Amazing what you can do when you don’t have elections.
Edit: I’m 100% for renewables. Unfortunately half my country is against them and they won last time.
ZeroGravitas · 30m ago
Climate action and renewables has always been very popular with voters. Since political action has consistently lagged popular support I'd suggest that you'd need to look outside elections to see what is holding the west back on this.
nielsbot · 26m ago
Popular but I guess not a top concern with voters for one thing. Also the influence of money on US politics is anti-progress.
softwaredoug · 32m ago
Solar and Wind are some of the most popular forms of energy generation
So they're evil and their progress is meaningless because it isn't immediately perfect?
The US is far, far worse than China.
thunderbong · 20m ago
Well, they are making more stuff
picafrost · 2h ago
We tried ideology driven energy policy in Europe and it hasn't gone well. We phased out nuclear power plants (because nuclear = bad) while doubling down on Russian gas dependency (because trade = peace). Clearly this has gone poorly and it will take Europe a decade to strengthen its energy sovereignty again.
There are good reasons to question renewable energy: the cost picture doesn't make sense right now, it has intermittency problems, etc. But killing renewable projects because, uh, farming or whatever?, particularly at a time when the demand for energy is growing faster than ever, seems short sighted at best.
ViewTrick1002 · 1h ago
> There are good reasons to question renewable energy: the cost picture doesn't make sense right now, it has intermittency problems, etc.
You seem to rely on quite outdated information. Renewables are the cheapest source of energy in human history. The recent explosive growth is fueled by pure economics rather than feelgood.
The same thing is happening with storage with the prices plummeting. With the recent auctions landing at $50-60/MWh.
In many regions unsubsidized renewables + storage are now the cheapest source of energy, undercutting coal and gas. Nuclear power does not even enter the picture due to the absolutely insane costs involved.
belorn · 5m ago
I would nothing more than to enjoy those cheap prices. Here in Sweden (and EU in general), while energy prices has drop in response to renewables, grid fees and energy taxes has increased more than to cover any savings. Grid fees are now the wast majority off the bill, which pays for grid stability and transmissions that is required to operate a much more variable energy production. grid stability and transmissions are primarily a government responsibility, and when cost goes up they forward that costs as grid fees and taxes.
To put some numbers down, a quertly bill recent had $1400 usd as grid fees, while the energy consumption came down to $300. Those numbers could be specific to that house, that energy company, but it is a story echoed by more and more people in this region. The consumption cost could be $0/MWh, and the grid fees alone would still be way more expensive compared to the full bill just a couple of years ago.
arcticbull · 1h ago
Renewables really aren't that cheap unless you view them entirely in isolation. Sun doesn't shine all night and wind doesn't blow continuously, it needs to be viewed with storage to represent a complete picture. Rooftop solar is more expensive than nuclear due to the zero economies of scale, residential storage is staggeringly expensive, and utility scale solar + storage only became less expensive than nuclear power a couple of years ago.
Solar and wind both have significant sovereignty issues. The entire solar supply chain is in China where they're heavily subsidized so the PRC can corner the market -- and substantially all the rare earths in wind turbines come from China. Generally recycling costs aren't considered and at least in the west there's no plan to recycle at least the fiberglass in turbine blades, leaving them to be buried.
I'm all for renewables but the way they're positioned is unrealistic.
Nuclear is only expensive because of the way it's built in the US, relying on the few locations made available (if any) to build basically fully customized installations. If we copy-pasted reactors onto sites that suit them it would be very competitive, don't take my word for it. Jigar Shah who headed the DOE loans program said the exact same thing during his term.
If we're being pedantic, nuclear is renewable too thanks to seawater extraction. There's a practically unlimited amount of uranium in the ocean and the rock underneath it.
ZeroGravitas · 25m ago
Lazard has retrofit household rooftop solar at roughly the same cost as nuclear.
Those are US numbers, Australian rooftop solar is 3 or 4 times cheaper.
And Lazard separately lists Commercial and Industrial rooftop solar which is much cheaper.
ViewTrick1002 · 51m ago
Which is why I also added that the costs for storage are absolutely plummeting? What problem are you solving? The final bit of emergency reserves?
> Solar and wind both have significant sovereignty issues. The entire solar supply chain is in China where they're heavily subsidizes so the PRC can corner the market -- and substantially all the rare earths in wind turbines come from China.
This seems like hand wringing over a nothing burger? Compare the dynamics with fossil fuels:
If the fossil fuel supply chain is disrupted we get an energy crisis within weeks.
What happens if the renewable supply chain is disrupted?
Well.... all existing installations keeps working for decades and in the meantime we need to figure out an alternative. After a couple of years our emergency reserves would start to work harder due to old installations aging out but the impact would be near zero.
> Nuclear is only expensive because of the way it's built in the US, relying on the few locations made available (if any) to build basically fully customized installations. If we copy-pasted reactors onto sites that suit them it would be very competitive, don't take my word for it, Jigar Shah who headed the DOE loans program said the exact same thing during his term.
Which is of course why all western reactors are struggling with cost. You do know that modular reactors has been a talking point for the nuclear industry since the 1950s? That is what the industry generally bounces to when large scale projects balloon in cost. They just never deliver.
But somehow if we magically handout another trillion in tax money to the nuclear industry they will fix it this time!!
> If we're being pedantic, nuclear is renewable too thanks to seawater extraction
With the minor caveat that you can't even drive the pump from the electricity final electricity you get out due to the volumes involved.
I love how the solution to horrifically expensive new built nuclear power is an even more economically infeasible technical solution.
Or you know, just diversify renewable supply chains?
zozbot234 · 42m ago
> Which is why I also added that the costs for storage are absolutely plummeting?
The only storage that matters at scale is pumped hydro, and the cost for that is not "plummeting" at all because it's built out. Battery storage is a toy, it won't cover a prolonged (can last multiple weeks over vast geography) winter-time dip in wind plus solar. The gap must be made up by either peaker natgas plants (which are costly, non-renewable and emit some carbon dioxide) or, more sensibly, nuclear baseload.
ViewTrick1002 · 34m ago
> Battery storage is a toy, it won't cover a prolonged (can last multiple weeks over vast geography) winter-time dip in wind plus solar.
I love how the talking point has switched from "storage can't even cover an hour" a couple of years ago to now apparently having trouble with "multiple weeks". How quickly reality shifts.
When we're talking about emergency reserves, because that is what you are trying to paint as the end of the world, then who the fuck cares where it comes from?
Having that problem means that close to 99% of our entire energy system is renewable. It is trivial to solve it with synfuels, biofuels, hydrogen or whatever when it is deemed necessary.
In the US the ethanol produced used as a gasoline mix in etc. is enough to run the entire grid without any other energy source for 16 days.
That is trivially repurposed as our car fleet is switched to BEVs.
Or just use whatever aviation and the shipping industry settles on as they decarbonize.
> or, more sensibly, nuclear baseload.
This tells me you don't have the slightest clue how the grid works and are reasoning backwards from attempting to justify a trillion dollar handout to the nuclear industry.
Take a look at France. They generally export quite large amounts of electricity. But whenever a cold spell hits that export flow is reversed to imports and they have to start up local fossil gas and coal based production.
What they have done is that they have outsourced the management of their grid to their neighbors and rely on 35 GW of fossil based electricity production both inside France and their neighbors grids. Because their nuclear power produces too much when no one wants the electricity and too little when it is actually needed.
Their neighbors are able to both absorb the cold spell which very likely hits them as well, their own grid as the French exports stops and they start exporting to France.
arcticbull · 29m ago
> In the US the ethanol produced used as a gasoline mix in etc.
Just so we're clear ethanol produced from corn is almost the same carbon intensity as the gasoline, and it's worse for the climate when you factor in the land use changes. [1] The whole program was just a giveaway to corn farmers from the Dubyah administration. Even the rosiest image painted by the renewables industry association says it's 26% less carbon intensive (but they neglect land use). Ethanol is basically fossil fuel with extra steps.
Was the carbon emitted from burning this ethanol sequestered in the ground or was it already in the air and is just cycling the same amount of carbon involved the atmosphere?
zozbot234 · 29m ago
> Because their nuclear power produces too much when no one wants the electricity
With nuclear power, there's no such thing as 'too much'. It's economically optimal to produce flat out ("baseload") because continued production really is "too cheap to meter", as the saying goes. The cost is pretty much all in the plant itself, which is why a lot of research into next-gen nuclear is about building smaller and cheaper plants.
> But whenever a cold spell hits that export flow is reversed
Yes? That's how a "baseload" source works. And we should not pretend that intermittent renewable sources aren't going to have the exact same issue, only to a far greater extent (especially as they scale out to "99%" of the system). You can address this by not putting all your eggs in the intermittent basket.
ViewTrick1002 · 24m ago
So what happens when you stick two French grids next to each other and you can't rely on your neighbors fossil fuel plants to absorb your over production by throttling down?
The cost for nuclear skyrockets. Do you dare calculating what running Vogtle at say a 40% capacity leads to? We're talking ~40 cents per kWh for the electricity now.
You do know that the nuclear industry has been talking "small" and "scale" since the 1950s? It is what they bounce to when large scale projects balloon in cost and fail to deliver.
Here's a history refresher:
The Forgotten History of Small Nuclear Reactors
Economics killed small nuclear power plants in the past—and probably will keep doing so
How will you solve the "cold spell" with your nuclear grid? Just ignore it and pretend nuclear power only solves "base" while keep drumming on the "renewable intermittency!!!" drum?
That does not sound very logical.
zozbot234 · 18m ago
> ...The cost for nuclear skyrockets.
The cost for the nuclear plants themselves is exactly the same, it's just no longer offsetting expensive non-renewable sources. Intermittent renewables run into this issue to a far greater extent as they scale out, because their variable cost is higher.
arcticbull · 49m ago
> This seems like hand wringing over a nothing burger? Compare the dynamics with fossil fuels:
I'm not comparing to fossil fuels, so it's not really relevant.
> Or you know, just diversify renewable supply chains?
That's happening about as fast as seawater extraction. There's good reasons why, at least for wind the extraction and processing of rare earths is an environmental catastrophe and only China is willing to pay the environmental price.
Regardless fuel costs for nuclear plants are roughly zero, about $0.0015/kWh, and there is more than enough uranium on land. And of course reprocessing spent fuel is a totally viable solution; most of France's uranium is closed loop. The entirety of the cost is in building and financing, which can be solved with policy changes.
margalabargala · 37m ago
> I'm not comparing to fossil fuels, so it's not really relevant.
If you're comparing solar + wind to not(solar + wind), then either you're mainly comparing to fossil fuels, or discussing a world that doesn't exist.
Sure, you like nuclear. You can say "oh, well, if we snap our fingers and magically have the world be different than it is, then nuclear would outperform solar".
Magic doesn't exist, and if you take two people in any country and task them with adding 5GW of reliable generation, one person with nuclear and the other with solar + battery, solar + battery will achieve that goal faster and cheaper every single time, in every country on earth.
ViewTrick1002 · 40m ago
> I'm not comparing to fossil fuels, so it's not really relevant.
Nuclear power is irrelevant in our energy systems today. The only comparison to make is fossil fuels and with that renewables give us major advantages.
For the nuclear supply chain we still have not been able to sanction the Russian industry. The west quickly diversified from their fossil fuels, but we have not been able to do the same with nuclear energy.
But I don't see you complaining about supply chain issues regarding how Russia absolutely dominates the nuclear energy sector?
> There's good reasons why, at least for wind the extraction and processing of rare earths is an environmental catastrophe and only China is willing to pay the price.
So now suddenly we are hand wringing about rare earth extraction consequences. You seem to change topics faster than I can follow.
You do know that the uranium supply is also extremely nasty? And don't start talking about all the other stuff we need to build said supply chain and nuclear power plants.
But it is fine when nuclear power does it right?
And now suddenly seawater extraction did not matter?
What are you even attempting to do here? Just muddying the waters because nuclear power evidently does not deliver and you can't bring yourself to accept it?
zekrioca · 19m ago
That person you are arguing with is not arguing with you in good faith. They are in the "base load" camp, despite knowing full well we need an "all of the above" approach. The subsidies that both nuclear and fossil fuel industries have received since the 50's is mind boggling, and they could not come up with a better idea if things go bad, I guess just bury the waste somewhere and and go live elsewhere.
arcticbull · 13m ago
> They are in the "base load" camp, despite knowing full well we need an "all of the above" approach.
I support renewables. I think it's important we understand the whole picture, and think we should construct them even if they're expensive and imperfect. However people seem to think that they're basically free and completely harmless to the environment while neither is true.
> The subsidies that both nuclear and fossil fuel industries have received since the 50's is mind boggling.
Nowhere in the world is nuclear subsidized per unit of production. The renewables industry has historically and also continues to receives significant subsidies. So does the fossil fuel industry.
> I guess just bury the waste somewhere and and go live elsewhere.
Nuclear waste is not now and has never been a real problem. Yes, you can put the spicy rocks back where they came from.
arcticbull · 36m ago
> Nuclear power is irrelevant in our energy systems today.
I dunno, it's been producing 20% of US power for decades. Same as renewables. Seems relevant.
> For the nuclear supply chain we still have not been able to sanction the Russian industry.
12% come from Russia. [1]
> So now suddenly we are hand wringing about rare earth extraction consequences. You seem to change topics faster than I can follow.
I feel like environmental implications are relevant to discuss, and I think the topic is relevant.
> You do know that the uranium supply is also extremely nasty?
Sure, but you need very little of it due to energy density, and reprocessing is a viable alternative as demonstrated by France. They have a 96% recovery rate. [2]
> And now suddenly seawater extraction did not matter?
