A very sobering assessment by one of our greatest economists. His logic is hard to rebut and what's so sad is that much of this damage is self inflicted.

We used to care about science and economic facts and making long term and far sighted investments to keep the country strong and prosperous. Now the Chinese are doing that while Trump and his administration work as hard as possible to knee cap renewables, which are by far the cheapest form of energy globally.

The stupidity and ignorance this administration has shown on green energy is, as Krugman points out, based not just on a desire to please the fossil fuel industry but on a deeper rejection of science and expertise. How else can you explain Chris Wright dismissing solar energy because "solar is unreliable", in complete ignorance of the dramatic drop in price of battery storage and their rapid deployment in places like Texas and California?

Meanwhile storage related stocks like EOSE, FLNC and others have experienced dramatic gains this year. The market gets it – but it's unlikely this administration ever will. And if they do indeed finally blink in the face of the facts and spiraling energy costs, will it be too late?

https://open.substack.com/pub/paulkrugman/p/china-has-overtaken-america?r=itfq8&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false

Paul Krugman: China has overtaken American and nowhere is that more clear than clean energy. And because of the damage that Trump is doing to our renewable sector, we will never catch up
byu/Epicurus-fan inenergy



by Epicurus-fan

14 comments

  1. But trump and his cronies will emerge far, far richer and that’s what counts. Making America great. Yeah.

  2. Repost, so Ill repost: I’m not sure this is making the point Krugman thinks he is. China is producing nearly 60% of its generation from coal. In raw TWh’s, they produce twice as much electricity from coal as the entire output from the EU’s gird in 2024.

  3. Krugman is a partisan hack. You couldn’t pay me to read his bullshit.

  4. The same Paul Krugman that predicted that the internet would be nothing more than a fad? The same man that predicted a permanent collapse of the U.S. economy after Trump won in 2016? The same man that SWORE that inflation was transitory?

    The dude should not be taken seriously.

  5. Solar energy is very dependable, reliable, and predictable. Solar facilities are simple with only a few moving parts (if any) and are very modular with there being only a few places that can break down which takes the whole facility offline. A traditional facility is way more complicated, has way more parts which can break or malfunction, and the most often time they break down is on startup.

    There are reasons not to construct solar facilities but the reliability is not one of them.

  6. He’s totally right, even though he’s a terrible economist rather than one of the greatest. Also, the important thing is the argument of what’s being said, not the person who says it.

  7. England had coal, the US had oil, and China is moving forward on renewables. Old economies get stuck in the past.

  8. Is this partially because china has 4x the population and a manufacturing economy that needs more power than the US service economy requires?

  10. I never thought I’d live to see my country slip to the sad state it is today. And it’s only going to get worse. While we defund everything, renewable energy, science research, health research etc., etc., and promote a white supremacist agenda the rest of the world is leaving us in the dust. Seems they are trying to turn us into a 3rd world country with only few ultra wealthy and the rest peasants. I see nothing but dark days ahead while China and other forward thinking nations assume the role of world leaders.

  11. Clean energy will eventually catch up because it’s not an infinite buildup in other countries. It will just be built up until 100% of demand is satisfied. How long the US will take to achieve that after others have finishes is anyone’s guess, though.

  12. I mean, even if you follow CC closely the scientific consensus is pretty clear on what’s happening. But there is zero science says we must do about it. Science described but does not prescribe. We will have to adapt. It’s getting tiring as I consistently hear we should follow the science. But science doesn’t tell us anything must be done. It’s a fallacy.

  13. Paul is being very disingenuous here, China didn’t pass US in 10 months, nobody does at that rate. Trump is only doing things more explicitly, fundamentally, the clean energy’s future in this country rests upon the demand from consumers, and what did Biden do? Take cheap EV off the table from American public.

  14. We don’t need values to have science. I follow the science not values.

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