Your Daily Dose of Climate Hope, August 25, 2026

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Solar has been a savior during the scorching 2026 European heatwaves. Coal plants in Poland, fossil gas plants in Italy, and nuclear reactors in France, Hungary, and Romania were all shut down due to rivers running low and causing dire shortages of water for cooling, while power generation from hydroelectric dams declined pretty much everywhere. “Baseload” power proved to be deeply vulnerable to climate shocks, cutting electricity supply just as demand skyrocketed with more people staying cool indoors.

But solar power stepped up, keeping the lights, fans, and fridges running across the continent! The long, hot, cloudless stretches that shut down coal and gas plants due to water shortages also benefited solar farms’ electricity production. Overall, the heatwaves increased daily power demand in Europe by up to 25%, but the hot, sunny weather simultaneously increased solar generation by up to 17%, directly stabilizing national grids across the European Union!

Clean energy doesn’t just help avoid worst-case future climate change — it actively builds resilience against present-day climate change! Renewables are traditionally attacked as “intermittent” because solar farms don’t generate power at night. But in the real world, the one with batteries to store solar power into the night and structural fossil fuel vulnerabilities to geopolitical and climate shocks, renewables are increasingly the least intermittent power source. America’s starting to see that as well, with solar providing over 51% of California’s electricity in May 2026.

This is vital context for policymaking as the current U.S. presidential administration continues its unprecedented campaign of sabotage and corruption to slow down renewable energy and prop up the dying fossil fuel industry. Congress must restore its constitutional role to control the power of the purse and rein in executive abuses! Furthermore, Congress should pass a clean permitting reform bill that both explicitly blocks presidential sabotage of clean energy build-outs and generally prioritizes firm, strong renewable electricity generation over weak and intermittent fossil fuels.

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Your Dose of Climate Hope is written by Sam Matey-Coste for Climate Action Now.