It didn't matter in my original post either which is why it's under "if we're being pedantic."
Like I said, irrelevant compared to the fossil fuel supply chain supplying 80%.
> 12% come from Russia. [1]
Of course ignoring the intermediary steps in the supply chain which Russia controls ~50% of. But Kazakh uranium being processed in Russia is Kazakh!
And this of course ignores that my main point was that Russia is the largest player in the global nuclear technological sector.
Like I said. The evidence is that Europe despite over 3 years of war in Ukraine still has not been able to sanction any part of the Russian nuclear industry.
> Sure, but you need very little of it due to energy density, and reprocessing is a viable alternative as demonstrated by France. [2]
And now we again "solve" nuclear power by saying that reprocessing works. Despite reprocessing producing massive quantities of nasty byproducts and more expensive Uranium.
Just make nuclear power even more horrifically expensive! No problem!
arcticbull · 22m ago
> Which falls to 7.6% when counting the useful energy and not staring yourself blind on the electricity grid.
Wind and solar is less than 7% combined on that graph, so either wind and solar aren't relevant and nuclear isn't relevant, or they're both relevant.
> Like I said. The evidence is that Europe despite over 3 years of war in Ukraine still has not been able to sanction any part of the Russian nuclear industry.
France is practically closed loop, and France is 55% of Europe's nuclear generation.
> Despite reprocessing producing massive quantities of nasty byproducts and more expensive Uranium.
Are you able to quantify this are compared to renewables or are we just assuming? Remember in terms of costs, it's basically entirely construction -- fuel costs almost nothing. So even if reprocessing is relatively expensive, adding cost there won't really change nuclear energy prices.
ViewTrick1002 · 4m ago
> Wind and solar is less than 7% combined on that graph, so either wind and solar aren't relevant and nuclear isn't relevant, or they're both relevant.
They are relevant given their trajectory and that they make up ~90% of new installations due to being the by far best option today.
Grid infrastructure has a lifespan of a couple decades. We are seeing a complete disruption of the grid, but it will take a couple of decades for all old plants to age out.
> France is practically closed loop, and France is 55% of Europe's nuclear generation.
Of course forgetting how France uses Russia for this reprocessing. But relying on Russia for your energy supply chain is fine as long as it is nuclear power?
anovikov · 1h ago
OK but what are the prices at which storage auctions land OUTSIDE of China?
ViewTrick1002 · 1h ago
> That means it’s fully within China’s purchasing power parity advantage sphere, where everything costs 40% less than in the west. That means zero tariffs.
Everything you are saying means that the government can keep their damn claws off of it, because its entirely self economically viable
UebVar · 1h ago
What you say is spectacular and completely wrong.
What you claim didn't happen, and can easily disproven with data. Your interpretation of a reasoning of a policy (that didn't happen) is bad faith.
You are wrong about both electricity [1], gas[2] and total energy [3].
Europe was very dependent on energy imports in the past and current policy is the by far most successful attempt in a long at changing it. It will help us for decades to come.
I don't understand your post. Europe absolutely spent many years phasing out nuclear energy while rationalizing that increased gas imports from Russia was good because trade will make us friends [0]. The data supports this (though obviously does not capture the political discourse around Russian gas reliance). I am in agreement that the current, post-Ukraine invasion policy is good.
> Europe absolutely spent many years phasing out nuclear energy
Germany is not Europe. Over 70% of electricity in France is nuclear and they have plans to build at least 6 EPR2 plants.
picafrost · 5m ago
It is more representative of the situation over the past 30 years to say that France is not Europe. But even they had plans to cut nuclear energy to 50%. [0]
Basically coal is less profitable and more expensive in places that have always been coal counties. The only thing to do in these areas is mine coal, so the concern is that entire regions will be rendered worthless if coal collapses.
Which means local residents cannot sell their homes without taking significant losses, and they probably lose their jobs in coal, which manifests into a poverty trap for the entire town.
And there are hundreds of these towns all through Appalachia.
So renewable energy will always be a political issue over the next 50 years, because entire towns and regions depend on its political outcome.
alistairSH · 2h ago
Anybody who didn’t see this coming hasn’t been paying attention. There’s been plenty of time to move, retrain, whatever. The government has probably failed these people in one way or another, but these tend to be areas the say they value self-sufficiency and minimal government interference , so…
zahlman · 1h ago
> move
To where, with what savings?
> retrain
To do what, in this area, with what existing infrastructure?
alistairSH · 1h ago
There are retrains programs dotted all over WV and Appalachia. They cover everything from construction and other trades to IT and more office-focused jobs.
ironman1478 · 1h ago
I don't believe in retraining, but tons of immigrants move for better opportunities with very little savings. It's difficult and unfortunate, but it's necessary
bluefirebrand · 1h ago
People probably should not be forced to behave like desperate immigrants within the borders of their own country though
ironman1478 · 28m ago
Why not? It'll probably build character. Also, it's happened all the time? People have been doing it for all of America's history. Tons of famous media is about people moving to the city for a better life.
bryanlarsen · 1h ago
Clinton had promised a large pile of cash to do this. Voters preferred Trump's lie that he would save the jobs.
ModernMech · 1h ago
> To do what, in this area, with what existing infrastructure?
Right! It's a real chicken and egg scenario. It would seem to me that without this infrastructure, it would be very hard to retrain and build new industries. It would really benefit the people of these regions to vote for people who, as a matter of policy, would bring training and infrastructure to them. Unfortunately, the people who most benefit from such policies vote against them [1], so the resources available are insufficient. So the conversation is about poverty reduction through social programs to support people working in a dying industry, rather than growing new industries. The solution, might be to vote for people proposing such resources, which I know is a radical idea, but it's at least something new to try.
There are only about 45,000 coal miners in the entire US. That's a tiny number.
rtkwe · 1h ago
They're also in geographically low population areas so counting them and the people employeed in their towns they have a significant sway on some states and the Senate skews things towards low population states through it's inequitable representation AND the outsized power Senate rules give individual Senators.
Plus it's made a few people EXTREMELY rich so they've made their opinions and interests everyone elses problem too.
hamdingers · 1h ago
There are approximately twice as many yoga instructors. It's unfortunate Big Yoga doesn't have the same political pull.
jeffbee · 2h ago
More people drive buses in NYC than are coal miners in the whole America.
HPsquared · 1h ago
Probably though, like the buses, there's an order of magnitude more work done on the "back end". The machines, logistics, etc etc and everything else that depends on the industry. In the bus drivers example, it could be all the people in NYC who need to take a bus to get to work and would be affected by the sudden disappearance of buses. So it is with many industries.
olddustytrail · 1h ago
If people really cared about coal miners then they could be offered a $1 million redundancy package. It would amount to a tiny fraction of government spending and I'm pretty sure it would be welcomed.
Sharlin · 2h ago
At the same time there are hundreds of towns in low-lying areas that are being rendered worthless by the climate change.
deadeye · 1h ago
Where can I find a list of these towns?
No comments yet
dalyons · 1h ago
At the speed at which coal has been declining, and will continue to decline now due to economics, it’s not going to take 50 years. Maybe 10 at most.
cosmic_cheese · 2h ago
The thing is, if you’re burning fossil fuels to generate power there’s not much reason to prefer coal over natural gas. The latter is cheaper and cleaner and once pipelines are in place, you don’t need to truck it around.
Coal is dead and it’s not coming back. Areas in which it served as the pillar of the economy need to figure something else out. I say this as someone hailing from one such area.
Speaking frankly, the way politicians keep selling the fantasy of it making a comeback is cruel.
ModernMech · 1h ago
> Areas in which it served as the pillar of the economy need to figure something else out. I say this as someone hailing from one such area.
Old steel towns had to do this, coal country might look to them for a model on how to leave a dying industry behind. But seeing how they vote, they might not like the answer for what it takes to survive:
Pittsburgh PA - famous former steel town, faced very uncertain economic future after the mills closed, now a booming metropolis with top industry leaders in education, healthcare, sports, finance. What did it take? A dedication to multiculturalism and diversity. Pittsburgh would have died without embracing the global economy and attracting doctors, professors, students, entertainers, and athletes from all over the world to visit, live, and grow a family.
Cleveland OH - once one of America's great manufacturing hubs, powered by steel mills, car parts, and shipping along Lake Erie. When industry collapsed, Cleveland faced deep decline, job losses, shrinking population, even bankruptcy in the 1970s. But today it's finding new strength as a center of healthcare, research, and culture.
Then you look at places like Youngstown OH. Unlike Pittsburgh or Cleveland, Youngstown struggled to reinvent itself. Population plummeted, tax bases collapsed, and poverty took hold. The city became a symbol of the Rust Belt's hardest struggles. What held it back? Overreliance on steel, limited diversification, and waves of outmigration left too few resources to rebuild. What are they doing today to fix things? Healthcare and education. Should have started a lot sooner.
One more example is Bethlehem PA, another former steel town that now has top industries in healthcare, education, and also some manufacturing.
So that's the model. If you're a dying town with an industry that's shrivveling up due to changing economic conditions, the model to survive is to quickly pivot to healthcare, education, and entertainment, and to invite a bunch of outsiders into your community with open arms.
And that is the main problem these dying coal regions have, because looking at how they vote, embracing healthcare, education, entertainment, and diversity is the last thing they want to do. You look at what the people who they voted for are doing with their power, they're attacking healthcare, attacking education, and attacking diversity sometimes violently, but always unrelentingly. So the Pittsburgh model is off the table, and they'll have to find another way from the abyss of failed post-industrial policy.
cosmic_cheese · 1h ago
> And that is the main problem these dying coal regions have, because looking at how they vote, embracing healthcare, education, and diversity is the last thing they want to do. You look at what the people who they voted for are doing with their power its attacking healthcare, attacking education, and attacking diversity sometimes violently, but always unrelentingly. So the Pittsburgh model is off the table, and they'll have to find another way from the abyss.
Spot on, from what I’ve seen. Just keep doubling down on what hasn’t worked in hopes that one day it’ll magically manifest a Disney ending and the good old days will return.
jimbob45 · 59m ago
What did it take? A dedication to multiculturalism and diversity. Pittsburgh would have died without embracing the global economy and attracting doctors, professors, students, entertainers, and athletes from all over the world to visit, live, and grow a family.
Just cater to the rich folks! That’s the same playbook every city in world is running right now to rampant failure. Rich people don’t bring prosperity. Prosperity brings the rich. Building prosperity is a difficult ordeal that takes time, sacrifice, a lot of money, and a culture of safety and community.
ModernMech · 46m ago
Sure if you want increase your tax base, step one is to be attractive to people with money.
But healthcare, education, and entertainment are not exclusive to rich people, they're industries that everyone enjoys and can take part in. The doctors, actors, professors, students, athletes, researchers, who come from around the world to live and work in Pittsburgh are not "the rich". They have money, but they're still just regular people.
For example the students who come to Pittsburgh for an education are not wealthy, but they are flush with cash from the government and lenders. They are attracted to Pittsburgh not because it's a good place for the rich, but because it's a good place for students.
Incidentally, good places for students are also good places for the rich. So I agree, rich people don’t bring prosperity. Prosperity brings the rich.
> That’s the same playbook every city in world is running right now to rampant failure.
Did you miss the part where Pittsburgh is thriving? Cleveland is doing okay. Bethlehem is booming. Youngstown... not great but moving in a good direction.
hollerith · 1h ago
>So renewable energy will always be a political issue over the next 50 years, because entire towns and regions depend on its political outcome.
I heard that before the first Trump administration, there was bipartisan support in Congress for phasing out the use coal in the US, so it seems quite possible that that bipartisan support will reassemble itself after Trump is gone (because the next President is unlikely to be as populist and as uncaring about climate change as Trump).
wat10000 · 1h ago
Coal counties are insignificant. Nobody is winning national elections by appealing to them.
The actual motive is to appeal to people who have made coal part of their identity. These are people who have never been anywhere near a coal mine, but have internalized coal as Important and American, and as a way to stick it to those stupid environmentalists.
notahacker · 51m ago
Yeah. Think this was epitomised by
the DoE tweeting pictures of coal to own the libs. Or as one wag put it the right in 2005: "we shouldn't overregulate energy markets"; the right in 2025: "I'm actually attracted to coal"
In Trump's case you can throw in a personal obsession with hating wind power because you can see it from one of his golf courses.
Generally pathetic that people are trying to retcon this reflexive lib-owning vice-signalling from incredibly stupid people as actual industrial policy.
JumpCrisscross · 2h ago
> the real motive for cancelling renewables is to appeal to coal counties in the USA
Wyoming here. Coal country. Everyone thinks this is dumb. Including the folks in Campbell county, our top-producing coal region that has been trying to build a wind farm [1].
Trump’s social media fans in Florida and Texas like this because it feels like owning the libs. (To the extent there may be pecuniary interest, it would be in power producers. Like housing, stopping new power raises prices and profits incumbents.)
Also, that Reddit thread is about coking coal. Not the thermal coal power plants burn. It’s about American steel production shutting down in the face of our trade war. Not this new economic miracle these idiots have spun up.
Dumb enough to make them reconsider voting Republican in the future? I doubt it.
No comments yet
groby_b · 2h ago
This would make sense if it were a single issue. (And then, limited sense - even quite red places like Texas invest in solar because they need it. Coal is a regional issue, not a national one)
If you see it in light of all the other actions taken across the spectrum, you land at best at "desperate dice roll to re-tool the US into a manufacturing power from the 80s", and at worst at "deliberate dismantling of a first-rate world power into a second tier paradise for oligarchs".
rtkwe · 1h ago
It's made a national issue by 1) Senators from coal mining heavy states and the ridiculous setup of the Senate and the outsized power it gives individual Senators unless one party has 60 seats and 2) the amount of wealth it's given a few people (like the Koch brothers) who've used that wealth to buy influence in the GOP.
