Welcome back: The U.S. renewable power industry was left reeling over the weekend after Senate Republicans proposed a new tax on wind and solar projects as part of a broader push to unravel incentives for clean energy, the WSJ's Jennifer Hiller writes.

The tax would apply to wind and solar projects completed after 2027 if they use a certain percentage of components from China, the industry’s primary supplier of everything from critical minerals to batteries.

Wind and solar projects would qualify for existing tax credits only if placed in service by the end of 2027. The prior version of the tax and spending bill being debated in Congress allowed projects to qualify based on their construction start date.

The new guidelines present a much tougher bar to clear. Developers can control construction starts, for instance, by ordering key equipment or building roads on a site. They have far less influence over in-service dates, which depend on being able to connect to the grid, where lines are long.

Meanwhile, in today’s newsletter we look at how tensions are erupting inside the oil industry as oil giants are under pressure to curb their emissions and collect and trap their own releases in the hope that this will allow them to stay in business. But for some small producers that eschew public scrutiny and don’t accept the scientific consensus on climate change, Big Oil is simply giving into climate hysteria—and raising the cost of producing fossil fuels.

Read on for more on this story plus other sustainability news.

As parts of the U.S. swelter under punishing temperatures, companies are faced with rising fatigue among workers who are exposed to the high heat, as well as infrastructure stresses, WSJ Pro Sustainable Business's Clara Hudson and Jon Leckie report.

And yet, businesses are talking less about extreme heat and other weather risks this year than they did in investor filings in the first half of 2024. Mentions of climate change have also dropped.

In total, the number of securities filings containing terms related to droughts, floods, wildfires and extreme heat have declined 31% in the first five months of 2025 from the same period a year earlier, according to an analysis by WSJ Pro Sustainable Business of data from Factiva, a product of Dow Jones, publisher of The Wall Street Journal. Mentions of climate change were down a similar 32% over that time.

The analysis, of more than 200,000 securities documents between 2024 and 2025, found mentions of flood-related terms fell nearly 40% while terms related to extreme heat declined 29%.

One possible explanation—aside from politics—could be that some companies have already invested in technologies or strategies to mitigate concerns, for example home insurers steering clear of Florida where flooding is rife, said Venky Nagar, a professor at the University of Michigan, who has researched mentions of weather in corporate reports.

• Dangerous Heat Dome to Bring Record Temperatures to Much of the U.S.
• 2024 Was the Hottest Year. Here Are Climate Trends to Watch in 2025.
• Rising Temperatures Drive Surge in Energy Demand, IEA Says

Exxon Mobil, Occidental Petroleum and other oil giants are expected to receive billions of dollars of incentives to collect and bury carbon emissions. Texas oil billionaire Ben “Bud” Brigham and pro-fossil-fuels activist Alex Epstein want to turn off the tap, the WSJ's Benoît Morenne writes.

Brigham, a serial entrepreneur and libertarian from Austin, is urging President Trump and the Republicans who are considering slashing a host of energy incentives to go further and nix tax credits for carbon capture. He says there is no climate disaster on the horizon, and that funneling public money into a nascent technology is a gift to oil behemoths.

Brigham has teamed up with Epstein, a philosopher popular with Republicans. He is helping fund a push by Epstein to persuade the GOP to ax virtually all of former President Joe Biden’s climate law, the Inflation Reduction Act—including the subsidies for carbon capture that Republicans are planning to expand in the tax bill moving through Congress.

The magnate is joining a motley coalition critical of carbon capture. From Iowa to the Dakotas and Colorado, representatives, landowners and environmentalists oppose the subsidies, citing concerns about carbon-dioxide pipelines, misuse of federal funds and the national debt.

• Megabill Stuns Clean Energy Industry With New Tax on Wind and Solar
• Clean Energy Is Under Attack Even Where It’s Booming
• Wind and Solar Overtake Coal Power for First Time in U.S.

Big banks are trying to get out of the crosshairs of Republican states that are cracking down on companies for “woke” policies that conservative policymakers say are illegal and discriminatory, the WSJ's Alexander Saeedy, AnnaMaria Andriotis and Dylan Tokar report.

Representatives from JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Wells Fargo and other big banks met in recent weeks with officials in states including Texas and Oklahoma to defend against allegations that they refuse to do business with industries such as gun manufacturing and fossil-fuel extraction, people familiar with the discussions said.

Banks are also worried about a bigger threat: that President Trump could turn the power of the federal government against them, as he has with universities. The Trump administration is considering an executive order on “debanking,” according to people familiar with the matter.

Leaders in a growing number of conservative states have accused banks of boycotting industries for political reasons, rather than based on traditional factors such as the ability to repay debts. States including Texas and Oklahoma have blacklisted some banks from state contracts as a result. Banks say they weigh risks when deciding who to do business with and limit ties with companies for financial, legal and reputational reasons.

• BlackRock Is Off Texas’ Blacklist. Where the ESG Battle Stands Now.
• Antitrust Cops Say BlackRock, Other Fund Giants May Have Hurt Coal Competition

Tell me what you think: Send me your feedback and suggestions at perry.cleveland-peck@wsj.com or reply to any newsletter. If you were forwarded this newsletter, you can sign up here.

• Temperatures reach dangerous highs as "heat domes" hit Europe and U.S. (FT)
   
• Hedge-fund strategy built on catastrophes taps a hot new trend. (Bloomberg)
   
• Brazil strikes deal with Musk’s Starlink to curb criminal use in the Amazon rainforest. (AP)
   
• Meta secures nearly 800 megawatts of renewable energy to power U.S. data centers. (ESG Today)
   
• New Global Reporting Initiative standards require deeper disclosure on social impact and climate transition plans. (Trellis)
   
• Spanish power grid pledges record investments. (Reuters)

WSJ Pro Sustainable Business gives you an inside look at how companies are tackling sustainability. Send comments to bureau chief Perry Cleveland-Peck at perry.cleveland-peck@wsj.com and reporters Clara Hudson at clara.hudson@wsj.com and Yusuf Khan at yusuf.khan@wsj.com. Follow us on LinkedIn at wsjperry, clara-hudson and yusuf_khan.