Across the world, politicians are facing up to the high costs and tiny climate returns of raising energy prices. Net zero is on its way out

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A new pragmatism is entering the climate debate, driven by voters weary of soaring energy bills and annoyed by increasingly hysteric and patronizing climate rhetoric. From Washington to Westminster, Berlin to Canberra, the political class is confronting a simple truth: aggressive net-zero mandates are delivering economic pain for unmeasurable and far-off climate gain.

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The starting shot might have been the election of Donald Trump, but the clearest warning comes from the United Kingdom, whose net-zero law, enacted in 2019, committed it to zero emissions by 2050. Hailed as bold leadership, its reality has been economic sabotage. Industrial electricity prices surged 124 per cent between 2019 and 2024 — four times the increase in the U.S. — leaving the U.K. with the highest power rates in the western world at 49.6 Canadian cents per kilowatt-hour.

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