ModernMech · 2h ago
This message seems to come from a timeline where the people cutting the renewable projects care about electoral outcomes.
But in this timeline, they tried to violently overturn the 2020 election, and they are currently trying to rig the 2026 election by gerrymandering states they control as much as possible.
This isn't about earning the political support of people in coal country who vote GOP. If they ever face negative electoral outcomes in the future, their plan is to overturn the election using either force or legal chicanery.
WA · 1h ago
All energy policies are ideology driven, but you make it sound like nuclear isn’t ideology driven. That’s just nonsense.
- Nuclear waste has non-zero cost that aren’t factored in.
- Nuclear risks are externalized, not factored in.
- Nuclear power is heavily subsidized.
- Solar power industry in Germany on particular was destroyed for ideological reasons.
What about nuclear between 10 years ago and 50 years ago? Same reasons to not use it?
cameldrv · 2h ago
The costs for solar and batteries have come down a whole lot since ~10 years ago during the energiewende. IMO solar is the cost leader in areas where there is decent sun. The U.S. has a lot better sun than Germany.
bryanlarsen · 54m ago
Solar is the cost leader in most areas with poor sun too. You have to have truly abysmal sun for it to not be the cost leader. Finland has such abysmal sun, Germany doesn't.
oezi · 2h ago
I would argue that buying Russian gas was primarily market driven and politics didn't stop it from happening. It was cheaper than American or Qatari gas why should European nations not have bought it?
It the same way that the US got hooked on cheap Chinese imports.
Also renewables make too much sense right now. That's why a lot of dollars are allocated towards them even though subsidies are mostly gone.
seanmcdirmid · 2h ago
Did France really phase out nuclear, or do you mean the rest of Europe?
masklinn · 2h ago
Mostly Germany, Belgium as well, possibly a few others.
France did shut down superphenix for completely ideological reasons tho.
Also stopped investing in nuclear but that was not really ideological (the nuclear buildup originated in something of a misprediction, and sadly the country didn’t really capitalise on it).
seszett · 2h ago
Belgium didn't phase out nuclear. They decided that someone in the future would handle the closure of the nuclear plants, and when the time came and no replacement plant had been built, we just kept the nuclear plants running.
masklinn · 1h ago
Belgium legislated the phase out of nuclear in 2003 due 2025, opting to neither replace nor postpone closure of nor refurbish its at the time 7 reactors as their lifetimes ran out.
Then it had to postpone the closure of at least two reactors following the second invasion of Ukraine, and this year officially dropped the phaseout and opened the door for new builds (unlikely as they are).
orwin · 59m ago
Belgium did not. My code currently help deploying updates on 3 nuke plants in belgium, so hopefully I'd know.
masklinn · 25m ago
> Belgium did not.
It absolutely did, back in 2003. This was pushed back after the invasion of Ukraine then repealed but Doel 3 and Tihange 2 were shut down under the phaseout plan.
danieldk · 2h ago
I think it's primarily Germany that phased it out? Seems like the grandparent is overgeneralizing.
pbhjpbhj · 1h ago
In UK we phased out nuclear by buying power from France who made it in nuclear power stations ... we were World leaders, but now we haven't the expertise to renew our nuclear power so have to rely on foreign companies.
Gravityloss · 39m ago
"Europe" certainly didn't do that. Some countries in Europe did.
tialaramex · 2h ago
The cost picture already makes sense for onshore wind, which is why if you have a suitable site people do that. If you own a hilltop farm in the UK a bank loan for a wind turbine is a no-brainer for the loan officer - because it's not correlated to farm gate prices unlike other loans you might want e.g. for equipment or buildings so that's a desirable loan to have.
miohtama · 55m ago
Europe didn't phase our nuclear plants. It was only Germany and Italy. Finland, France and UK kept building.
manoDev · 2h ago
The artificial energy supply shortage caused by this prohibition will be a great excuse to invade another oil-rich country. The current administration has already demonstrated Venezuela is next in line.
delusional · 1h ago
> We tried ideology driven energy policy in Europe and it hasn't gone well. We phased out nuclear power plants (because nuclear = bad)
Maybe that was the discussion where you're from, what do i know. Where I'm from we had a honest political debate about nuclear, and the public decided on no. It wasn't because of "ideology". We discussed the safety, the waste challenge, and everything else.
pluc · 2h ago
The obstacle to clean energy has always been humans. We'll get our due soon enough.
masklinn · 2h ago
Killing solar because “farming” is an unfathomable level of mind-bogglingly nonsensical.
Of course making sense does not in any way matter to this administration, and Trump hates wind turbines because of his dumb golf course, but still…
lazide · 2h ago
The US (near as I can tell) isn’t even killing them for any concrete reason (any reason given changes), just to be anti-whatever they are.
Which, is similar to the German anti-nuclear approach, to be frank. Burning dirty coal instead of keeping an already existing nuke plant running isn’t a decision based on either environmental or economic reasoning, and that was done a lot.
Pendulum swings, etc, etc.
mulmen · 1h ago
> There are good reasons to question renewable energy: the cost picture doesn't make sense right now
What? Did renewables get more expensive for some reason? Solar and wind have been cheaper than coal for years.
Attacking renewables is the ideological move because anything good is bad. It’s just weaponized ignorance.
exe34 · 1h ago
> We tried ideology driven energy policy in Europe and it hasn't gone well. We phased out nuclear power plants (because nuclear = bad) while doubling down on Russian gas dependency (because trade = peace). Clearly this has gone poorly and it will take Europe a decade to strengthen its energy sovereignty again.
what I don't understand is how this was obvious to me 20 years ago as a teenager, but European leaders just somehow thought it was a good idea. Was it just "a lucky guess" on my part? it was just so obvious that when you tolerate and interact with narcissists as if their behaviour was acceptable, they will simply escalate their behaviour. I was also critical of ties with the Chinese government and I was told I was just paranoid/racist. today we suddenly realise oh that was a bad idea, the leopards are chewing on our faces.
I reckon the rich and powerful saw it coming alright and they just figured they'd make bank before it got to the point they'd have to send the kids of poor people to war.
delusional · 1h ago
It was also obvious to all my friends when I was a teenager in 2008 that being friends with America was a bad idea. That also turned out to be right.
All we would have had to do was have no allies for the past ~60 years, and we would have never gotten burned. We also would have been entirely irrelavant to international politics, and likely wouldn't have become one of the richest nations on earth.
World politics is like love. It's better to have had a productive alliance that hits a rough patch, than never to have had one at all.
HPsquared · 1h ago
Still, farming is pretty important and we must strike a balance.
dalyons · 1h ago
The US grows more acres of corn just for ethanol than the number of acres needed to go 100% solar. We would have _more_ useful farmland if we switched.
softwaredoug · 2h ago
A lot of people on this thread don’t seem to realize that solar and wind now work fine without government subsidies. The Biden-era subsidies have been about accelerating decarbonization, not about propping up the market.
If you let the market choose, it would choose a lot of wind and solar.
> Despite facing macro challenges and headwinds, utility-scale solar and onshore wind remain the most cost-effective forms of new-build energy generation on an unsubsidized basis (i.e., without tax subsidies).
So the admin just needs to get out of the alway and let the market solve this problem. Not try to centrally manage the economy like the Soviet Union.
The government is actively threatening to block wind and solar projects through permitting denials. The market can’t permit for itself no matter how good the economics are.
But keep in mind most solar is built on private lands only needing local/state approval. With the biggest builders red states like Texas.
Drunk_Engineer · 28m ago
Yes, but local permitting is a complete shitshow. For example, I should be able to plug in a simple balcony-solar system, but my PUC prohibits the technology.
softwaredoug · 17m ago
Yes. Though that’s the current regime most capacity is installed under. And the companies building solar farms have more energy to navigate the process than me/you.
But it just goes to show you being involved in local government, showing up to advocate for green energy projects, etc at local levels is one of the best things you can do.
jorgen123 · 1h ago
And remember that you all are part of the market. In my area you can choose what power generation your electricity comes from. Most customers do not bother, unfortunately (less than 10% of Marin Clean Energy customers).
I know, not real-time. Renewable energy credit trading, and such. But you become the demand for clean generation if you choose to do so. It is easy. If you are in Marin, Contra Costa, Napa, or Solano go to https://mcecleanenergy.org/opt-up/
Similar CCA's are all over California and probably beyond.
JumpCrisscross · 2h ago
> lot of people on this thread don’t seem to realize that solar and wind now work fine without government subsidies
This isn’t about subsidies. Orsted, for example, is being blocked on national security grounds using environmental regulation [1].
Which is horrible for the US economy as it insulates our companies from market pressure, preventing them from adapting.
delusional · 1h ago
It's also quite bad for US "allies". My country, Denmark, is (in my own opinion, this hasn't been discussed by the media yet) going to have to bail out Orsted.
nerevarthelame · 55m ago
The truly free market response to all of this would be to remove the need for approvals, or just rubber stamp all projects with no real review. I don't think that's a great idea. But this is the complete opposite of that. The market wants to build more renewables, and the administration is blocking it.
It's amazing how much leeway many people give this administration for policies that they have a long history of opposing: government ownership of companies (10% of Intel, US Steel's "golden share"), blocking private development of energy production, sending the National Guard to hostilely takeover cities, etc. It's the sort of stuff that they've accused their opponents of wanting to do in deranged, nightmarish worst-case scenarios.
Spivak · 1h ago
Ah yes Republicans, the party of strong environmental regulations and impeding business.
"You betrayed everything you believe in, and for what?"
"To own the libs."
AnotherGoodName · 1h ago
One of the biggest improvements recently is battery tech. Many countries are 10x'ing the GWh of battery capacity in the next couple of years without any real government drive.
This is one thing that actually prevents the power price spikes since the batteries can jump in to cover gaps. I can quote many installations that have completely paid themselves off in 2 years (see hornsdale battery as an example - one year of operation alone, 2020, generated profit of half its initial $90million cost) and while this 2 year payoff will come down as more and more are installed part of the reason the payoff is going down is due to power price costs becoming more and more steady as more batteries are installed.
Even the USA is installing massive amounts of capacity right now. Look at Texas - 3x battery capacity available in 2025 compared to 2024 due to massive installations coming online and they are a state that does not do a lot to support renewables at all. There's no stopping it, it doesn't need subsidies and it's one of the most straightforward capital payoffs available right now.
I actually think the predictions in the article won't come to fruition honestly. The battery installation rise is dominating the investment landscape right now and it's completely flown under the radar without any political controversy (no things such as questionable media trying to claim battery banks are somehow bad for our health and should be stopped) nor are there subsidies required.
TrackerFF · 2h ago
I'm all for nuclear power, but those project take years. Even the small modular ones, even if fast tracked. I think it is a misstep to simply cancel current projects, and hope (?) that nuclear will pull it all. Even if it does so, you'll have a big gap in where demand could outpace supply.
HarHarVeryFunny · 45m ago
Exactly - electricity demand is surging NOW due to datacenter/AI use, and all signs are that this increased demand will continue to grow.
Nuclear is a decent option, but it takes years to bring new capacity online.
There's nothing wrong with investing in nuclear that'll come online in 5+ years time, but at the same time the government should also be green lighting all projects capable of adding capacity more quickly.
euroderf · 34m ago
1) Elect stooge
2) Sabotage
3) PROFIT!
yathaid · 2h ago
This is a feature, not a bug.
roxolotl · 2h ago
Yea all the “this bad thing will happen” discussion misses that the intent has been plain for at least a year now. The administration has plainly said what they would do during the election and they have rather faithfully executed on that plan. This isn’t about fixing things or saving people money it’s about doing what they want to do.
mlinhares · 2h ago
Its about inflicting as much pain in the american public as possible because if you cause indiscriminate damage its bound to also damage their enemies. Its a death cult.
ambicapter · 33m ago
I don't think they think about the other side much at all. It's all about enriching themselves, end of story.
von_neumann · 2h ago
Exactly, see Enron. Once you control the production and can manipulate the price you then extract obscene profits.
mensetmanusman · 1h ago
Lots of states are still supporting renewables, that’s the great thing about a republic.
softwaredoug · 37m ago
Exactly. Solar / wind on land, on private property rarely needs Federal approval
Even stats I find are from a friendlier permitting regime. And now I bet all the money will be poured into projects not needing federal approval.
And we might hope something good comes out of the nuclear this admin wants to build. The US has a lot of room for approval there.
losvedir · 1h ago
It frustrates me that neither party is about energy abundance. The Democrats have clamped down on coal, fracking, nuclear for various largely climate reasons. And now the republicans want to reverse it and restrict renewables mostly in a "turnabout is fair play" kind of way. I wish the current administration had just cut regulations and enabled more fracking or whatever and left it at that.
Taking the environmental hit for lower energy costs is understandable at least, even if those who are more financially stable would prefer not to. But whatever this is makes no sense and is just puerile revenge.
jfengel · 2h ago
“We will not approve wind or farmer destroying Solar,” Trump posted on Truth Social Wednesday. “The days of stupidity are over in the USA!!!”
It's just so self fulfilling. Someone is being very stupid. Maybe it's me. Maybe it's him. Possibly it's both of us.
But there is no way out of the conclusion that the country is (at least) a near majority of very stupid people. Not merely mistaken or holding different values, but genuinely incapable of distinguishing reality from fantasy.
