Upfront Capital Kills Clean Energy. Let’s Fix That.
The Illusion of Fossil Fuel Efficiency
Clean energy has already won the race—at least on paper. Solar and wind are, by now, the cheapest ways to generate electricity over their entire lifecycle. Yet fossil fuel projects still receive more investment. Why is that?
The answer isn’t primarily technological, or even political. It’s financial.
Fossil fuel plants offer a structure that capital likes. Only a fraction of the total cost needs to be paid upfront—often less than 20%. The rest is spread out over decades, typically offset by revenue generated as the plant comes online. This staggered expense model allows investors to show returns quickly, even if the total cost of ownership is high and volatile. In contrast, clean energy flips the timeline. Nearly the entire cost—panels, turbines, integration, installation—must be paid before the first kilowatt-hour is generated. After that, energy flows cheaply and steadily. The technology is sound. The economics are solid. But the timing is all wrong for the short-term logic of financial markets.
The Real Problem Is Time
And this is the crux: fossil fuels win not because they are better—but because they match the tempo of extractive finance. The market isn’t choosing the most sustainable, efficient, or responsible energy source. It’s choosing the one that can be sold to an investment committee without upsetting quarterly targets.
We keep hearing that clean energy isn’t scaling fast enough. That it’s too idealistic. That it needs subsidies to compete. But that’s not true anymore. What it needs is a different kind of capital logic—one that values long-term payoff over short-term optics.
If clean energy is cheaper over its lifetime, then the only thing stopping us is time itself. So let’s buy time—for everyone.
Buying Time with Public Capital
This is where post-growth policy can deliver without reverting to central planning. We don’t need to nationalize clean energy. We just need to rebalance risk and time.
Public development banks, sovereign tech funds, or municipal infrastructure trusts could offer ultra-low interest loans or partial guarantees specifically for clean energy projects with high upfront cost and negligible long-term operating cost. These aren’t subsidies. They’re financial equalizers—tools that allow the best technology to win by removing distortions caused by short-term capital scarcity.
This would leave the grid publicly owned, ensuring fair and democratic access, while allowing the energy plants themselves to be privately or cooperatively owned. Ownership diversity stays alive. Innovation is rewarded. But the unfair advantage of fossil fuel cash flow models disappears.
A Post-Growth Financial Imagination
We often say we want transformation without collapse. This is how we get there: by taming capital's tempo, not destroying it. A post-growth economy doesn’t demonize profit or private enterprise—but it does ask capital to align with planetary timelines, not quarterly ones.
We don’t need more rhetoric. We need systems that let long-term thinking win.
Let’s stop pretending clean energy isn’t ready. Let’s stop punishing those who build what lasts. Let’s stop asking for miracles from spreadsheets.
Let’s buy time—and give it to those building the future.
🦣 Find me and discuss this on Mastodon: @thilosch@mastodon.social