Fossil fuels fall below 50% of US electricity for the first month on record

https://ember-energy.org/latest-updates/fossil-fuels-fall-below-50-of-us-electricity-for-the-first-month-on-record/

270•xnx•14h ago

Comments

neallindsay•13h ago

Despite all the data about climate change, the thing that is actually shifting us away from fossil fuels is that solar panels are cheap.

stavros•13h ago

That's all we've ever cared about, unfortunately.

pyfon•13h ago

Yeah I'd be subsidising panels coming in from China personally.

xbmcuser•12h ago

Lol this to me was the greatest stupidity from Europe. I get Petro states like US or maybe even Canada complaining about China subsiding energy and hurting their oil and gas but what the fuck did Europe protect. They even got fucked over by US into a Russian war and now they are stuck buying US gas.

pjc50•9h ago

The Russian war is entirely the fault of the Russians, along with massive complacency after Russia shot down a planeload of Dutch nationals and used chemical weapons in a UK city.

Gibbon1•4h ago

What's interesting is the US has always been opposed to Europe being dependent on Russian natural gas. And historically the US is an importer of natural gas. so it's not like the US wants to sell it's natural gas to Europe instead.

hylaride•5h ago

> They even got fucked over by US into a Russian war and now they are stuck buying US gas.

Europe was stupid as they let "green" political groups (often historically clandestinely backed by Soviet/Russian government) get nuke plants shut down to shift to coal/gas.

While Europe was incredibly naive to remain so udderly reliant on Russian gas, especially after the the annexation of Crimea and the shoot-down of MH17, the war is 150% the fault of the Russian government and nobody else (USA, NATO, Ukraine, etc).

Workaccount2•5h ago

The irony that the Chernobyl meltdown was probably the most profitable thing to ever happen to Russia.

rjsw•2h ago

s/Europe/Germany/

hylaride•2h ago

Germany was not the only one, but arguably the worst.

gmuslera•13h ago

Maybe not shifting, but adding. Alternative energy sources are being adopted in increasing ways, but in absolute numbers traditional sources keep increasing too.

xbmcuser•13h ago

The shift is about to come now as LCOE of Solar + Bess is cheaper than coal in China now and getting cheaper

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43749571

wolfram74•12h ago

No, it's definitely shifting, based on [0] the carbon emissions per kwh globally are down from 542 g/kwh to 481 g/kwh in the last 10 years, that's over a 10% reduction. Countries that are staying flat are the exception, not the norm.

[0]https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/carbon-intensity-electric...

tialaramex•12h ago

Because we're talking about electricity the total power usage for the US is mostly stable.

It's not declining like the UK (efficiencies mean total electricity production is down about 25% this century despite population growth) but it's growing only a tiny fraction, like maybe 2% in a decade - much less than the amount of new solar and wind.

So it's definitely shifting, the biggest shift is away from coal. Coal is awful, it's too expensive and it's incredibly polluting, some of that shift is towards gas, which is also a fossil fuel but has the advantage that it burns cleaner and is often cheaper - but as we see in this data lots of the shift is to "green" sources.

bryanlarsen•11h ago

That may no longer be true. For example, China's coal usage is down 5% YoY despite increased electricity usage.

https://cleantechnica.com/2025/04/20/chinas-coal-generation-...

testing22321•13h ago

And getting cheaper everyday.

A year ago I paid $8k for 7.8kw on my roof. My Dad just paid $5k for 10kw.

Neither of us will ever pay for power again.

Edit: Western, southern Canada for those asking.

isoprophlex•13h ago

... during daytime, in summer. Or did you install a load of batteries, too?

testing22321•12h ago

We use the grid like a battery, getting a one for one credit for everything we put in. So during summer/daytime we put in enough to then use up our credit in winter/nighttime.

The power we put in even covers the monthly connection fee.

I’m just about to hit 12 months with mine, 8 Mwh generated, never paid a bill.

In our area the cost of electricity is already Confirmed to increase 5% a year forever, so this will only get better for us.

belorn•12h ago

Subsidies like one for one credit are generally going away since those are prohibitively expensive and not sustainable when the ratio of renewables start to climb. It can be useful to jump start adoption, but having the government pay the true cost of the grid only moves the energy bill to the tax bill.

testing22321•11h ago

When that happens, I’ll get batteries.

tasuki•11h ago

You'll need a lot of batteries. It might or might not be economical, but definitely not ecological. So... depends on your values and goals.

bryanlarsen•11h ago

Compared to what? Yes, batteries have ecological costs, but compared to fossil fuels it's minor. Home storage batteries will likely be LFP which are all abundant and recyclable.

berdario•3h ago

A Tesla Powerwall3 (which apparently uses LFP) has a capacity of 13.5kWh

A household uses up at least around 2MWh per year, most of which during the winter, if you don't use air conditioning in the summer and don't have an electric car to charge.

That means you'd need around 150 (!) Powerwall 3 units. At a price of around 10k GBP each, you'd have to shell out more than 1 million pounds just for the batteries. Not to mention the space that they'd have to take, and the increased risk in having something failing.

In the USA, homes are even less efficient (and depending on locale, people run AC all year round, and drive tens of thousands of kilometers on cars which also need to be powered). 2 years ago MKBHD published a video about his experience with the Tesla roof:

https://youtu.be/UJeSWbR6W04

In it, he revealed that his yearly power consumption is 55MWh. His battery was able to tide him over the next cloudy day, and during the winter the solar panel wouldn't ever fully recharge again.

Expecting every household to be energy independent year-round via solar is patently absurd. Renewable energy tided over with massive batteries upstream? Maybe that could work, I haven't run the numbers... But you cannot hope to push that responsibility downstream to every household. Reliable baseline is still going to be necessary for the foreseeable future.

hiatus•2h ago

Why would a household need enough batteries to store a year's worth of energy?

berdario•1h ago

The grandparent comment is arguing about the budget over a whole year

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43751178

> We use the grid like a battery, getting a one for one credit for everything we put in. So during summer/daytime we put in enough to then use up our credit in winter/nighttime.