Of course if I'm the stupid one, maybe my reasoning there is also wrong. I know I conflated individuals and groups in a less-than-rigorous fashion.
But either way I feel unable to find a solution to this conundrum. Certainly I can't if I'm stupid. And if a majority of voters are stupid, then it undercuts the principle that enables us to live in the same region together. I am rapidly running out of ideas to continue that.
amanaplanacanal · 2h ago
I think about one third who heard what they wanted to hear in his campaign promises, one third completely against and one third who consider themselves "apolitical".
With any luck the midterm elections will allow sanity to return.
jfengel · 1h ago
As far as I can tell, those who heard what they wanted in his campaign promises are reasonably satisfied that they are getting it. There's some loss of approval as reality precludes some options, but that happens to everyone.
Nor do I think the "apolitical" will become any less so. I see no reason why the midterms should give radically different results.
Now, it just so happens that historically things swing a bit back at midterms, and given how close things are that's enough to sway the entire power structure.
It's an unfortunate reality of voting: a one-vote margin is no different from unanimity.
Even so I do not expect the overall tone to change any time soon. Those proportions seem fairly durable.
SoftTalker · 2h ago
I think you will be disappointed but we'll see.
somewhereoutth · 2h ago
> genuinely incapable of distinguishing reality from fantasy
Having spent some time in the US, my theory is that things have got so complicated over there (or more precisely nobody is incentivized to make them simple), that it has fried people's minds. They just respond to the last stimulus, having given up trying to make sense of anything, as they attempt to get through each day as best they can.
Healthcare is the obvious example, but I'd say that that is representative of most things in the US, in terms of being a minefield where one foot wrong can wreck your life.
anon191928 · 2h ago
Voting for masses lead to this. Voting with some IQ tests, education or income/wealth background check would at least improve it. not a perfect solution but way better than random people voting all. Everyone needs to driving license or other licences to do things. Voting is more important but no selection????
jfengel · 1h ago
My opinion is that we should open voting further. If voting works at all, it's only because you don't do any selection on the voter base, and hope some kind of "wisdom of crowds" kicks in.
As far as I'm concerned everyone who lives here should vote. Felons, infants, people in jail, anyone who can pull a lever or an unambiguous gesture. I'd even include fetuses if they could. If the law affects you then you should have a say.
This is undoubtedly a stupid idea. But the current system is clearly broken and I'd be willing to at least try taking the principle seriously.
DangitBobby · 1h ago
Then the people who create the test gets to choose the voters.
bitfilped · 2h ago
Ah yes, segregation at the polles. The true definition of freedom and democracy.... Give me a break.
JumpCrisscross · 1h ago
> segregation at the polles
I disagree with it. But I think it is worth discussing.
We don’t have universal suffrage. The most-successful democracies in history never did. In our day-to-day lives and commerce we weigh opinions based on their source. And the current system isn’t working, in many cases because the majority votes for something stupid.
dragonwriter · 1h ago
The current system isn't working because, we know from comparative study of modern democracies, the US has all of the features that contributed maximally to disfunction: strong presidential system, unequal legislative representation, and first-past-the-post single-member-district elections for both houses of the national legislature.
We could fix those peoblems, or we could add additional problems by layering even more broken systems that the US (among others) has tried before and rejected on top of the existing problems.
jfengel · 1h ago
I don't believe that fixing those problems would solve the underlying issue, which is that the voters themselves have a deep antipathy towards each other. We could alter the rules to try to reduce the effects of it, but I don't expect it to reduce the underlying division that leads us to push the rules to (and past) the breaking point.
Plus, of course, there is little appetite for any given set of fixes. We can easily calculate who will benefit, and because of the division I mentioned, half the people will oppose the change just to avoid losing influence.
I'm hard pressed for a solution short of starting over from scratch, which would at least make some of the existing alliances moot.
anon191928 · 1h ago
we are seeing what democracy leads to. Intel stake bought via democracy? lol. give me a break
gonzo41 · 2h ago
Enjoy having brown outs to keep data centers running guys.
jmyeet · 2h ago
They are correct. You will see in the coming years that electricity across the US is going to get substantially more expensive. There are several reasons for this:
1. Data centers, primarily driven by AI. Why? Because they can (and do) negotiate deeply discounted prices AND either don't pay for the connection and required infrastructure or they only pay a portion of it. Who pays for the rest? Consumers. Who subsidizes the discounted electricity? Consumers.
2. Increased electricity use in an area tends to raise the prices for everyone. We actually saw this in the crypto mining boom (eg [1]). In short, in a region like upstate New York where it otherwise has access to cheap hydro power, the local provider will have a long term power supply contract for a certain amount of electricity. A big increase usually means they now have to buy power on the spot market, which can be much more expensive. This raises the average electricity price for everyone;
3. The administration is pushing a huge expansion in LNG exports. IIRC ~41% of US power generation comes from natural gas. A huge increase in LNG exports will inevitably cause a rise in natural gas prices for all domestic power producers. This is in part driven by the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine but natural gas suppliers have seen (and pounced upon) an opportunity to drive up the wholesale price of natural gas;
4. The dam has really broke on contraining price hikes for pure profit purposes (eg [2]). If you look at the finances of any private electricity utility, you'll see that simply increasing shareholder profits is probably the biggest single factor in electricity price hikes;
5. While all this is happening and we're not really building new power plants (at least not enough to match demand), the administration has cut off renewables, which are key to meeting demand beyond any environmental concerns (which are real and true). Power usage spikes during the day. Well guess what? That's when solar power production happens. So adding significant solar power production to your electricity mix will decrease the baseline power needed from other sources;
6. Private equity has turned its eye to the guaranteed profits of electricitiy providers [3]. This will do absolutely nothing other than raise prices; and
7. Lip service is given to nuclear but it simply isn't the answer, primarily because the lead time for building a nuclear power plant is about 10-15 years. Plus it's one of the most expensive forms of electricity (in LCOE terms) and having a company safely manage a nuclear power plant in an era where regulation is being gutted doesn't seem like a great idea.
Not a single nuclear power plant has been built without government subsidy. Why not just subsidize renewables instead, particularly solar? Efforts such as small modular reactors to lower costs simply make no sense. Larger reactors are more efficient.
I think by 2030 a significant portion of the population will be paying $0.50/kWh or more for residential electricity.
> Power usage spikes during the day. Well guess what? That's when solar power production happens. So adding significant solar power production to your electricity mix will decrease the baseline power needed from other sources
Wrong, actually. At least in Australia, peak energy is in the late afternoon when everyone comes home, around 6pm. The other peak is in the morning around 7am. These are times when solar is not producing significantly, meanwhile it makes baseload unviable during the day.
ZeroGravitas · 51m ago
It's common to quote the peak "demand" seen by the grid, which ignores rooftop solar which is fulfilling lots of actual demand when it is delivering.
This is especially true in Australia, a world leader in rooftop solar, here's something from AEMO on the topic:
> Both minimum and maximum operational demand are shifting to later in the day, driven by increasing contribution from rooftop PV. Minimum operational demand is expected to occur in the middle of the day by the mid-2020s. Maximum operational demand is expected to shift later in the day by an hour or two, when PV contribution is falling but temperatures are remain high (depending on the region and POE).
orwin · 48m ago
I think you're confusing general power usage peak with residential usage peak. Or maybe you're talking about what you've learned 20 years ago (or Australia industry is 20 years late).
As AC use increased, industry switched from oil to electricity, coal to electric arc, and as power grid stabilized, peak usage shifted a lot in the last ~20 years. That's why summer/winter time do not make sense anymore and a lot of European countries are talking about not switching anymore.
jmyeet · 1h ago
You're wrong.
The peak demand depends on a number of factors including what city/town it is, the season, the mix of residential/industrial usage, the time of day and the day of the week [1].
Also, if the peak time includes summer afternoon/evenings from 3pm to 9pm (as it does for several cities), a significant portion of that time is in daylight hours. In January in Sydney, sunset is after 8pm. You have lower (or no) power generation from solar at dusk so say 7pm but that's still 4 of the 6 peak hours where solar is impacting peak usage.
Power companies will tend to point to residential peak demand to justify price increases while often just entirely excluding industrial usage that drops off at about the same time.
Also, residential power usage (in Australia) is changing as building standards change (ie Australian houses are notorious for their energy ineeficiency, historically) and the rollout of residential solar. Smart meters, energy efficiency and batteries can really put a dent in peak electricity usage and this will only continue given how comparatively expensive Australian electricity is.
> Power usage spikes during the day. Well guess what? That's when solar power production happens. So adding significant solar power production to your electricity mix will decrease the baseline power needed from other sources;
This is so funny to me, because if you listen to anti-solar people, they'll tell you it's a bad idea because it doesn't generate anything at night. Given what you say, even if batteries weren't a thing, it would seem like solar would be an ideal component of any power grid, even if it didn't produce any energy for the nighttime whatsoever.
jmyeet · 7m ago
Solar really is ideal for partial or total residential power generation, for several reasons:
1. The price. It has plummeted in the alst 10-20 years and shows no signs of abating;
2. For many people it can be placed on their roofs so doesn't take up any land or generally require building any new structure. Generally the only planning required is artificial barriers in place to protect electricity providers;
3. It is the only form of direct power generation. Everything else involves turning a turbine. No moving parts is great for reliability. You do need some infrastructure to convert the panel output to the right voltage (eg an inverter) but that's all commodity tech;
4. Batteries are a largely solved problem for energy storage. You can use golf cart batteries if you really want.
There are problems. We need panel standardization, which I think will come with industry maturity.
Another big issue is lack of regulation for solar companies who use predatory financing on consumers and can actually make selling your home much more difficult. This is a big enough problem that any realtor will tend to advise you not to get solar because of the selling issues. This shouldn't be the case. It's a regulatory problem.
lotsofpulp · 2h ago
>4. The dam has really broke on contraining price hikes for pure profit purposes (eg [2]). If you look at the finances of any private electricity utility, you'll see that simply increasing shareholder profits is probably the biggest single factor in electricity price hikes;
Where, in the USA, can an electricity seller increase the price without government approval? Hell, your [2] link is about an entity of the federal government, there are no shareholders.
xyzzzzzzz · 2h ago
Fun fact, people in California are paying nearly twice the price for energy than the rest of the US.
Price of energy is proportional to energy output of the tech, regulations, competition.
The best way forward, factoring in current and future energy use, is nuclear.
Solar is a feel good tech that is great when subsidised, but doesn't put out anywhere near the power of nuclear.
If California wants to do solar, it can! Though it will likely go the way of the rail project, the firefighting org etc
bryanlarsen · 2h ago
> Fun fact, people in California are paying nearly twice the price for energy than the rest of the US.
People in California are paying massive amounts for power distribution. The utilities themselves are paying very little for power generation -- for example, they pay 4c/kWh for a solar+batteries plant build in 2022.
> but doesn't put out anywhere near the power of nuclear.
We have > 250GW of solar and 97 GW of nuclear. Nuclear produced 779TWh and solar 303TWh in 2024. They are quite comparable.
> If California wants to do solar, it can! Though it will likely go the way of the rail project, the firefighting org etc
California already has a lot of solar and batteries.
declan_roberts · 2h ago
Distribution is a separate line item on your PG&E bill. They have to bill you separately for the cost of electricity and the cost of delivery (maintenance of the grid)
Your energy prices are extremely high for reasons apart from the grid.
bryanlarsen · 1h ago
Sure, but it's not high because PG&E is paying 4c/kWh for battery shifted solar power.
throwaway173738 · 1h ago
There is no “best way.” There are multiple good ways but there is no single “best way.” If someone has told you there is a ”best way” and no other path forward stands a chance then they are selling you something.
LastTrain · 2h ago
OK, but Texas has a higher percentage of renewables than California, and is half the cost, so maybe it’s something else…
jeffbee · 1h ago
No. Texas has more renewables and uses way more total electricity. The fraction of grid electricity in Texas that comes from renewables is less than half of what it is in California.
AtlasBarfed · 2h ago
Your comment reflects energy policy from somewhere around like 1975?
How can I tell someone on hackernews knows absolutely nothing about power generation economics? They say we have to go all in on nuclear. And that's assuming that the poster isn't being completely disingenuous.
Nuclear is expensive, and there are no technologies that will reduce the price in the near term. Solar wind and battery storage is still on a economies of scale price reduction curve that no other form of electricity generation can match.
Not coal, not natural gas, and certainly not nuclear.
If you start building nuclear plants which best case come online in 10 to 12 years, with nuclear technology that already is not economical, by the time they come online that is another 10 or 12 years of battery, solar panel, and wind technology improvement and further economies of scale.
Wind and solar have the ability to be organically grown and expanded. Solar can be placed practically anywhere there's a roof.
Now do I think we should be researching nuclear, researching lftrs, and perhaps funding nuclear power plants to perform peaking in the grid? Sure.
Do I think we should be shutting down existing nuclear power plants not particularly. I'd rather use those than natural gas and coal fired plants for grid balancing.
Right now rooftop solar or residential solar is probably about the price of nuclear. In 10 years it will probably be half the price of nuclear.
Anyway, the overall good news with this typically unhinged Trump announcement is it the economic reality is on the side of alternative energy proponents.
Of course the government can screw things up, boy howdy. Do we know that now. But then Americans will just learn the brutal truth that other economies are going to drop the price of their electricity, which is one of the basic drivers of economic growth and competition.
And the US will be left behind.
Because it's not like we're entering a multipolar highly competitive world right? oh.
zahlman · 1h ago
> How can I tell someone on hackernews knows absolutely nothing about power generation economics? They say we have to go all in on nuclear.
