The Competitive Enterprise Institute advocates for free market reforms that ensure abundant and affordable energy and better protect our environment. CEI has been instrumental in fighting decades of climate alarmism and anti-energy policies that constrict energy supplies, raise prices, and stoke unjustified pessimism about human adaptive capabilities.
Conclusions of CEI’s research and analysis include: Abundant, affordable energy is a blessing underpinning the unprecedented improvements of the past two centuries in life expectancy, health, standards of living, food and nutrition, and industrial production. The climate catastrophe narrative is based on global climate models that inflate greenhouse gas emission scenarios and have been falsified by the past four decades of temperature data. The real costs of proposed solutions to the alleged crisis hugely exceed their hypothetical benefits.
Coalitions led by CEI were instrumental in defeating ratification of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, defeating enactment of the 2009 Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill, and convincing President Trump to withdraw from the 2015 Paris climate treaty.
Energy and Environment Issue Areas
Featured Posts
National Review
Endangered Species Act reform restores property rights and common sense species conservation
For decades, the federal government’s misinterpretation of a single word (“harm”) in the Endangered Species Act (ESA) has had severe effects on…
News Release
CEI releases a broad-based permitting reform blueprint to remove unnecessary and unreasonable obstacles for projects across the economy.
Today, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, having worked closely with many outside experts, released a new report, detailing a series of comprehensive recommendations for environmental…
Study
Permitting Reform for a Freer and More Prosperous Nation
Contents Special Advisors The Importance of Permitting Reform Part 1: 11 Principles for Permitting Reform Part 2: Statute-by-Statute Analysis for Permitting…
Studies
The ESA Amendments Act of 2025 Will Help Species
In 1973, the Endangered Species Act (ESA) was enacted into law. Since that time, more than half a century ago, the law has been…
Free the Appliances!
Introduction The Department of Energy’s (DOE) appliance efficiency standards program has been in place for decades, subjecting nearly every major home appliance to multiple…
Laboratories of Bureaucracy
Introduction The United States faces significant challenges in modernizing its infrastructure and meeting evolving energy needs. One of the obstacles is the complex and…
Blog
One lesson socialists forgot: Price controls never work
Socialists in both parties may feel they are offering fresh solutions to today’s problems, whether it is government-run grocery stores from Democrats or…
Demystifying the DCC: Where circuit courts draw the line on energy protectionism
The Dormant Commerce Clause (DCC) is a headache for students and professionals alike. The doctrine’s applicability is notoriously nuanced. In recent decades, however, its…
RCP8.5: Dead and buried
On April 29, American Enterprise Institute scholar and Substack author Roger Pielke, Jr. announced that RCP8.5, the high-end emission scenario that dominated…
News
Coalition of over 40 organizations supports the End EPA Abuse Act
Today, the Competitive Enterprise Institute sent a coalition letter to Congress in support of legislation that would put a stop to the most egregious…
End EPA Abuse Act would ensure agency does not expand its authority beyond Congressional intent
Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) and Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-Ga.) introduced the End EPA Abuse Act today, a bill to stop the Environmental…
SEC seeks end to costly climate-related mandates
The Securities and Exchange Commission today proposed rescinding the costly, Biden-era rules mandating that companies provide climate-related information in registration statements and annual reports. The SEC cited a return to the…
Op-Eds
Daily Wire
The EPA Needs a Power Check
Not long ago, if people predicted the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) would issue rules to help kill off gas-powered cars or reliable electricity sources…
Fox News
Either ignore climate change lunacy or high energy prices will make you wish you had
Congressional Republicans spent four years opposing the Biden administration’s energy policies, asserting that they raised prices from the gas pump to our utility bills.
National Review
The Insane Climate Bureaucracy That Never Was
On Friday, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Paul Atkins made one of the most important announcements in the history of modern financial regulation. His…
Staff & Scholars
Daren Bakst
Director of the Center for Energy and Environment and Senior Fellow
- Energy and Environment
- Lands and Wildlife
- Property Rights
Ben Lieberman
Senior Fellow
- Climate
- Consumer Freedom
- Energy
Marlo Lewis, Jr.
Senior Fellow
- Climate
- Energy
- Energy and Environment
Myron Ebell
Senior Fellow
- Climate
- Energy
- Energy and Environment
Paige Lambermont
Research Fellow
- Capitalism and Free Enterprise
- Energy
- Energy and Environment