> The power we put in even covers the monthly connection fee.

> I’m just about to hit 12 months with mine, 8 Mwh generated, never paid a bill.

And later the same commenter argues

> When that happens, I’ll get batteries.

tasuki•11h ago

This is unsustainable: you deliver power when its real market value is close to zero, and you want to take power out of the grid when its real market value is large.

Mistletoe•13h ago

That’s really neat. Can you share what part of the world you live in? I’d love to do that.

fullstop•13h ago

Where are you, geographically? I'm interested in adding them but I have a large tree on the south side of my house that I really do not want to cut down.

homebrewer•12h ago

At current rates, 5k USD is enough to cover my electricity costs for the next 87 years. Your quoted prices still make them a non-starter in (probably) most of the world.

kasey_junk•12h ago

You are paying less than $5 a month for that level of energy generation?

Thats ummm extremely cheap.

byefruit•12h ago

Indeed, average in CA is $260/month so $5k pays off very fast in some places.

kasey_junk•12h ago

I live in a locale that has cheap energy, in fact one that makes solar a pretty bad deal. Depending on the real generation numbers of the panels it would take about 20 years for me to payback that level of generation.

So saying most people have an 80 year payback period just feels wildly off (depending on the assumptions in the calculation I think that implies less than a penny per kWh generated).

testing22321•12h ago

Many parts of the US have staggeringly cheap power compared to the rest of the world.

Before all this our power bills were smack on $100 per month, so I’ve got about a 6.5 year pay off. Electricity here is 13 cents per kWh, but is confirmed to increase 5% per year basically forever. So my pay off is less than that.

enlyth•12h ago

That's if the price of electricity doesn't change in the next 87 years

The panels are also a hedge against that uncertainty and provide self reliance

Paradigma11•10h ago

The more usage of intermittent renewables increases the more your electricity bill is dominated by fixed costs. You still need the grid, which is only growing more expensive.

ben_w•8h ago

Or batteries, which are also getting cheaper.

For places not already on the grid, using batteries instead of paying for a new grid connection is close enough to be a question worth asking, though from what I've seen not a definite "yes" or "no" in general.

bawolff•12h ago

Well how much electricity are you using? If you use much less electricity, then you would need less solar panels which means the system would be cheaper.

I highly doubt there is anywhere in the world where you can buy the amount of energy specified by the parent as cheaply as you said. Like i think it would work out to less then a penny per kwh

If you are not accounting for amount of generation than this is an apples and oranges comparison.

jfengel•12h ago

The parts of the world that use so little electricity are not major contributors to climate change.

kllrnohj•12h ago

A 10kW system produces somewhere between 11,000kWh - 17,000kWh / year give or take. Qatar has one of lowest electricity prices in the world at $0.03/kW

$0.03 * 11,000kWh/year * 87 years = $28,710.

So either you're vastly underestimating the amount you pay in electricity, or you're using vastly less electricity in which case you obviously wouldn't get a 10kW system.

hyperhello•12h ago

While the cost of power will be reduced, I think that's overly optimistic in the long run. Fixing the lines and power distribution systems when they wear out or get hit by weather is really the cost of your electricity bill. You can have a shared power grid, or not pay for it, but you can't have both. Even areas powered by hydro have to maintain cherry pickers for that.

jmyeet•12h ago

I believe solar is the future. And hydro where approppriate. China is doing massive things with hydro. The largest hydro power station in the world is the Three Gorges Dam and they've just announced building one three times as large in Tibet for $137 billion [1].

But there's an issue with solar most people don't talk about. Yes it can be variable due to weather and day/night cycles. That's obvious. But a real issue is power lines.

Power lines are built to deliver power to businesses and homes. The cost of that is amortized over the electricity purchased by consumers. If people end up purchasing only half as much power due to more energy-efficient building standards, the use of solar, etc then the cost of the power lines is still the same except now it needs to be amortized over less electricity sold.

This I think is why municipalities tend to limit how much solar power houses are allowed to have. How do you build and maintain a grid when houses are generally self-suficient? Should you? Is it acceptable to not have a grid?

[1]: https://newatlas.com/energy/yarlung-tsangpo-hydroelectric-pr...

lifeoflejf•11h ago

Do you think that will just be moved to the flat connection fee? I had an apt with a gas stove, and nothing else gas. The $8/m connection fee was pretty much my entire gas bill. If it’s $50/m per building to be connected to the grid, plus demand charges, then charge that and pass along wholesale energy costs.

jmyeet•3h ago

A connection fee helps but not as much as you think. You could turn that off but there are still pipes built into your house or apartment down to the street. There's still a pipe that runs down the street. There is distribution infrastructure. You might be paying for your connection separately on your bill but you're still amortizing all that downstream infrastructure. If overall usage drops, that connection fee still has to go up.

vikramkr•3h ago

The real issue is politics - grids are absolutely going to be required for all the folks who can't generate enough solar on their own roofs, industry, cities, restauraunts, etc. Plus how else are you going to make use of wind, grid scale utility solar installations, etc. I have a feeling many countries in the world (especially china) will not have much trouble forcing the grid to do what's needed and subsidizing shared infrastructure with taxes as a shared societal good. If we insist on not doing that though, the grid system as is is not going to be able to financially and logistically figure out this transition, which is probably a competitive disadvantage for us long term if our own energy grid is stopping us from competing on energy because of the way it's structured.

jmyeet•3h ago

China has specific needs that almost nobody else does. Most notably, all of China's power generation is in the west of the country (eg Three Gorges, the new Tibet dam) but all the people are in the east. You lose power with long-range transmission and on China's scale that's a real problem.