The comment says nothing of the sort.
zekrioca · 5m ago
> The best way forward, factoring in current and future energy use, is nuclear.
They have wrote it, just read it in "0.5x" mode rather than "2x".
jmyeet · 1h ago
To back up your point, here is the plummeting price of renewable energy [1].
The real reason for all this is because people get extremely rich off of fossil fuels and people don't relaly get rich off of renewables. Resource extraction (mining, drilling for oil and gas, etc) is a wealth concentrator.
Oh and it's worth adding that the recent bill reduced royalty payments paid by oil companies [2].
The whole thing is simply yet another form of wealth transfer from ordinary citizens to the mega-wealthy.
This doesn't stand up against any scrutiny. Natural gas primarily comes from the Permian basin of Texas as a byproduct of fracking. It's almost free.
You know we're an exporter of fossil fuels not importer right?
breadwinner · 1h ago
The United States plays an outsized role in shaping global technology trends. If Saudi Arabia wants to delay the shift toward renewable energy, its most effective strategy would be to shape U.S. policy.
JumpCrisscross · 1h ago
> If Saudi Arabia wants to delay the shift toward renewable energy, its most effective strategy would be to shape U.S. policy
Global energy policy, particularly relating to solar, begins and ends in China. They’re the largest variable marginal consumer of energy and producer of solar panels.
breadwinner · 1h ago
China has undeniably emerged as a global leader in renewable energy technology, thanks to its massive investments in solar, wind, and energy storage systems. However, despite China’s dominance in manufacturing and scaling renewable technologies, the world—especially when it comes to cutting-edge innovations—still tends to follow the trends set by the U.S.
shmerl · 2h ago
Probably not just paid, but constantly keep paying for preferential treatment.
Analemma_ · 2h ago
Depressingly, the real answer is probably even worse. It’s not like there aren’t rich companies who won’t suffer from the upcoming power crunches and would write big checks to keep them from happening. But that won’t work.
No, the actual answer is that it’s pure ideology: this is about Owning the Libs, pure and simple, irrespective of the collateral damage to the economy. We’re currently being led by vengeance-minded morons who want to destroy anything that has even a tangential connection to liberal politics, and renewables are definitely on that list.
xhkkffbf · 2h ago
Could it be as much as the amounts that the renewable companies paid to the last administration?
You might prefer certain types of energy, but you would be naive if you didn't recognize the cash flows from all the different types of companies.
barbazoo · 2h ago
Interested in this. Source please as I couldn’t find anything.
whatisthiseven · 2h ago
This is what-aboutism and sealioning taken to a disingenious level
Total world oil revenues: $4.2 trillion in 2025, market cap of $7.2 trillion in 2023
Total world solar/wind revenues: estimate $500 billion, so 1/8th. Market cap between $1.02 trillion and $1.51 trillion in 2024.
Oil, gas, and coal have spent: $150 million on federal lobbying in 2024, and has consistently spent over $100 million annually since 2006.
At the state level, hard to get data for. In CA alone, it was estimated $40m in 2024.
For the renewables industry in 2024: $60 million in federal lobbying in 2024. That has increased over the years, unlike oil and gas.
At the state level, renewables spent in CA: $4.68 million on state-level lobbying, or 1/10th.
In conclusion: oil and gas have been consistently spending hundreds of millions of dollars to convince politicians alone to support their cause for years, whereas renewables has been increasing their spend and is only a fraction of it.
Yes, both sides are putting money into it. No, both sides are not equal. FWIW, democrats support oil and gas just fine: under Obama oil and gas exports and refining grew to record highs, just as they did under Trump, and as they did under Biden.
The US is the largest oil exporter in the world. That has happened despite the mix of politicians holding majority of SCOTUS, Congress, and President. That has happened despite the small fraction of spending from renewables.
We prefer renewables because, unlike oil and gas, they aren't rejecting their role in climate impact: renewables do studies to understand them, and they are always far lower than oil and gas, an inconvenient truth the anti-renewable crowd wants to deny because they want to shout a wind turbine killing some birds is somehow equivalent to the millions of birds coal kills every year, along with the cancers it causes in humans, and the climate change, and the dirty business of mining the coal, and the water needed to cool the turbines. Yes, renewables obviously have some environmental impact. Its always less in total.
We prefer renewables because they aren't profitting to TRILLIONS of dollars and poisoning political discourse to spread lies about climate change. We prefer renewables because it means less cases of asthma. It means less control over the world's stage by extractive autocratic regimes such as Saudi Arabia and Russia. It means less cancer, less pollutants, less damage overall. Less oil spills.
Maybe we prefer renewables because we have a lot of reasons to prefer them, despite the relatively small amounts of cash flows desperately trying to prevent oil and gas from KILLING their industry. Which, btw, oil and gas have now successfully done. Renewables are significantly hampered under this administration.
declan_roberts · 2h ago
Almost all fossil fuel power plants in America run on natural gas from the Permian basin in Texas and is almost free, since it's a byproduct of fracking.
And unlike solar they work 24/7.
chermi · 2h ago
My optimistic take is that the left takes this + the slight momentum from books/ideas like Abundance and coalesce into a pro-build anti red-tape yimby party.
That's very optimistic. And yeah, I see how this comment is kind of the equivalent of bringing up Obama or Hillary or something when it's about Trump's bullshit. To be very clear, I hate any efforts to impede energy build out.
colechristensen · 2h ago
The reason this won't be effective is money. The more they obstruct, be more motivated people with money will be to get around the restrictions. Here greed is our friend.
JumpCrisscross · 1h ago
> more they obstruct, be more motivated people with money will be to get around the restrictions
Or you build the power plant and data centre somewhere with a stable economy. No tariffs on importing model weights.
elzbardico · 2h ago
Intermittent renewables are what is making the grid less reliable and energy more expensive. A truly Orwellian article this piece from cnbc
jeffbee · 1h ago
Renewables are the only reason the lights are regularly on in California. Go look at the timeline of large-scale blackouts in California, then compare with the buildout of solar and storage.
cbradford · 2h ago
Just look at the title.. "Solar executives warn..". Of course they do, their business model is government subsidy. I live in a blue state that has decided to bet on renewables and our electricity rates are skyrocketing. If solar was viable, it would not require forcing tax payers to fund these businesses.
cure · 2h ago
> If solar was viable, it would not require forcing tax payers to fund these businesses.
So then removing the subsidies shouldn't be an issue?
MyOutfitIsVague · 1h ago
It's not just subsidies, it's also permitting and any other roadblocks they can manage. This isn't just economic or political, it's a weird personal crusade.
It shouldn’t. Trump is using environmental regulation to block projects. It’s crazy seeing the GOP embrace San Francisco’s last decade of policy.
coredog64 · 1h ago
"'I never thought leopards would eat MY face,' sobs woman who voted for the Leopards Eating People's Faces Party."
derbOac · 2h ago
Whatever cost it is, I highly doubt it's cheaper to cancel projects that are well underway without recouping any benefits at all, in some cases over the objections of local customers, without an alternative in place with environmental and financial analysis to support it.
Otherwise you're just burning money without an alternative to meet increasing demand (which is likely why costs are increasing and why the additional supply is being built).
abeppu · 2h ago
But the Biden administration which introduced the IRA subsidies also jacked up tariffs on solar panels, increasing the price of these projects. Would many of these businesses been viable if neither subsidies nor tariffs had been introduced? Given the declining cost of PVs over time, would they have become viable eventually?
wat10000 · 1h ago
If fossil fuels were viable, they would not require the right to put toxic substances into my lungs without compensation.
olddustytrail · 2h ago
It doesn't. Solar is ridiculously cheap and requires no subsidy at all to be profitable.
If this is happening (which frankly I doubt) it's just corruption.
lotsofpulp · 2h ago
If this were true, then wouldn’t every electricity supplier be building tons of solar, regardless of what the government does?
softwaredoug · 1h ago
93% of new energy generation is renewable.
Nobody wants a new coal or nuclear plant in their back yard.
Well, not in California where there is both a residential solar mandate assuring new distributed supply and where solar already reaches over 100% of demand at peak; adding new utility-scale solar doesn't make a lot of sense even if it is cheap.
Politics and corruption. The generation cost is low, but the government backed monopoly folds all kinds of distribution, deferred maintenance, fire damage, and political pet projects into the retail price. It sucks.
JumpCrisscross · 2h ago
> wouldn’t every electricity supplier be building tons of solar, regardless of what the government does?
They are. And it’s undercutting the owners of pricier plants. Hence Trump using environmental regulation to block more solar.
lotsofpulp · 1h ago
Land of the free, home of the brave gets funnier and funnier.
olddustytrail · 1h ago
As JumpCrisscross said, they really are. Look at solar deployments across the planet.
They do need planning permission of course and that's where they can be blocked.
lotsofpulp · 1h ago
I see that now, thanks. So much for all that freedom.
lukeschlather · 1h ago
According to the article Trump is trying to ban new solar developments. Suppliers are building tons of solar but they can't do so if the government makes it illegal.
declan_roberts · 2h ago
CPI energy prices have risen for the last 10 years steadily, and is now going parabolic.
Maybe some forms of green energy have helped in some areas and times of day, but they have done nothing to stop the climb.
It's time to try something other than solar and wind, which are demonstrably not lowering energy prices, and may be making it worse (TOU energy plans are becoming the norm because of the broken duty cycle of solar)
softwaredoug · 2h ago
If you want to lower costs, why would you prevent the easiest to deploy form of supply? Why would you prevent the market from meeting the demand?
This isn’t about subsidies, it’s about standing in the way of the free market.
And why do you think cost relates to a form of supply? It seems more likely that demand is also much higher (data centers, more air conditioning, etc).
bryanlarsen · 2h ago
The price of a commodity is the marginal cost. The marginal electricity provider in the US is natgas.
rtkwe · 1h ago
It hasn't lowered it because tech keeps inventing new ways to burn hideous amounts of power; first it was crypto mining on PoW chains now it's AI training. Renewables aren't the problem.
JumpCrisscross · 2h ago
> CPI energy prices
What does this mean?
> solar and wind, which are demonstrably not lowering energy prices
Why would the government intervening to ban supply make things better?
This policy is a hand-out to power producers. It constricts supply. It’s Trump copying San Francisco and Los Angeles housing policymakers, except for energy.
wat10000 · 1h ago
Why put the blame on renewables instead of on fossil fuels, which have been the majority for that entire time?
wat9999 · 52m ago
> Why put the blame on renewables instead of on fossil fuels, which have been the majority for that entire time?
I can't even begin to understand your logic here.
bArray · 52m ago
In the UK the push towards renewable energy has so far been disastrous for energy prices and stability. There have been days in the UK where the sun doesn't shine and the wind doesn't blow, and we came extremely close to blackouts [0]. We were forced to buy energy for eye watering prices. After the initial shock from the Russia-Ukraine conflict gas prices moved slightly, but electricity prices are not really recovering well and are projected to rise [1] [2].
According to government figures, 11% of electricity costs goes toward green initiatives, and 5% to VAT, which is also earmarked for green initiatives. The government has promised that as we become greener, we should see the prices come down, but the opposite has been true [3]. The green energy sector is currently largely subsidised by fossil fuels, as we transition more and more to green energy, the true costs are realised. Our Energy Secretary (failed prime minister candidate) says:
> Responding to the 6% price cap rise, Energy Secretary Ed Miliband said it was due to "our reliance on the fossil fuel markets" and added: "We're acting to bring down bills for everyone with our mission for clean, home-grown power that we control."
The irony is that we don't make our own wind turbines or solar panels, so our grid is still precariously dependant on foreign actors. We're breaking away from the likes of Russia to become dependant on China - great. Bare in mind, all of this effort for the UK which produces less than 1% of global emissions, but outsources its manufacturing to Countries such as China that have not even started to attempt to reduce their emissions (recent drops are due to economic collapse).
One difference with renewables and traditional fuel sources is that once renewable infrastructure is built you don’t need to continually import from another country. Maintenance is definitely an issue and on going expansion and upgrades as well. I do think long term renewables wouldn’t have the same issues as oil dependency on another country though.
The UK does still need to build more on shore nevertheless.
femiagbabiaka · 36m ago
> China that have not even started to attempt to reduce their emissions (recent drops are due to economic collapse).
This is completely incorrect, and it makes me wonder if the rest of your comment is too.
Then 4% relies on Federal lands [2]
1 -https://www.rff.org/publications/reports/how-long-does-it-ta...
2 - https://www.nrel.gov/news/detail/program/2025/vast-federal-l...
https://www.technologyreview.com/2025/07/10/1119941/china-en...
https://apnews.com/article/china-climate-solar-wind-carbon-e...
https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=65064
Edit: I’m 100% for renewables. Unfortunately half my country is against them and they won last time.
https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2025/06/05/americans-vie...
https://www.pv-magazine.com/2025/07/07/china-moves-to-curb-s...
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-s...
The US is far, far worse than China.
There are good reasons to question renewable energy: the cost picture doesn't make sense right now, it has intermittency problems, etc. But killing renewable projects because, uh, farming or whatever?, particularly at a time when the demand for energy is growing faster than ever, seems short sighted at best.
You seem to rely on quite outdated information. Renewables are the cheapest source of energy in human history. The recent explosive growth is fueled by pure economics rather than feelgood.
The same thing is happening with storage with the prices plummeting. With the recent auctions landing at $50-60/MWh.
https://www.ess-news.com/2025/06/26/china-energy-engineering...
In many regions unsubsidized renewables + storage are now the cheapest source of energy, undercutting coal and gas. Nuclear power does not even enter the picture due to the absolutely insane costs involved.
