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Reports
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Raising the Housing Investment Level
Read the full report here. Executive Summary America has a housing shortage. Depending on how you count, we’re short between 2 and 7 million units, and the gap is widening. As cities, states, and the federal government increasingly address regulatory barriers that hamper construction like zoning restrictions, permitting processes, and environmental reviews, we will now…
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The Firm Frontier
Read the full report here. Executive summary The western United States is entering a period of unprecedented electricity demand growth driven by data center expansion, electrification, and new manufacturing activity. Utilities preparing integrated resource plans (IRPs) face a fundamental question: what new sources of clean, firm, dispatchable power can come online fast enough to meet…
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Research note: Using RFIs to build project pipelines for clean energy
Read the full research note here. This research note by the Center for Public Enterprise and the State Support Center focuses on how RFIs can serve as a procurement strategy for public agencies with project finance, development, and/or ownership authorities. RFIs can be a valuable tool for state and municipal instrumentalities to (1) gather information…
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Research note: Energy finance in 2026
Every January, the project finance law team at Norton Rose Fulbright (NRF) brings together bankers and infrastructure investment experts to discuss trends across the American energy and infrastructure finance landscape. Their annual Cost of Capital outlook is a deep well of information that allows our team to support our state and local government clients. Last…
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A new class of supply-focused housing investment programs
Read the full report here. Executive Summary When the housing tax credit program began in the late 1980s, few anticipated it would reach today’s scale, facilitating more than sixty thousand new units of multifamily housing per year, approaching 20% of the nation’s annual multifamily starts. The scale of the programs employed by housing agencies across…
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Bubble or Nothing
Policymakers concerned about the deployment of clean energy and compute-focused infrastructure over the long term need a framework for managing the uncertainty in the AI sector’s investment landscape—and for understanding the local and regional impacts of a market correction that strands data centers and their energy projects.
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Research note: Evaluating the impacts from reducing equity in investor-owned utility capital stacks in California
Read the full report here. Investor owned utilities (IOUs) have often presented concerns that the public development and financing of critical energy infrastructure such as transmission would weaken their financial position resulting in higher customer costs. IOUs often argue that increasing the percentage of debt on their books or lowering their potential rate base will…
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What’s next for the LPO?
Read the full report here. Read our abridged list of recommendations here. Executive Summary The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, now made law, looks better for the Loan Programs Office than what the Senate Energy and Natural Resource Committee had initially proposed. That first draft both rescinded funding for and repealed the authorities of all…
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Infill Nation: Reforming NEPA to Build More Housing
Read the full report here. Imagine if the Inflation Reduction Act had included the housing supply provisions from the House-passed Build Back Better Act. Based on the magnitude of the investments, the package would have provided tens of billions of dollars to build or rehabilitate millions of units of housing. That resulting influx of affordable…
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Reimagining Economic Development: A Playbook for State Economic Development Agencies
Read the full report here. This report was written jointly with Charles Yang, Executive Director at the Center for Industrial Strategy. Sustained economic growth is the key driver for improving standards of living and national power. Levers for driving economic growth have received significant focus at the national level, such as through monetary policy and…
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The Dealer Always Wins
Read the full report here. In previous publications we have described the dynamics holding back investment into the enhanced geothermal sector—namely, that the sector’s lack of project finance slows deployment and that lack of deployment, in turn, slows the maturation of the industry required to make it attractive to project finance lenders. Project debt investors…
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Committing to the Drill Bit
Read the full report here. Executive summary Proponents of enhanced geothermal energy are correct that this nascent technology has incredible potential to decarbonize the U.S. energy system. Enhanced geothermal systems (EGS) share drilling technologies with the shale fracking industry, making them a compelling option for policymakers looking to leverage existing American supply chains to drive…