So China has largely invested in, deployed and perfected Ultra-High Voltage Direct Current ("UHVDC") transmission infrastructure. China has really shown they think 10, 20 and 50 years into the future with their planning.

As for grids, there are a lot of places that could be self-sufficient with solar plus batteries. A lot of remote towns and houses work this way already.

aweiland•8h ago

Those are great prices. In the US we are at least double that for an equivalent system. Many solar installers/sellers here are very predatory and have been for a long time. Prices have dropped, but not by enough for it to be worth it for me.

usaar333•6h ago

> Neither of us will ever pay for power again.

Seems optimistic? With 2 EVs and almost all electric utilities, I'm well past the ~26 KWH a day electricity your system might generate.

I'm also impressed how cheap your costs are. The install cost alone in the Bay Area is going to be past that. Panels getting cheaper just don't matter much.

gwbas1c•6h ago

I spent $60k for panels to support 2 EVs and a heat pump. I live in the Northeastern US. I generate ~80% of my electricity.

Assuming the parent doesn't have EVs and uses gas, oil, or wood for heat, the cost makes sense. "Domestic" electricity usage, when you aren't using it for heat and cars, is quite low.

testing22321•4h ago

My system has generated 50kwh on a few day. Many over 45.

alabastervlog•6h ago

Installed?!

Just the electrician's part would be a good chunk of the $5k, where we live (East coast US) before you even get into placing the panels themselves.

I keep seeing cheap panel costs with a "look, now you can afford it!" thing, but for those of us who may be handy but aren't quite willing to do high-power lines & boxes, or confident bolting steel to a roof without either killing ourselves or ruining the roof, the labor costs continue to be very high, and that part's not going down. From what I'm seeing for online "average costs for 10kw in your area" I'd hesitate to pull the trigger even if it were $5k lower than it is, which would probably be an even bigger discount than if the panels and other hardware were simply free.

cogman10•5h ago

Back in the first Trump presidency, there was a 30% tariff on solar panels and equipment, which has significantly increased the price of going solar in the US.

Couple that with the fact that Canada very likely has subsidies for people adopting solar power.

klipt•5h ago

Probably helps the Canadian government isn't trying to tariff solar power in the hopes of promoting "beautiful clean coal" instead

alabastervlog•4h ago

I mean, yes, separately that's going to put solar plans on hold for a lot of people in the US. I just meant that labor costs alone already tended to easily exceed $5k for rooftop solar projects in the US, so I was surprised at that price for that much solar.

bawolff•3h ago

Canada does actually apply significant tarrifs to chinese solar panel companies

https://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/sima-lmsi/mif-mev/sml-eng.html

_jules•5h ago

As one who went diy in your region - keep calling electricians, you'll eventually find one who'll do the job at a fair price. With micro-inverters, there's no power in the lines till you connect into the main panel & you can work that our with a licensed electrician.

alabastervlog•4h ago

Very good info, thanks.

testing22321•4h ago

Yes, installed with a bit of diy. Licensed solar installer and myself did most of the work. Electrician to actually wire into the house panel was $125 for 1 hour. Permits were $36.

hinkley•4h ago

With solar the power per panel speaks a bit to the labor cost of installation. For one you are less likely to have to go to lengths to squeeze the system onto your roof and gang the correct number together.

EnPissant•3h ago

Meanwhile, new construction in California is required by law to include solar panels, and builders can price them however they want. You will typically see prices of $27,000 for a 5.7 kWh system. You can also choose a lease if you wish, but it's the same as buying the panels, except with a much higher interest rate than including it in your mortgage.

baxtr•12h ago

China saving the Planet?

How dare you…

amima•12h ago

To my understanding, scaling production to bring prices down due to economy of scale is the part of the initial plan, which was based on the data about climate change. So these things are connected.

moffkalast•12h ago

Not to mention how much's been invested in government subsidies to develop that scale. Cheap solar is not a spontaneous occurrence by any means.

toddmorey•12h ago

That's the only environmental hope I've been able to hang onto. It's now cheaper in most places[1] for net new energy installations to NOT use fossil fuels. I knew environmentally conscious approaches could never survive being the morally correct yet more expensive option.

[1] IRENA 2023 report shows that solar photovoltaic (PV) generation was 56% less expensive than the weighted average fossil fuel-fired alternatives, despite being 414% more expensive back in 2010. Bloomberg New Energy Finance found in March 2021 that "renewables are the cheapest power option for 71% of global GDP and 85% of global power generation."

Paradigma11•10h ago

But how much more expensive would it make the power for the last 15% of global power generation?

What is the total cost for both scenarios?

bryanlarsen•9h ago

Use it for the 85% first, and then when that's done, battery prices will have declined enough that the number will be a lot closer to 100%.

SOLAR_FIELDS•6h ago

And honestly 85% would be pretty damn good all by itself. That would significantly stem the bleeding and give time to address the long tail

AlecSchueler•5h ago

I thought we were past the stem the bleeding point?

datadrivenangel•5h ago

There are reasons to be optimistic!

Lots of bad things will happen from climate change, but we can mitigate the impact of many of those issues.

Teever•3h ago

How many people do you think are going to die painful deaths because of climate change?

mrDmrTmrJ•5h ago

In the US Nuclear gives about 19% of total generation and hydro another 6%. So you don't have to go beyond 75% renewables to start with.

Long term, we need a combination of the following technologies to get to 100% carbon free electricity with 80% renewables: 1. Long distance transmission lines. 2. Some type of "clean, firm, dispatchable" power. Examples include: Nuclear fission, fusion power, deep geothermal, and space based solar power.

We can certainly use the cost savings from getting to 80% renewables to finance figuring out how to scaling production of one (or more) of the later technologies to lower cost. Simply reducing the regulatory burden on Nuclear Fusion can accomplish that if a society chooses this path.

