds focus specifically on the energy transition (wind, solar, batteries, efficiency). The sector has faced significant volatility recently, making the top performer an outlier. [1, 2, 3, 4]

1. 1. Fidelity Environment and Alternative Energy Fund (FSLEX)

• • 5-Year Annualized Return: +11.65%
  • Performance: This is the best-performing clean energy fund It has significantly outperformed popular ETFs like ICLN.
  • Why it Won: It is actively managed and takes a broader view of “environmental solutions.”
  • Strictness: While focused on clean energy, it is not a “purist” fund. It has recently held companies like Siemens Energy and GE Vernova (gas turbine manufacturers) because they are critical to grid efficiency and the energy transition, even though they service natural gas infrastructure. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

1. 2. Calvert Global Energy Solutions Fund (CAEIX)

• • 5-Year Annualized Return: +4.05%
  • Performance: Positive but modest returns. It holds a “Gold” medalist rating from Morningstar for its process but has lagged behind the broader market. [1, 2, 3]

1. 3. Popular ETFs (Underperformers)

Note: These passive funds suffered from the post-2021 deflation in clean tech valuations, whereas the actively managed Fidelity fund avoided the worst of the drawdown. [1, 2]

• • iShares Global Clean Energy ETF (ICLN): +1.92%
  • First Trust Nasdaq Clean Edge Green Energy (QCLN): -1.57% annualized (Negative return).

• • For the highest raw return, Vanguard (VFTAX) is the winner, but you will own shares in the world’s largest fossil fuel financiers.
  • For the best performing strict option, Green Century Equity (GCEQX) offers the strongest combination of a ~11% return and a “fossil free” mandate that actively addresses the banking sector’s role in climate change.
  • For clean technology exposure, Fidelity (FSLEX) is the only fund in this category that has delivered double-digit annualized returns over this period. [1]

Or, of course, you can always do the work yourself or use a financial planner (which I am not). Useful green investment funds information resources include Fossil Free Funds for analyzing carbon exposure, Morningstar for sustainable fund ratings, and Green America for curated lists of environmental mutual funds and ETFs. These platforms help identify options that avoid fossil fuels and focus on clean energy, sustainability, and ESG criteria.

Key Information Resources for Green Investing

• Fossil Free Funds: A premier tool for searching mutual funds and ETFs to analyze fossil fuel exposure and check the carbon footprint of portfolios.
• Morningstar: Provides comprehensive analysis, performance rankings, and lists of the best sustainable funds and ETFs to buy.
• Green America: Offers a guide to green mutual funds and ETFs that specifically avoid fossil fuels and focus on environmental solutions.
• Green Century Funds: Provides resources on fossil fuel-free investing, shareholder advocacy, and sustainable investment strategies.
• S. News & World Report: Regularly publishes lists of top-performing socially responsible funds and green stocks.

Top-Rated Green Funds and ETFs (As of 2025-2026)

• Fossil-Free Focused: Etho Capital Climate Leadership U.S. ETF, Green Century Funds.
• Clean Energy & Environmental: iShares Global Clean Energy ETF (ICLN), Invesco Solar ETF (TAN), Impax Global Environmental Markets Fund.
• Sustainable Broad Market: Vanguard ESG U.S. Stock ETF, Sphere 500 Climate Fund, Fidelity U.S. Sustainability Index Fund.

Key Considerations

• Shareholder Advocacy: Some funds (e.g., Green Century) actively urge companies to improve environmental policies.
• Expense Ratios: Look for competitive fees; the Fidelity U.S. Sustainability Index Fund (FITLX) has a low expense ratio of 0.11%.
• Performance: Sustainable funds can outperform traditional funds, with some specialized funds providing high returns in 2025 and 2026.

I See Your Confusion and I Raise Your Awareness

So, you want to help push the transition to clean energy forward. You want to do your part to reduce the consequences of climate change. One way is to put your retirement savings to work within financial instruments like mutual fund IRAs. Personally, having to pay attention to this sort of thing makes me want to pull my own head off, but then I’m not a financial planner, remember?

On the other hand, I do want to encourage clean energy in order to help reduce the present and future challenges of climate change, so I’m making the effort. I’m also one of those 11 million Americans with a chunk of savings for retirement, and while my accounts are modest compared to many, it’s unseemly to think that I’m less fortunate than them, with the far better way to think is that I’m more fortunate than a big majority of Americans to have such resources. An even better way to think of these retirement resources is that I can put my money where my mouth is, and that means putting what retirement resources I have into the market in such a way as to encourage the direction I want to see the world take.

This seems like a good bet to me.

The post Clean Tech/Fossil-Free Funds Can Make A Difference first appeared on David Guenette.