The U.S. Energy Cost of the Iran War

… In association with the Costs of War project, the Climate Solutions Lab at Brown University recently released an Iran War Energy Cost Tracker that measures the additional financial burden placed on American consumers by higher gasoline and diesel prices following the start of the war. It compares actual prices to a "no-war" counterfactual estimate of what prices would have been had the conflict not occurred. As of May 18, 2026, our calculations show that Americans have spent over $40 billion on extra gasoline and diesel costs, above what they had been paying in February. This briefing asks: what, as a country, could we have spent that money on instead? What else could $40 billion have been spent on? The United States’ aggregate extra fuel costs since February 28: ●​ Could pay for the entire federal Bridge Investment Program announced in 2024 to repair, restore, and modernize over 10,200 of the nation’s bridges …