Lot of work to do. And many economic powers would loose out from this transition (e.g. Exxon or Russia) but totally feasible to accomplish.

If you want to do a deep dive into cost scenarios look at the work of Christopher Clack or Jesse Jenkins.

Example: https://www.nature.com/articles/nclimate2921

candiddevmike•5h ago

Too little, too late. We should've been switching to solar in the 80s. Even if we could switch to be carbon free tomorrow, the amount of CO2 already in the atmosphere is predicted to cause breadbasket collapses within the next 20 years.

If it makes folks feel better, there's a good chance you probably had no control/influence over this outcome if you were born after 1980.

https://www.sciencealert.com/researchers-weve-underestimated...

kstrauser•5h ago

We were trying to switch to solar in the 80s, but it was infeasible. The technology just wasn't there. Now it is and we're adopting it en masse.

Workaccount2•5h ago

We will spray the atmosphere to buy more time.

People will haggle over it because of the unknowns, but when imminent social chaos becomes obvious, we'll be forced to pull the trigger on it.

rickydroll•5h ago

This is why I think we need to roll the dice on geoengineering. We can try to tilt the odds in our favor, but it's still a crapshoot. From what I've read, iron fertilization would be one of the better paths to go. A potentially better path would be the creation of synthetic whale poop.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/scientists-are-cra...

datadrivenangel•5h ago

It's not hopeless. The risk of crop failures may be higher than it would be if we were going to experience less warming, but having a bad harvest year isn't existential. We'll work to mitigate things.

bryanlarsen•5h ago

> 1. Long distance transmission lines.

Those are really expensive. They're part of the toolbox, but they're not tool #1.

> 2. Some type of "clean, firm, dispatchable" power. Examples include: Nuclear fission, fusion power, deep geothermal, and space based solar power.

If you're relying on that to supply power during those winter weeks without sun & wind then it has to scale up to 100% of power needs. And if it can do that, why build anything else?

To get to 100% carbon free with > 99.99% reliability for under $1T, your primary tool is modelling.

Then you reach for:

- source diversity. Wind is more expensive than solar, but it tends to be highest at dawn/dusk so is a great complement. - overprovisioning. Enough solar to supply needs on a cloudy winter day - storage. - long distance interconnect. There's never been an hour in recorded history where there's no sun or wind somewhere in the continental US.

https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262545044/electrify/

vikramkr•5h ago

the sun shines and the wind blows in the winter. Plus, batteries. Giant redox flow batteries are coming online now, sodium batteries, it's not like there aren't options for storage people are working on.

zdragnar•5h ago

> There's never been an hour in recorded history where there's no sun or wind somewhere in the continental US.

But is that sufficient to handle the full load across the entire continental US? And how do you do that without the really expensive long distance high voltage transmission lines?

Where I live, bad winters can see us go for weeks of full cloud cover and little wind in January. If we really get away from fossil fuels and run heat pumps, that means electrical use in winter will rival that in summer.

bryanlarsen•4h ago

No it isn't. That's why I said that modelling is tool #1. The whole US might not go an hour without sun and wind, but your area might go 3 weeks. But the combination of your area and a neighboring area might max at 3 days. So thus instead of building a continent wide interconnect and no storage, you build a regional one and 3 days of storage.

rasz•2h ago

>solar photovoltaic (PV) generation was 56% less expensive than the weighted average fossil fuel-fired alternatives

Only if you need electricity during the day.

nielsbot•1h ago

I thought solar + battery was cheaper the nat gas now.

https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/lcoe-and-valu...

(If not it soon will be.)

1970-01-01•12h ago

Tariffs are changing this, however. Buy them ASAP if you're building.

thinkingtoilet•12h ago

I'm confused by your statement. What else would it be if not cheaper renewable options?

jeffbee•12h ago

You could instead make the fossil fuels cost more.

delusional•3h ago

Why would you do one or the other? We've done both so far. Let's keep doing both.

TuringNYC•12h ago

>> solar panels are cheap

I want solar panels, but i'm also a skeptic on the cost, and not enough time has passed to prove how things will go. While I agree the metered cost may now favor solar -- what is the TCO for the average resident? Some things on my mind:

1. Everything seems inexpensive at first, before you have to pay for servicing. Just like with cars, HVAC systems, plumbing systems, or any complex system where you are at the mercy of repair companies that are highly local. With plumbers in our area, you cannot even effectively get multiple quotes because there is a "visit fee" of $125, which gets credited to repairs if you choose the provider.

2. Roofs in general are expensive to maintain and repair. Here on the costs, i've never seen even a minor repair be under 1k. Major roof replacements cost 5 to 15k for average homes. This might be a greater-metro-NY issue though. Part of it is the liability insurance of workers being on the roof, so I'm not saying the cost is unjustified -- just that it is really expensive.

3. What happens when these solar panels need to be serviced? Many of these solar shops are fly by night, looking to cash in on govt incentives. Will they be around to service malfunctioning or panels? What will repair costs be? Who guarantees the warranty? As an example, here in NJ even minor tweaks on a leaking showerhead will cost $500 to $1000. I can only imagine what a broken solar panel will cost.

4. I realize this is a very selfish opinion -- but just from a systems boundary perspective, traditional energy complexity is all upstream and I consume the end-product. Solar energy complexity is all local and I take the risk.

jeffbee•12h ago

Nobody even mentioned rooftop solar.

kadushka•12h ago

Major roof replacements cost 5 to 15k for average homes

I just got some quotes to replace a tile roof on my very average 2400 sqft house in FL: 50-60k. Asked neighbors - seems reasonable to them.

apercu•11h ago

I assume Florida is an outlier due to storms, in most of the country you'd probably pay half that unless your roof is complicated.

kadushka•4h ago

I also got a quote from Tesla to get solar shingles roof - $110k.