To put some numbers down, a quertly bill recent had $1400 usd as grid fees, while the energy consumption came down to $300. Those numbers could be specific to that house, that energy company, but it is a story echoed by more and more people in this region. The consumption cost could be $0/MWh, and the grid fees alone would still be way more expensive compared to the full bill just a couple of years ago.
Solar and wind both have significant sovereignty issues. The entire solar supply chain is in China where they're heavily subsidized so the PRC can corner the market -- and substantially all the rare earths in wind turbines come from China. Generally recycling costs aren't considered and at least in the west there's no plan to recycle at least the fiberglass in turbine blades, leaving them to be buried.
I'm all for renewables but the way they're positioned is unrealistic.
Nuclear is only expensive because of the way it's built in the US, relying on the few locations made available (if any) to build basically fully customized installations. If we copy-pasted reactors onto sites that suit them it would be very competitive, don't take my word for it. Jigar Shah who headed the DOE loans program said the exact same thing during his term.
If we're being pedantic, nuclear is renewable too thanks to seawater extraction. There's a practically unlimited amount of uranium in the ocean and the rock underneath it.
Those are US numbers, Australian rooftop solar is 3 or 4 times cheaper.
And Lazard separately lists Commercial and Industrial rooftop solar which is much cheaper.
> Solar and wind both have significant sovereignty issues. The entire solar supply chain is in China where they're heavily subsidizes so the PRC can corner the market -- and substantially all the rare earths in wind turbines come from China.
This seems like hand wringing over a nothing burger? Compare the dynamics with fossil fuels:
If the fossil fuel supply chain is disrupted we get an energy crisis within weeks.
What happens if the renewable supply chain is disrupted?
Well.... all existing installations keeps working for decades and in the meantime we need to figure out an alternative. After a couple of years our emergency reserves would start to work harder due to old installations aging out but the impact would be near zero.
> Nuclear is only expensive because of the way it's built in the US, relying on the few locations made available (if any) to build basically fully customized installations. If we copy-pasted reactors onto sites that suit them it would be very competitive, don't take my word for it, Jigar Shah who headed the DOE loans program said the exact same thing during his term.
Which is of course why all western reactors are struggling with cost. You do know that modular reactors has been a talking point for the nuclear industry since the 1950s? That is what the industry generally bounces to when large scale projects balloon in cost. They just never deliver.
https://spectrum.ieee.org/the-forgotten-history-of-small-nuc...
But somehow if we magically handout another trillion in tax money to the nuclear industry they will fix it this time!!
> If we're being pedantic, nuclear is renewable too thanks to seawater extraction
With the minor caveat that you can't even drive the pump from the electricity final electricity you get out due to the volumes involved.
I love how the solution to horrifically expensive new built nuclear power is an even more economically infeasible technical solution.
Or you know, just diversify renewable supply chains?
The only storage that matters at scale is pumped hydro, and the cost for that is not "plummeting" at all because it's built out. Battery storage is a toy, it won't cover a prolonged (can last multiple weeks over vast geography) winter-time dip in wind plus solar. The gap must be made up by either peaker natgas plants (which are costly, non-renewable and emit some carbon dioxide) or, more sensibly, nuclear baseload.
I love how the talking point has switched from "storage can't even cover an hour" a couple of years ago to now apparently having trouble with "multiple weeks". How quickly reality shifts.
When we're talking about emergency reserves, because that is what you are trying to paint as the end of the world, then who the fuck cares where it comes from?
Having that problem means that close to 99% of our entire energy system is renewable. It is trivial to solve it with synfuels, biofuels, hydrogen or whatever when it is deemed necessary.
In the US the ethanol produced used as a gasoline mix in etc. is enough to run the entire grid without any other energy source for 16 days.
That is trivially repurposed as our car fleet is switched to BEVs.
Or just use whatever aviation and the shipping industry settles on as they decarbonize.
> or, more sensibly, nuclear baseload.
This tells me you don't have the slightest clue how the grid works and are reasoning backwards from attempting to justify a trillion dollar handout to the nuclear industry.
Take a look at France. They generally export quite large amounts of electricity. But whenever a cold spell hits that export flow is reversed to imports and they have to start up local fossil gas and coal based production.
What they have done is that they have outsourced the management of their grid to their neighbors and rely on 35 GW of fossil based electricity production both inside France and their neighbors grids. Because their nuclear power produces too much when no one wants the electricity and too little when it is actually needed.
Their neighbors are able to both absorb the cold spell which very likely hits them as well, their own grid as the French exports stops and they start exporting to France.
Just so we're clear ethanol produced from corn is almost the same carbon intensity as the gasoline, and it's worse for the climate when you factor in the land use changes. [1] The whole program was just a giveaway to corn farmers from the Dubyah administration. Even the rosiest image painted by the renewables industry association says it's 26% less carbon intensive (but they neglect land use). Ethanol is basically fossil fuel with extra steps.
[1] https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/us-corn-based-e...
With nuclear power, there's no such thing as 'too much'. It's economically optimal to produce flat out ("baseload") because continued production really is "too cheap to meter", as the saying goes. The cost is pretty much all in the plant itself, which is why a lot of research into next-gen nuclear is about building smaller and cheaper plants.
> But whenever a cold spell hits that export flow is reversed
Yes? That's how a "baseload" source works. And we should not pretend that intermittent renewable sources aren't going to have the exact same issue, only to a far greater extent (especially as they scale out to "99%" of the system). You can address this by not putting all your eggs in the intermittent basket.
The cost for nuclear skyrockets. Do you dare calculating what running Vogtle at say a 40% capacity leads to? We're talking ~40 cents per kWh for the electricity now.
You do know that the nuclear industry has been talking "small" and "scale" since the 1950s? It is what they bounce to when large scale projects balloon in cost and fail to deliver.
Here's a history refresher:
The Forgotten History of Small Nuclear Reactors
Economics killed small nuclear power plants in the past—and probably will keep doing so
https://spectrum.ieee.org/the-forgotten-history-of-small-nuc...
How will you solve the "cold spell" with your nuclear grid? Just ignore it and pretend nuclear power only solves "base" while keep drumming on the "renewable intermittency!!!" drum?
That does not sound very logical.
The cost for the nuclear plants themselves is exactly the same, it's just no longer offsetting expensive non-renewable sources. Intermittent renewables run into this issue to a far greater extent as they scale out, because their variable cost is higher.
I'm not comparing to fossil fuels, so it's not really relevant.
> Or you know, just diversify renewable supply chains?
That's happening about as fast as seawater extraction. There's good reasons why, at least for wind the extraction and processing of rare earths is an environmental catastrophe and only China is willing to pay the environmental price.
Regardless fuel costs for nuclear plants are roughly zero, about $0.0015/kWh, and there is more than enough uranium on land. And of course reprocessing spent fuel is a totally viable solution; most of France's uranium is closed loop. The entirety of the cost is in building and financing, which can be solved with policy changes.
If you're comparing solar + wind to not(solar + wind), then either you're mainly comparing to fossil fuels, or discussing a world that doesn't exist.
Sure, you like nuclear. You can say "oh, well, if we snap our fingers and magically have the world be different than it is, then nuclear would outperform solar".
Magic doesn't exist, and if you take two people in any country and task them with adding 5GW of reliable generation, one person with nuclear and the other with solar + battery, solar + battery will achieve that goal faster and cheaper every single time, in every country on earth.
Nuclear power is irrelevant in our energy systems today. The only comparison to make is fossil fuels and with that renewables give us major advantages.
For the nuclear supply chain we still have not been able to sanction the Russian industry. The west quickly diversified from their fossil fuels, but we have not been able to do the same with nuclear energy.
But I don't see you complaining about supply chain issues regarding how Russia absolutely dominates the nuclear energy sector?
> There's good reasons why, at least for wind the extraction and processing of rare earths is an environmental catastrophe and only China is willing to pay the price.
So now suddenly we are hand wringing about rare earth extraction consequences. You seem to change topics faster than I can follow.
You do know that the uranium supply is also extremely nasty? And don't start talking about all the other stuff we need to build said supply chain and nuclear power plants.
But it is fine when nuclear power does it right?
And now suddenly seawater extraction did not matter?
What are you even attempting to do here? Just muddying the waters because nuclear power evidently does not deliver and you can't bring yourself to accept it?
I support renewables. I think it's important we understand the whole picture, and think we should construct them even if they're expensive and imperfect. However people seem to think that they're basically free and completely harmless to the environment while neither is true.
> The subsidies that both nuclear and fossil fuel industries have received since the 50's is mind boggling.
Nowhere in the world is nuclear subsidized per unit of production. The renewables industry has historically and also continues to receives significant subsidies. So does the fossil fuel industry.
> I guess just bury the waste somewhere and and go live elsewhere.
Nuclear waste is not now and has never been a real problem. Yes, you can put the spicy rocks back where they came from.
I dunno, it's been producing 20% of US power for decades. Same as renewables. Seems relevant.
> For the nuclear supply chain we still have not been able to sanction the Russian industry.
12% come from Russia. [1]
> So now suddenly we are hand wringing about rare earth extraction consequences. You seem to change topics faster than I can follow.
I feel like environmental implications are relevant to discuss, and I think the topic is relevant.
> You do know that the uranium supply is also extremely nasty?
Sure, but you need very little of it due to energy density, and reprocessing is a viable alternative as demonstrated by France. They have a 96% recovery rate. [2]
> And now suddenly seawater extraction did not matter?
It didn't matter in my original post either which is why it's under "if we're being pedantic."
[1] https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/nuclear/where-our-uraniu...
[2] https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/frances-efficiency-in-t...
Which falls to 7.6% when counting the useful energy and not staring yourself blind on the electricity grid.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/per-capita-energy-stacked...
Like I said, irrelevant compared to the fossil fuel supply chain supplying 80%.
> 12% come from Russia. [1]
Of course ignoring the intermediary steps in the supply chain which Russia controls ~50% of. But Kazakh uranium being processed in Russia is Kazakh!
And this of course ignores that my main point was that Russia is the largest player in the global nuclear technological sector.
Like I said. The evidence is that Europe despite over 3 years of war in Ukraine still has not been able to sanction any part of the Russian nuclear industry.
> Sure, but you need very little of it due to energy density, and reprocessing is a viable alternative as demonstrated by France. [2]
And now we again "solve" nuclear power by saying that reprocessing works. Despite reprocessing producing massive quantities of nasty byproducts and more expensive Uranium.
Just make nuclear power even more horrifically expensive! No problem!
Wind and solar is less than 7% combined on that graph, so either wind and solar aren't relevant and nuclear isn't relevant, or they're both relevant.
> Like I said. The evidence is that Europe despite over 3 years of war in Ukraine still has not been able to sanction any part of the Russian nuclear industry.
France is practically closed loop, and France is 55% of Europe's nuclear generation.
> Despite reprocessing producing massive quantities of nasty byproducts and more expensive Uranium.
Are you able to quantify this are compared to renewables or are we just assuming? Remember in terms of costs, it's basically entirely construction -- fuel costs almost nothing. So even if reprocessing is relatively expensive, adding cost there won't really change nuclear energy prices.
They are relevant given their trajectory and that they make up ~90% of new installations due to being the by far best option today.
Grid infrastructure has a lifespan of a couple decades. We are seeing a complete disruption of the grid, but it will take a couple of decades for all old plants to age out.
https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=64586
> France is practically closed loop, and France is 55% of Europe's nuclear generation.
Of course forgetting how France uses Russia for this reprocessing. But relying on Russia for your energy supply chain is fine as long as it is nuclear power?
Something like $70-80 per MWH.
https://medium.com/the-future-is-electric/grid-storage-at-66...
Archive: https://archive.is/UXcdL
What you claim didn't happen, and can easily disproven with data. Your interpretation of a reasoning of a policy (that didn't happen) is bad faith.
You are wrong about both electricity [1], gas[2] and total energy [3].
Europe was very dependent on energy imports in the past and current policy is the by far most successful attempt in a long at changing it. It will help us for decades to come.
[1] https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-s...
[2] https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/infographics/where-does-t...
[3] https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-s...
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wandel_durch_Handel
Germany is not Europe. Over 70% of electricity in France is nuclear and they have plans to build at least 6 EPR2 plants.
[0] https://www.lemonde.fr/en/economy/article/2023/01/24/france-...
Coal is in a scary place right now in the US, see this as an example:
https://www.reddit.com/r/antiwork/comments/1mmqwd3/i_live_in...
Basically coal is less profitable and more expensive in places that have always been coal counties. The only thing to do in these areas is mine coal, so the concern is that entire regions will be rendered worthless if coal collapses.
Which means local residents cannot sell their homes without taking significant losses, and they probably lose their jobs in coal, which manifests into a poverty trap for the entire town.
And there are hundreds of these towns all through Appalachia.
So renewable energy will always be a political issue over the next 50 years, because entire towns and regions depend on its political outcome.
To where, with what savings?
> retrain
To do what, in this area, with what existing infrastructure?
Right! It's a real chicken and egg scenario. It would seem to me that without this infrastructure, it would be very hard to retrain and build new industries. It would really benefit the people of these regions to vote for people who, as a matter of policy, would bring training and infrastructure to them. Unfortunately, the people who most benefit from such policies vote against them [1], so the resources available are insufficient. So the conversation is about poverty reduction through social programs to support people working in a dying industry, rather than growing new industries. The solution, might be to vote for people proposing such resources, which I know is a radical idea, but it's at least something new to try.
https://medium.com/hillary-for-america/the-future-of-america...
[1] https://static.politico.com/b8/90/cbbc9c59413089d87e8d6340f1...