ChoGGi•10h ago

That's the asphalt shingle price, tile is pricey.

apercu•11h ago

>2. Roofs in general are expensive to maintain and repair. Here on the costs, i've never seen even a minor repair be under 1k. Major roof replacements cost 5 to 15k for average homes. This might be a greater-metro-NY issue though. Part of it is the liability insurance of workers being on the roof, so I'm not saying the cost is unjustified -- just that it is really expensive.

Where exactly is this? I have a modest, single story house (1600 sq ft) and most of my estimates are ~$20k. (SW Wisconsin).

ChoGGi•10h ago

If that's just stripping the old shingles off and placing new ones, you should be looking at around $6-10k.

Is there a lot of rebuilding or something going on around you?

My roof (1200 sq roof deck not house) would've been about 18, but that's because it had cedar shingles under the asphalt. I did it myself for 3 in materials and about 3 weeks of labour. These are all CAD prices.

MisterTea•10h ago

1. HVAC manufactures have moved to building proprietary computer controlled HVAC systems which must be serviced by a certified technician. This allows them to build a system of regional service companies who maintain complete monopoly over an entire region. Even if you wanted to open a shop to compete with the incumbent, you can't because the manufacturer wont allow you if another shop in your region exists. The result is gate-kept artificial scarcity of technicians and parts allowing for price gouging. The solution is right to repair and boycotting these clowns.

2. Roof work has always been a huge cost as it's very labor intensive (I learned some flat roof maintenance from a roofer friend.) The issue is we have not developed a roof system that works in conjunction with solar panels. Until that happens roofs and solar will be orthogonal problems no one wants.

3. My work got semi-screwed by this. They used concrete blocks, around 60,000 pounds worth, to hold down metal frames the panels were bolted to. Total bonkers fly-by night operation company disappeared after 2 years and we had to maintain it ourselves. Roof was destroyed after 7 years as it was leaking all over and several cracks formed in the blocks around beams. It was deemed unsafe and the entire 75kW system removed. Building owner spent $200k on a new roof and building repairs then banned solar from being installed again.

4. So is your fancy HVAC system. I believe that electrical generation should become part of a homes infrastructure just like HVAC. It enables authority and autonomy over energy which is something I have wanted. Though I also believe if someone wishes to surrender that autonomy then they should be allowed to do so.

r00fus•5h ago

> The issue is we have not developed a roof system that works in conjunction with solar panels.

Millions of data points suggest your POV is unfounded.

MisterTea•5h ago

Please post them.

r00fus•4h ago

Every single solar installation with no reported issues.

MisterTea•3h ago

The issue here are current racking systems make service of the roof difficult or impossible without tedious and costly disassembly of traditional solar panel installation. Someone has to go around and unbolt everything. We need a system where you can rapidly attach and remove them without tools. Otherwise roof maintenance becomes roofer + PV maintenance.

r00fus•1h ago

While you have a valid point, how often do people need to reroof their house? Or even repair something that is impacted from a solar install?

My anecdotal understanding is that there are no such complaints from owners.

WillAdams•5h ago

For your point 2. isn't there a company making solar cell arrays in the form of a metal roof panel?

A quick search shows: Forward Solar Roofing, a San Francisco, USA company (but they seem to have vanished?)

Another company with a similar approach (which is not Tesla) is: https://www.suntegrasolar.com/

MisterTea•4h ago

My concern with these systems is what happens if the company goes out of business and you need to replace a proprietary shaped panel?

WillAdams•4h ago

The Forward Solar Roofing company had panels which were interchangeable w/ existing metal panels, so could have been replaced (albeit at a loss of capacity).

Agree that's a concern for the other products in this space.

xbmcuser•10h ago

Equipment cost is actually not that much now it mostly labor and marketing. That is the main reason solar makes countries with cheap labor have huge advantage with solar. A similar system will cost $60k in the US to $15-20k in India and China

jandrese•4h ago

Or Australia. For some reason Aussie installers are able to install systems for incredibly affordable prices. I'm always jealous when I see a quote from down under that is like a third of what I paid per watt in the US.

pjc50•9h ago

As someone else points out, this is just a rooftop solar question and utility has better economics unless land is really expensive everywhere or your grid connection permitting regime is broken.

My rooftop solar installation is about 10 years old, has long since broken even, and has required .. exactly one incidence of maintenance, to fit pigeon-proofing. Which could have been done at the initial install time, I just wasn't aware of how necessary it could be.

It has huge advantages against HVAC (and, by extension, all the plumbing-based systems like nuclear) in that it doesn't have any plumbing. The panel is a big photodiode. There is basically nothing to go wrong unless you have serious storm damage - and my panels have survived winds that took down nearby trees and fences.

> What happens when these solar panels need to be serviced?

To a first approximation, they don't. Maybe at the 20-25 "EOL" mark.

(even cheaper option would be balcony solar, but that requires legalization)

NooneAtAll3•5h ago

how does pigeon-proofing work?

pjc50•3h ago

Since I have curved tiles, that creates a space underneath that's ideal for nesting in. Since they're a nuisance, the pigeon proofing consists of fitting some combination of wire mesh and plastic around the edges to stop them from getting underneath.

r00fus•5h ago

You opinion is not selfish (I'm selfishly taking advantage of low solar cell costs and decent ROI). You are however, quite uninformed about the details. Go ask on /r/solar or some other forums or just ask friends who've installed - most are just silently soaking up ROI.

Three things to keep in mind: * I would definitely install after replacing your roof unless it's like just < 5yr old. * Most solar loans, PPA or leases have significantly bad financial terms so I recommend people to avoid them. * Make sure your utility has some kind of net-metering or you will have to install batteries to make it cost effective.

01100011•2h ago

So my experience with a leased solar system installed in SoCal in 2011 and owned until 2018(SunRun). The system ended up costing me a fair amount of money although it let me run my AC all day without thinking about it. Sure I could have turned off the AC but the amount I'd have made from selling electricity wouldn't have been much. I hear the situation is even worse now because of the new plans(and now people in the old plans will be forcibly removed). The system also slightly complicated the sale of the home.

I'll say that one goal of the current administration, assuming they're competent enough to accomplish anything, is to dramatically increase US electricity production and I believe them. So with electric costs predicted to drop I suspect it is a bad time to invest in a solar system. China tariffs probably make this even worse as panels should rise in cost.

I would also defer a solar install until I got a new roof since replacing your roof means paying to remove and replace the solar system.

I'll admit that I am biased, generally, against residential rooftop solar for non-off-grid installs since my personal belief is those panels serve society better when they're filling commercial rooftops where economies of scale can make maintenance overhead per watt lower but I'm sure someone will contradict that belief with statistics. Just throwing it out there.

moomin•12h ago

Yes, but solar panels are cheap as a consequence of investment, partly supported by many solar promotion policies around the world, that were inspired by climate change concerns.

This is actually a victory lap for political activism, we just need a lot more of it.

ashoeafoot•11h ago

What could real push a shift would be thermal longtime storage. Basically heatpump heating with a artificial heat stored underground in the summer.

mulmen•6h ago

What geological impacts does heating the ground cause?

jandrese•4h ago

If you could figure out a way to do this economically you could have a real winner. Ground source heat pumps already exist, but they're so expensive to install that they basically never make their cost back vs. air source heat pumps.

bufferoverflow•7h ago

And it doesn't make almost any difference, because other countries are building hume amounts of coal plants. China started 95GW of coal plant construction just last year.

bryanlarsen•6h ago

China's coal usage is down 5% in the last 12 months: https://cleantechnica.com/2025/04/20/chinas-coal-generation-...

They're adding coal capacity quickly, but they're lowering the capacity factor of that usage even faster. Those coal plants are peakers that only run when solar & batteries are empty.

jahnu•6h ago

I think it was on Volts podcast where I heard that many of them are built as political insurance for regional governments who don’t want an angry population if they have an unusually cold winter and a lot of them are going to end up as stranded assets which the population gets way less mad about.

bryanlarsen•6h ago

Ironically building coal plants probably helps wean China off coal. They use a lot of coal for heating. But nobody is going to want to switch to a heat pump unless they have reliable electricity.

Aloisius•2h ago

Not in the last 12 months. This quarter compared to a year ago.

It was up 1.5% for 2024 compared to 2023: https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/chinas-thermal-power...

Analemma_•6h ago

The top-line number doesn't accurately explain what's going on in China: they have a bunch of coal plans, but many of them operate at 10% or less of rated capacity, probably out of a combination of "these are peaker and/or worst-case (i.e. American oil embargo) scenario energy security plants" and old-fashioned deficiencies in central planning. In any case, you should measure coal burned instead of capacity installed, which is leveling off: [1]

[1]: https://www.statista.com/statistics/265491/chinese-coal-cons...

amanaplanacanal•6h ago

China also installed way more solar than, for example, the US. Their energy needs are growing quickly as a developing nation.

CorrectHorseBat•5h ago

China didn't just install more solar than any other country, they installed more than all other countries combined.

jandrese•4h ago

Economies of scale. That's how you win.

LUmBULtERA•6h ago

China is deploying far more solar generation, at an increasing rate. [0]

Increasingly cheap battery storage, also built in China, is also being deployed rapidly.

It all makes a lot of difference.

[0] https://www.pv-magazine.com/2024/02/02/chinas-new-pv-install...

dghlsakjg•6h ago

It provably does matter.

Western transition away from fossil fuel usage is still a reduction in net fossil fuel usage when compared to no shift at all. In other words fossil fuel usage might still be growing, but it is growing at a slower rate. If we accept that fossil fuel usage should be minmized then it very much matters.

Aside from that; this argument reduces to an exceptionally bad moral stance which is: Someone else is doing bad things, therefore that justifies me doing that bad thing. Or as you might phrase the counter-argument to a young child: just because someone else is littering doesn't mean that it is ok for you to litter.

Tireings•6h ago

Yes but climate change made them so cheap.

Lucky enough for us and everyone else economy of scale kicked in. I'm taking it

r00fus•5h ago

s/climate change/China/

The US bungled its lead in photovoltaics and politics prevented us from catching up - so like most other things, China leads the way, and we benefit.

gamblor956•5h ago

China literally just subsidized soar panel manufacturing to the time of several billions of dollars with the express goal of killing manufacturing everywhere else and then raising prices once the competition was gone.

cogman10•5h ago

There's really no reason the US or other major economies couldn't have followed suit. The chinese plan only works because the other major economies are more than willing to give them that manufacturing capacity since it means a local (although somewhat temporary) boon.

The whole plan could have been snookered by the US similarly subsidizing their solar production 10 or 20 years into the chinese plan. Which would have put most of the cost onto China while we reaped the benefits of cheap power production.

jandrese•4h ago

The Obama administration tried, but it was too little too late and they were raked over the coals by Republicans for "choosing winners".

But fundamentally solar cell production was (is?) pretty dirty and US environmental regulations were always going to be a stumbling block. One used to be able to spot Chinese solar factories on satellite maps by looking upstream from deadzones, but apparently that has been enough of an embarrassment that even the CCP has started cracking down.

anonymars•4h ago

And choosing "losers", specifically Solyndra was shrieked at along the lines of Benghazi

Basically DOE funded research pretty successfully but it only takes one failure for the loud voices to win

Same program funded Tesla as I recall

Example source: https://www.reuters.com/article/world/us/exclusive-controver...

pfdietz•3h ago

> But fundamentally solar cell production was (is?) pretty dirty

There's nothing "fundamentally" dirty about it. It's not like fossil fuel combustion that inevitably produces a large stream of waste (CO2).

klipt•5h ago

Wow, only several billion dollars? That's like 0.1% of the US federal budget.

vikramkr•3h ago

yeah, pretty smart move. We shoulda done that too - controlling the means of production for energy generation is a pretty useful thing imo.

worewood•3h ago

environmental "awareness" doesn't mean dog poo; environment-friendly will only be prioritized when it's cheaper to do so. That's why government subsidies and taxing are REQUIRED.