Plus it's made a few people EXTREMELY rich so they've made their opinions and interests everyone elses problem too.
No comments yet
Coal is dead and it’s not coming back. Areas in which it served as the pillar of the economy need to figure something else out. I say this as someone hailing from one such area.
Speaking frankly, the way politicians keep selling the fantasy of it making a comeback is cruel.
Old steel towns had to do this, coal country might look to them for a model on how to leave a dying industry behind. But seeing how they vote, they might not like the answer for what it takes to survive:
Pittsburgh PA - famous former steel town, faced very uncertain economic future after the mills closed, now a booming metropolis with top industry leaders in education, healthcare, sports, finance. What did it take? A dedication to multiculturalism and diversity. Pittsburgh would have died without embracing the global economy and attracting doctors, professors, students, entertainers, and athletes from all over the world to visit, live, and grow a family.
Cleveland OH - once one of America's great manufacturing hubs, powered by steel mills, car parts, and shipping along Lake Erie. When industry collapsed, Cleveland faced deep decline, job losses, shrinking population, even bankruptcy in the 1970s. But today it's finding new strength as a center of healthcare, research, and culture.
Then you look at places like Youngstown OH. Unlike Pittsburgh or Cleveland, Youngstown struggled to reinvent itself. Population plummeted, tax bases collapsed, and poverty took hold. The city became a symbol of the Rust Belt's hardest struggles. What held it back? Overreliance on steel, limited diversification, and waves of outmigration left too few resources to rebuild. What are they doing today to fix things? Healthcare and education. Should have started a lot sooner.
One more example is Bethlehem PA, another former steel town that now has top industries in healthcare, education, and also some manufacturing.
So that's the model. If you're a dying town with an industry that's shrivveling up due to changing economic conditions, the model to survive is to quickly pivot to healthcare, education, and entertainment, and to invite a bunch of outsiders into your community with open arms.
And that is the main problem these dying coal regions have, because looking at how they vote, embracing healthcare, education, entertainment, and diversity is the last thing they want to do. You look at what the people who they voted for are doing with their power, they're attacking healthcare, attacking education, and attacking diversity sometimes violently, but always unrelentingly. So the Pittsburgh model is off the table, and they'll have to find another way from the abyss of failed post-industrial policy.
Spot on, from what I’ve seen. Just keep doubling down on what hasn’t worked in hopes that one day it’ll magically manifest a Disney ending and the good old days will return.
Just cater to the rich folks! That’s the same playbook every city in world is running right now to rampant failure. Rich people don’t bring prosperity. Prosperity brings the rich. Building prosperity is a difficult ordeal that takes time, sacrifice, a lot of money, and a culture of safety and community.
But healthcare, education, and entertainment are not exclusive to rich people, they're industries that everyone enjoys and can take part in. The doctors, actors, professors, students, athletes, researchers, who come from around the world to live and work in Pittsburgh are not "the rich". They have money, but they're still just regular people.
For example the students who come to Pittsburgh for an education are not wealthy, but they are flush with cash from the government and lenders. They are attracted to Pittsburgh not because it's a good place for the rich, but because it's a good place for students.
Incidentally, good places for students are also good places for the rich. So I agree, rich people don’t bring prosperity. Prosperity brings the rich.
> That’s the same playbook every city in world is running right now to rampant failure.
Did you miss the part where Pittsburgh is thriving? Cleveland is doing okay. Bethlehem is booming. Youngstown... not great but moving in a good direction.
I heard that before the first Trump administration, there was bipartisan support in Congress for phasing out the use coal in the US, so it seems quite possible that that bipartisan support will reassemble itself after Trump is gone (because the next President is unlikely to be as populist and as uncaring about climate change as Trump).
The actual motive is to appeal to people who have made coal part of their identity. These are people who have never been anywhere near a coal mine, but have internalized coal as Important and American, and as a way to stick it to those stupid environmentalists.
In Trump's case you can throw in a personal obsession with hating wind power because you can see it from one of his golf courses.
Generally pathetic that people are trying to retcon this reflexive lib-owning vice-signalling from incredibly stupid people as actual industrial policy.
Wyoming here. Coal country. Everyone thinks this is dumb. Including the folks in Campbell county, our top-producing coal region that has been trying to build a wind farm [1].
Trump’s social media fans in Florida and Texas like this because it feels like owning the libs. (To the extent there may be pecuniary interest, it would be in power producers. Like housing, stopping new power raises prices and profits incumbents.)
Also, that Reddit thread is about coking coal. Not the thermal coal power plants burn. It’s about American steel production shutting down in the face of our trade war. Not this new economic miracle these idiots have spun up.
[1] https://billingsgazette.com/news/state-and-regional/wyoming/...
Dumb enough to make them reconsider voting Republican in the future? I doubt it.
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If you see it in light of all the other actions taken across the spectrum, you land at best at "desperate dice roll to re-tool the US into a manufacturing power from the 80s", and at worst at "deliberate dismantling of a first-rate world power into a second tier paradise for oligarchs".
But in this timeline, they tried to violently overturn the 2020 election, and they are currently trying to rig the 2026 election by gerrymandering states they control as much as possible.
This isn't about earning the political support of people in coal country who vote GOP. If they ever face negative electoral outcomes in the future, their plan is to overturn the election using either force or legal chicanery.
- Nuclear waste has non-zero cost that aren’t factored in.
- Nuclear risks are externalized, not factored in.
- Nuclear power is heavily subsidized.
- Solar power industry in Germany on particular was destroyed for ideological reasons.
- Solar has much more capacity than nuclear for many years now: https://www.smard.de/page/home/topic-article/211972/212382/e...
It the same way that the US got hooked on cheap Chinese imports.
Also renewables make too much sense right now. That's why a lot of dollars are allocated towards them even though subsidies are mostly gone.
France did shut down superphenix for completely ideological reasons tho.
Also stopped investing in nuclear but that was not really ideological (the nuclear buildup originated in something of a misprediction, and sadly the country didn’t really capitalise on it).
Then it had to postpone the closure of at least two reactors following the second invasion of Ukraine, and this year officially dropped the phaseout and opened the door for new builds (unlikely as they are).
It absolutely did, back in 2003. This was pushed back after the invasion of Ukraine then repealed but Doel 3 and Tihange 2 were shut down under the phaseout plan.
Maybe that was the discussion where you're from, what do i know. Where I'm from we had a honest political debate about nuclear, and the public decided on no. It wasn't because of "ideology". We discussed the safety, the waste challenge, and everything else.
Of course making sense does not in any way matter to this administration, and Trump hates wind turbines because of his dumb golf course, but still…
Which, is similar to the German anti-nuclear approach, to be frank. Burning dirty coal instead of keeping an already existing nuke plant running isn’t a decision based on either environmental or economic reasoning, and that was done a lot.
Pendulum swings, etc, etc.
What? Did renewables get more expensive for some reason? Solar and wind have been cheaper than coal for years.
Attacking renewables is the ideological move because anything good is bad. It’s just weaponized ignorance.
what I don't understand is how this was obvious to me 20 years ago as a teenager, but European leaders just somehow thought it was a good idea. Was it just "a lucky guess" on my part? it was just so obvious that when you tolerate and interact with narcissists as if their behaviour was acceptable, they will simply escalate their behaviour. I was also critical of ties with the Chinese government and I was told I was just paranoid/racist. today we suddenly realise oh that was a bad idea, the leopards are chewing on our faces.
I reckon the rich and powerful saw it coming alright and they just figured they'd make bank before it got to the point they'd have to send the kids of poor people to war.
All we would have had to do was have no allies for the past ~60 years, and we would have never gotten burned. We also would have been entirely irrelavant to international politics, and likely wouldn't have become one of the richest nations on earth.
World politics is like love. It's better to have had a productive alliance that hits a rough patch, than never to have had one at all.
If you let the market choose, it would choose a lot of wind and solar.
> Despite facing macro challenges and headwinds, utility-scale solar and onshore wind remain the most cost-effective forms of new-build energy generation on an unsubsidized basis (i.e., without tax subsidies).
So the admin just needs to get out of the alway and let the market solve this problem. Not try to centrally manage the economy like the Soviet Union.
1 - https://www.lazard.com/news-announcements/lazard-releases-20...
https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2025/08/20/trump-says-us-will-not-a...
But keep in mind most solar is built on private lands only needing local/state approval. With the biggest builders red states like Texas.
But it just goes to show you being involved in local government, showing up to advocate for green energy projects, etc at local levels is one of the best things you can do.
I know, not real-time. Renewable energy credit trading, and such. But you become the demand for clean generation if you choose to do so. It is easy. If you are in Marin, Contra Costa, Napa, or Solano go to https://mcecleanenergy.org/opt-up/
Similar CCA's are all over California and probably beyond.
This isn’t about subsidies. Orsted, for example, is being blocked on national security grounds using environmental regulation [1].
Power producers are in on a fix.
[1] https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/us-orders-orsted-ha...
Which is horrible for the US economy as it insulates our companies from market pressure, preventing them from adapting.
It's amazing how much leeway many people give this administration for policies that they have a long history of opposing: government ownership of companies (10% of Intel, US Steel's "golden share"), blocking private development of energy production, sending the National Guard to hostilely takeover cities, etc. It's the sort of stuff that they've accused their opponents of wanting to do in deranged, nightmarish worst-case scenarios.
"You betrayed everything you believe in, and for what?"
"To own the libs."
https://elements.visualcapitalist.com/top-20-countries-by-ba...
This is one thing that actually prevents the power price spikes since the batteries can jump in to cover gaps. I can quote many installations that have completely paid themselves off in 2 years (see hornsdale battery as an example - one year of operation alone, 2020, generated profit of half its initial $90million cost) and while this 2 year payoff will come down as more and more are installed part of the reason the payoff is going down is due to power price costs becoming more and more steady as more batteries are installed.
Even the USA is installing massive amounts of capacity right now. Look at Texas - 3x battery capacity available in 2025 compared to 2024 due to massive installations coming online and they are a state that does not do a lot to support renewables at all. There's no stopping it, it doesn't need subsidies and it's one of the most straightforward capital payoffs available right now.
I actually think the predictions in the article won't come to fruition honestly. The battery installation rise is dominating the investment landscape right now and it's completely flown under the radar without any political controversy (no things such as questionable media trying to claim battery banks are somehow bad for our health and should be stopped) nor are there subsidies required.
Nuclear is a decent option, but it takes years to bring new capacity online.
There's nothing wrong with investing in nuclear that'll come online in 5+ years time, but at the same time the government should also be green lighting all projects capable of adding capacity more quickly.
Even stats I find are from a friendlier permitting regime. And now I bet all the money will be poured into projects not needing federal approval.
And we might hope something good comes out of the nuclear this admin wants to build. The US has a lot of room for approval there.
Taking the environmental hit for lower energy costs is understandable at least, even if those who are more financially stable would prefer not to. But whatever this is makes no sense and is just puerile revenge.
It's just so self fulfilling. Someone is being very stupid. Maybe it's me. Maybe it's him. Possibly it's both of us.
But there is no way out of the conclusion that the country is (at least) a near majority of very stupid people. Not merely mistaken or holding different values, but genuinely incapable of distinguishing reality from fantasy.
Of course if I'm the stupid one, maybe my reasoning there is also wrong. I know I conflated individuals and groups in a less-than-rigorous fashion.
But either way I feel unable to find a solution to this conundrum. Certainly I can't if I'm stupid. And if a majority of voters are stupid, then it undercuts the principle that enables us to live in the same region together. I am rapidly running out of ideas to continue that.
With any luck the midterm elections will allow sanity to return.
Nor do I think the "apolitical" will become any less so. I see no reason why the midterms should give radically different results.
Now, it just so happens that historically things swing a bit back at midterms, and given how close things are that's enough to sway the entire power structure. It's an unfortunate reality of voting: a one-vote margin is no different from unanimity.
Even so I do not expect the overall tone to change any time soon. Those proportions seem fairly durable.
Having spent some time in the US, my theory is that things have got so complicated over there (or more precisely nobody is incentivized to make them simple), that it has fried people's minds. They just respond to the last stimulus, having given up trying to make sense of anything, as they attempt to get through each day as best they can.
Healthcare is the obvious example, but I'd say that that is representative of most things in the US, in terms of being a minefield where one foot wrong can wreck your life.
As far as I'm concerned everyone who lives here should vote. Felons, infants, people in jail, anyone who can pull a lever or an unambiguous gesture. I'd even include fetuses if they could. If the law affects you then you should have a say.
This is undoubtedly a stupid idea. But the current system is clearly broken and I'd be willing to at least try taking the principle seriously.
I disagree with it. But I think it is worth discussing.
We don’t have universal suffrage. The most-successful democracies in history never did. In our day-to-day lives and commerce we weigh opinions based on their source. And the current system isn’t working, in many cases because the majority votes for something stupid.
We could fix those peoblems, or we could add additional problems by layering even more broken systems that the US (among others) has tried before and rejected on top of the existing problems.
Plus, of course, there is little appetite for any given set of fixes. We can easily calculate who will benefit, and because of the division I mentioned, half the people will oppose the change just to avoid losing influence.
I'm hard pressed for a solution short of starting over from scratch, which would at least make some of the existing alliances moot.
1. Data centers, primarily driven by AI. Why? Because they can (and do) negotiate deeply discounted prices AND either don't pay for the connection and required infrastructure or they only pay a portion of it. Who pays for the rest? Consumers. Who subsidizes the discounted electricity? Consumers.