The western world should have subsidized it too, now you can't dismiss it because it wasn't organic--because it NEVER would be organic.

philipkglass•1h ago

China has accounted for the majority of global solar panel manufacturing for over 10 years now:

https://www.statista.com/chart/1576/chinese-solar-photovolta...

Despite that dominance, prices continue to fall:

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/solar-pv-prices

As an addendum, the US also saw a rapid increase in domestic solar panel manufacturing in recent years:

https://seia.org/news/american-solar-panel-manufacturing-cap...

But that was due to government incentives that are now under fire from the Trump administration.

Tireings•5h ago

Germany actually started the push.

NooneAtAll3•5h ago

I heard explanation that at some point silicone prices skyrocketed, so Germany shifted RnD from monocrystals to thin film panels

High prices caused an influx of investment - and silicone prices plummeted, which allowed China to get the crown

vel0city•4h ago

Silicone != Silicon. Two different materials. I use silicone caulk to seal things up. I use silicon crystals to make microchips.

delusional•3h ago

So THATS what I've been doing wrong. I'm telling you guys, we're this close to getting competitive chip production to the west.

gotoeleven•6h ago

I keep hearing that solar panels are cheap but then I get my PG&E bill every month.

porphyra•5h ago

I personally think that it is amazing that we are likely going to shift away from fossil fuels out of pure capitalistic greed. Trying to convince people to give up fossil fuels out of some altruistic desire to save the planet was never gonna work.

jandrese•4h ago

If you want to change the world you need to align the incentives.

ZeroGravitas•4h ago

It has been the smart economic decision for a decade or more already. Capitalistic greed caused some to spread FUD around that issue, deny there was a problem and attack several useful tools for dealing with it.

The fact that capitalistic greed has caught up with reality a decade later after most of the hard work was done and is now fighting on both sides of the issue is somewhat tragic.

Doubly so if you consider what it means about every other global problem we face that might affect a powerful incumbent's short term profits.

hinkley•4h ago

We have at least subsidized solar enough to build up enough manufacturing to contribute to that price.

tw04•4h ago

>Despite all the data about climate change, the thing that is actually shifting us away from fossil fuels is that solar panels are cheap.

It also requires the political will. Texas is showing us that the market is in fact not rational, and will absolutely do something that's universally contrary to everyone's best interests for the sake of grandstanding.

https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/energy-markets/texas-bi...

9283409232•4h ago

That is not showing us the market is not rational, it is showing us that Texas politics is corrupt. Texas is interfering in the market and picking the winners despite renewables being the favorable market option. Republicans are only in favor of no regulations and letting the market decide when it favors them.

moate•4h ago

>>That is not showing us the market is not rational, it is showing us that Texas politics is corrupt.

Dear capitalists, this is not a bar:

The first thing proves the second. The market is a real thing that exists in the universe we live in, not just in academic research. The markets are never "rational", because they're just people. They may be "predictable" or even "stable" but humans are not rational. The fact that the market can be manipulated, means that it is manipulated.

alephnerd•3h ago

Texas subsidized wind energy for 30 years now - it was actually George W Bush and Rick Perry's legacy making project when they were Governors of Texas [0][1][2] and made up 20-30% of total energy produced.

Issue is, a significant proportion of Texas's budget comes out of NatGas and Oil revenue, so there's a perverse incentive when renewables end up pricing well below NatGas and Oil, and labor unions aligned to ONG like the UAW, ILU, and affiliates of the AFL-CIO like the United Steelworkers are VERY politically powerful.

This will be a major hurdle in energy exporting countries like the US, Norway, Canada, Netherlands, the Gulf, etc and it can't be handwaved away.

And no - rETraInInG doesn't work when much of the renewable industry is heavily automated, a major reason the ILU, UAW, and parts of the AFL-CIO ended up supporting the Trump admin's tariffs regime: either you drop the unions and cause tens of thousands to lose high paying jobs and radicalize a vast swath of Americans OR you do nothing and let the earth cook.

[0] - https://www.technologyreview.com/2016/08/29/70295/george-w-b...

[1] - https://www.texastribune.org/2013/09/16/book-excerpt-go-get-...

[2] - https://www.masterresource.org/texas/george-w-bush-wind-ener...

worewood•3h ago

That's why environmental "awareness" doesn't mean dog poo; environment-friendly will only be prioritized when it's cheaper to do so. That's why government subsidies and taxing are REQUIRED for the switch to more environmentally friendly alternatives--this applies to everything, from fossil fuels to packaging.

newuser94303•3h ago

Solar panels WERE cheap until 145% tariffs were applied

DontchaKnowit•2h ago

Yeaaaahhh but the data on climate change informed government policy that subsidized renewable energy.

jmyeet•12h ago

Energy is a frustrating topic because people have some very entrenched but uninformed opinions about it, like hte "energy independence" argument. We're clearly energy independent but people will look to see that we still import oil and natural gas and say we're not. That's a business. Refining is a business. Making LNG is a business. Canada has no real way of exporting oil and natural gas so we buy it, process it and either use it or export it.

Another: peak total and per-capita greenhouse gas emissions in the US peaked in about 2007 and has decreased ~10% since then [1]. We still produce the most per-capita so there's a long way to go. China leads the world on renewable energy builds by a mile. It's not even close. Yet their usage of coal is still increasing as is their greenhouse gas emissions (total and per-capita) due to a still industrializing population.