2. Increased electricity use in an area tends to raise the prices for everyone. We actually saw this in the crypto mining boom (eg [1]). In short, in a region like upstate New York where it otherwise has access to cheap hydro power, the local provider will have a long term power supply contract for a certain amount of electricity. A big increase usually means they now have to buy power on the spot market, which can be much more expensive. This raises the average electricity price for everyone;
3. The administration is pushing a huge expansion in LNG exports. IIRC ~41% of US power generation comes from natural gas. A huge increase in LNG exports will inevitably cause a rise in natural gas prices for all domestic power producers. This is in part driven by the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine but natural gas suppliers have seen (and pounced upon) an opportunity to drive up the wholesale price of natural gas;
4. The dam has really broke on contraining price hikes for pure profit purposes (eg [2]). If you look at the finances of any private electricity utility, you'll see that simply increasing shareholder profits is probably the biggest single factor in electricity price hikes;
5. While all this is happening and we're not really building new power plants (at least not enough to match demand), the administration has cut off renewables, which are key to meeting demand beyond any environmental concerns (which are real and true). Power usage spikes during the day. Well guess what? That's when solar power production happens. So adding significant solar power production to your electricity mix will decrease the baseline power needed from other sources;
6. Private equity has turned its eye to the guaranteed profits of electricitiy providers [3]. This will do absolutely nothing other than raise prices; and
7. Lip service is given to nuclear but it simply isn't the answer, primarily because the lead time for building a nuclear power plant is about 10-15 years. Plus it's one of the most expensive forms of electricity (in LCOE terms) and having a company safely manage a nuclear power plant in an era where regulation is being gutted doesn't seem like a great idea.
Not a single nuclear power plant has been built without government subsidy. Why not just subsidize renewables instead, particularly solar? Efforts such as small modular reactors to lower costs simply make no sense. Larger reactors are more efficient.
I think by 2030 a significant portion of the population will be paying $0.50/kWh or more for residential electricity.
[1]: https://bfi.uchicago.edu/insight/research-summary/when-crypt...
[2]: https://cleanenergy.org/news/tva-executes-the-largest-electr...
[3]: https://jacobin.com/2025/08/private-equity-minnesota-power-t...
Wrong, actually. At least in Australia, peak energy is in the late afternoon when everyone comes home, around 6pm. The other peak is in the morning around 7am. These are times when solar is not producing significantly, meanwhile it makes baseload unviable during the day.
This is especially true in Australia, a world leader in rooftop solar, here's something from AEMO on the topic:
> Both minimum and maximum operational demand are shifting to later in the day, driven by increasing contribution from rooftop PV. Minimum operational demand is expected to occur in the middle of the day by the mid-2020s. Maximum operational demand is expected to shift later in the day by an hour or two, when PV contribution is falling but temperatures are remain high (depending on the region and POE).
As AC use increased, industry switched from oil to electricity, coal to electric arc, and as power grid stabilized, peak usage shifted a lot in the last ~20 years. That's why summer/winter time do not make sense anymore and a lot of European countries are talking about not switching anymore.
The peak demand depends on a number of factors including what city/town it is, the season, the mix of residential/industrial usage, the time of day and the day of the week [1].
Also, if the peak time includes summer afternoon/evenings from 3pm to 9pm (as it does for several cities), a significant portion of that time is in daylight hours. In January in Sydney, sunset is after 8pm. You have lower (or no) power generation from solar at dusk so say 7pm but that's still 4 of the 6 peak hours where solar is impacting peak usage.
Power companies will tend to point to residential peak demand to justify price increases while often just entirely excluding industrial usage that drops off at about the same time.
Also, residential power usage (in Australia) is changing as building standards change (ie Australian houses are notorious for their energy ineeficiency, historically) and the rollout of residential solar. Smart meters, energy efficiency and batteries can really put a dent in peak electricity usage and this will only continue given how comparatively expensive Australian electricity is.
[1]: https://localelectricianssydney.com.au/electricity-peak-off-...
This is so funny to me, because if you listen to anti-solar people, they'll tell you it's a bad idea because it doesn't generate anything at night. Given what you say, even if batteries weren't a thing, it would seem like solar would be an ideal component of any power grid, even if it didn't produce any energy for the nighttime whatsoever.
1. The price. It has plummeted in the alst 10-20 years and shows no signs of abating;
2. For many people it can be placed on their roofs so doesn't take up any land or generally require building any new structure. Generally the only planning required is artificial barriers in place to protect electricity providers;
3. It is the only form of direct power generation. Everything else involves turning a turbine. No moving parts is great for reliability. You do need some infrastructure to convert the panel output to the right voltage (eg an inverter) but that's all commodity tech;
4. Batteries are a largely solved problem for energy storage. You can use golf cart batteries if you really want.
There are problems. We need panel standardization, which I think will come with industry maturity.
Another big issue is lack of regulation for solar companies who use predatory financing on consumers and can actually make selling your home much more difficult. This is a big enough problem that any realtor will tend to advise you not to get solar because of the selling issues. This shouldn't be the case. It's a regulatory problem.
Where, in the USA, can an electricity seller increase the price without government approval? Hell, your [2] link is about an entity of the federal government, there are no shareholders.
Price of energy is proportional to energy output of the tech, regulations, competition.
The best way forward, factoring in current and future energy use, is nuclear.
Solar is a feel good tech that is great when subsidised, but doesn't put out anywhere near the power of nuclear.
If California wants to do solar, it can! Though it will likely go the way of the rail project, the firefighting org etc
People in California are paying massive amounts for power distribution. The utilities themselves are paying very little for power generation -- for example, they pay 4c/kWh for a solar+batteries plant build in 2022.
> but doesn't put out anywhere near the power of nuclear.
We have > 250GW of solar and 97 GW of nuclear. Nuclear produced 779TWh and solar 303TWh in 2024. They are quite comparable.
> If California wants to do solar, it can! Though it will likely go the way of the rail project, the firefighting org etc
California already has a lot of solar and batteries.
Your energy prices are extremely high for reasons apart from the grid.
How can I tell someone on hackernews knows absolutely nothing about power generation economics? They say we have to go all in on nuclear. And that's assuming that the poster isn't being completely disingenuous.
Nuclear is expensive, and there are no technologies that will reduce the price in the near term. Solar wind and battery storage is still on a economies of scale price reduction curve that no other form of electricity generation can match.
Not coal, not natural gas, and certainly not nuclear.
If you start building nuclear plants which best case come online in 10 to 12 years, with nuclear technology that already is not economical, by the time they come online that is another 10 or 12 years of battery, solar panel, and wind technology improvement and further economies of scale.
Wind and solar have the ability to be organically grown and expanded. Solar can be placed practically anywhere there's a roof.
Now do I think we should be researching nuclear, researching lftrs, and perhaps funding nuclear power plants to perform peaking in the grid? Sure.
Do I think we should be shutting down existing nuclear power plants not particularly. I'd rather use those than natural gas and coal fired plants for grid balancing.
Right now rooftop solar or residential solar is probably about the price of nuclear. In 10 years it will probably be half the price of nuclear.
Anyway, the overall good news with this typically unhinged Trump announcement is it the economic reality is on the side of alternative energy proponents.
Of course the government can screw things up, boy howdy. Do we know that now. But then Americans will just learn the brutal truth that other economies are going to drop the price of their electricity, which is one of the basic drivers of economic growth and competition.
And the US will be left behind.
Because it's not like we're entering a multipolar highly competitive world right? oh.
The comment says nothing of the sort.
They have wrote it, just read it in "0.5x" mode rather than "2x".
The real reason for all this is because people get extremely rich off of fossil fuels and people don't relaly get rich off of renewables. Resource extraction (mining, drilling for oil and gas, etc) is a wealth concentrator.
Oh and it's worth adding that the recent bill reduced royalty payments paid by oil companies [2].
The whole thing is simply yet another form of wealth transfer from ordinary citizens to the mega-wealthy.
[1]: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/the-plummeting-cost-of-rene...
[2]:https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/21/trump-administratio...
At least he’s talking about nuclear now and not the pipe dream of coal generation
https://democracyforward.org/work/uncovering-trumps-ties-to-...
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/trump-franchis...
You know we're an exporter of fossil fuels not importer right?
Global energy policy, particularly relating to solar, begins and ends in China. They’re the largest variable marginal consumer of energy and producer of solar panels.
No, the actual answer is that it’s pure ideology: this is about Owning the Libs, pure and simple, irrespective of the collateral damage to the economy. We’re currently being led by vengeance-minded morons who want to destroy anything that has even a tangential connection to liberal politics, and renewables are definitely on that list.
You might prefer certain types of energy, but you would be naive if you didn't recognize the cash flows from all the different types of companies.
Total world oil revenues: $4.2 trillion in 2025, market cap of $7.2 trillion in 2023
Total world solar/wind revenues: estimate $500 billion, so 1/8th. Market cap between $1.02 trillion and $1.51 trillion in 2024.
Oil, gas, and coal have spent: $150 million on federal lobbying in 2024, and has consistently spent over $100 million annually since 2006.
At the state level, hard to get data for. In CA alone, it was estimated $40m in 2024.
For the renewables industry in 2024: $60 million in federal lobbying in 2024. That has increased over the years, unlike oil and gas.
At the state level, renewables spent in CA: $4.68 million on state-level lobbying, or 1/10th.
In conclusion: oil and gas have been consistently spending hundreds of millions of dollars to convince politicians alone to support their cause for years, whereas renewables has been increasing their spend and is only a fraction of it.
Yes, both sides are putting money into it. No, both sides are not equal. FWIW, democrats support oil and gas just fine: under Obama oil and gas exports and refining grew to record highs, just as they did under Trump, and as they did under Biden.
The US is the largest oil exporter in the world. That has happened despite the mix of politicians holding majority of SCOTUS, Congress, and President. That has happened despite the small fraction of spending from renewables.
We prefer renewables because, unlike oil and gas, they aren't rejecting their role in climate impact: renewables do studies to understand them, and they are always far lower than oil and gas, an inconvenient truth the anti-renewable crowd wants to deny because they want to shout a wind turbine killing some birds is somehow equivalent to the millions of birds coal kills every year, along with the cancers it causes in humans, and the climate change, and the dirty business of mining the coal, and the water needed to cool the turbines. Yes, renewables obviously have some environmental impact. Its always less in total.
We prefer renewables because they aren't profitting to TRILLIONS of dollars and poisoning political discourse to spread lies about climate change. We prefer renewables because it means less cases of asthma. It means less control over the world's stage by extractive autocratic regimes such as Saudi Arabia and Russia. It means less cancer, less pollutants, less damage overall. Less oil spills.
Maybe we prefer renewables because we have a lot of reasons to prefer them, despite the relatively small amounts of cash flows desperately trying to prevent oil and gas from KILLING their industry. Which, btw, oil and gas have now successfully done. Renewables are significantly hampered under this administration.
And unlike solar they work 24/7.
That's very optimistic. And yeah, I see how this comment is kind of the equivalent of bringing up Obama or Hillary or something when it's about Trump's bullshit. To be very clear, I hate any efforts to impede energy build out.
Or you build the power plant and data centre somewhere with a stable economy. No tariffs on importing model weights.
This is not true. Solar and wind are already cheaper than fossil fuel generation for new capacity. Source: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/wind-and-solar-en...
https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/us-orders-orsted-ha...
Otherwise you're just burning money without an alternative to meet increasing demand (which is likely why costs are increasing and why the additional supply is being built).
If this is happening (which frankly I doubt) it's just corruption.
Nobody wants a new coal or nuclear plant in their back yard.
https://www.npr.org/2025/03/12/nx-s1-5319056/trump-clean-ene...
They are. And it’s undercutting the owners of pricier plants. Hence Trump using environmental regulation to block more solar.
They do need planning permission of course and that's where they can be blocked.
Maybe some forms of green energy have helped in some areas and times of day, but they have done nothing to stop the climb.
It's time to try something other than solar and wind, which are demonstrably not lowering energy prices, and may be making it worse (TOU energy plans are becoming the norm because of the broken duty cycle of solar)
This isn’t about subsidies, it’s about standing in the way of the free market.
And why do you think cost relates to a form of supply? It seems more likely that demand is also much higher (data centers, more air conditioning, etc).
What does this mean?
> solar and wind, which are demonstrably not lowering energy prices
Why would the government intervening to ban supply make things better?
This policy is a hand-out to power producers. It constricts supply. It’s Trump copying San Francisco and Los Angeles housing policymakers, except for energy.
I can't even begin to understand your logic here.
According to government figures, 11% of electricity costs goes toward green initiatives, and 5% to VAT, which is also earmarked for green initiatives. The government has promised that as we become greener, we should see the prices come down, but the opposite has been true [3]. The green energy sector is currently largely subsidised by fossil fuels, as we transition more and more to green energy, the true costs are realised. Our Energy Secretary (failed prime minister candidate) says:
> Responding to the 6% price cap rise, Energy Secretary Ed Miliband said it was due to "our reliance on the fossil fuel markets" and added: "We're acting to bring down bills for everyone with our mission for clean, home-grown power that we control."
The irony is that we don't make our own wind turbines or solar panels, so our grid is still precariously dependant on foreign actors. We're breaking away from the likes of Russia to become dependant on China - great. Bare in mind, all of this effort for the UK which produces less than 1% of global emissions, but outsources its manufacturing to Countries such as China that have not even started to attempt to reduce their emissions (recent drops are due to economic collapse).
[0] https://watt-logic.com/2025/01/09/blackouts-near-miss-in-tig...
[1] https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-...
[2] https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-...
[3] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/crkep1vx3mro
The UK does still need to build more on shore nevertheless.
This is completely incorrect, and it makes me wonder if the rest of your comment is too.