Electricity costs continue to increase [2]. Some blame this on renewables. It's not. This is a longstanding trend. It goes beyond inflation though. Utilities are generally regional monopolies. For some reason we've decided that privatizing these is somehow a good idea (it's not). The need for ever-increasing profits just means things will continue to get more expensive.

[1]: https://www.wri.org/insights/charts-explain-per-capita-green...

[2]: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/APU000072610

EduardoBautista•12h ago

> Canada has no real way of exporting oil and natural gas so we buy it, process it and either use it or export it.

Just to be clear, you mean "we" as in the USA? So the USA basically manages the exports of Canadian fossil fuels?

jmyeet•12h ago

Yes, I mean the USA. Here's a presentation on the Canadian oil and gas industry [1]. You can see that a very small portion is exported directly. Almost all of it is via pipelines to the USA.

This is a huge strategic benefit to the US, which is yet another reason why alienating Canada through tariffs and other policies is such a laughably ignorant and terrible idea.

It's also why anyone pointing to non-zero US imports of oil and gas as damning proof of the US not being energy independent is incredibly ill-informed.

[1]: https://www.capp.ca/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Canadian-Expo...

ChoGGi•10h ago

China is ramping up imports of Canadian crude.

https://financialpost.com/commodities/energy/oil-gas/china-u...

jmyeet•3h ago

I see the announcements of China importing more Canadian oil to be largely performative.

Canada lacks the facilities to export oil so they'd have to build them when there are existing piplines that export it to the US. That's a hard to justify expense, particularly because Canada-US relations could change any moment. LNG is even worse because those facilities are expensive.

China is going to get its oil from Russia, Iran and Venezuela, like it already does. Russian oil can be imported overland. Sanctions are laughably avoided by simply laundering oil exports through Malaysia and elsewhere [1].

This also suits China's strategic interests of not having a unipolar world.

But long-term China seeks to end its dependence on imported oil, just like the US did, except China is doing it with hydro and solar and by decreasing demand by electrifying transportation.

[1]: https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/chinas-march-ira...

alephnerd•3h ago

Westridge Marine Terminal back in Burnaby (right outside Vancouver) can handle APAC oil exports.

That said, Canada is ambivalent about negotiations with China as much of Canada's automotive industry would be destroyed in a liberalized trade deal with China, just like what happened to Australia after their FTAs with ASEAN, China, India, SK, and Japan.

China was also caught trying to influence Canadian elections by the CSIS [0], so trust is limited.

[0] - https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/canada-spies-found-ch...

hylaride•5h ago

Canada *can* export its oil and natural gas, but mostly doesn't because the economics haven't historically warranted it. Most Canadian Oil is relatively heavy, which the gulf refineries in the US are tailored to refine when mixed with Texan and Oklahoman oil (for historical reasons the heavy mix was Canadian and Venezuelan, but the latter is not a factor with the combination of mostly being sanctioned as well as lower output levels due to mismanagement).

The gulf refineries are designed to have a decent chunk of heavy oil, so the historical price discount that Canada gets is less compared to if it shipped it elsewhere. It's similar for natural gas - we just didn't extract enough of it to justify dedicated LNG terminals, not to mention the extra pipelines to ship it to them. The price delta didn't have an ROI compared to just piping it south.

However, with Trump the economics are all now shifting. It now may very well be worth it. There are recently completed pipelines from Alberta to the Pacific and there's now (very, very early) serious talk of more going east, along with terminals.

bryanlarsen•11h ago

> [China] usage of coal is still increasing

China's coal usage is down 5% YoY. https://cleantechnica.com/2025/04/20/chinas-coal-generation-...

WillPostForFood•5h ago

According to wikipedia, as of 2023, the US ranks 17th in greenhouse emissions per capita.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_greenhous...

jillesvangurp•4h ago

China's coal usage is estimated to peak in the next few years and projected to start dropping there as well. Possibly a lot faster than they announced a few years ago as it seems they too underestimated their own ability to do things better and cheaper.

A lot of the story in the US is not about the amount of energy used but about the amount of energy wasted. Most of the energy used in the use is simply heating the universe without doing anything useful whatsoever. The US is very inefficient with it's energy usage. Heating/cooling barely insulated buildings, moving around in stupidly heavy vehicles, etc. Per capita, the Chinese are doing way better per kwh. They pay less for and do more with their kwh.

Cost of energy in the US has more to do with it's bloated system than with technology. Outdated/broken infrastructure, restrictive/backwards policy, inefficient equipment, obsolete technology, etc.

thegreatpeter•12h ago

Is it bc solar is subsidized or is it bc it's cheaper? Every time I walk into Lowes I'm sold on solar but they say it's bc the government is heavily subsidizing it

Bluecobra•12h ago

If you look up your address here it will give you the cost breakdown. (https://sunroof.withgoogle.com/) I just checked my house again and it’s $30K for 10kW, but there is a $10K tax credit, so the subsidy is a 1/3 of the cost.

mulmen•5h ago

It’s both. The subsidies help the solar power market develop. Supply lines of panels, installation, etc. as these grow and mature prices come down. We subsidize fossil fuel production as well with similar results.

vikramkr•5h ago

It's cheaper and they're all subsidized. Solar is subsidized, oil and gas is subsidized, nuclear is subsidized. Fracking recieved significant subsidies to develop the market initially. Right now, solar/wind is cheaper than fossil fuels by a lot, which is why it's the largest percentage of newly added energy capacity worldwide. Cheaper, faster, and after installation, the power plant doesn't need to keep getting fed with a consumable (incredibly low variable costs are causing issues where markets are getting messed up and going into 0/negative prices since power plants are competing to dump energy it doesn't cost them anything to generate)

jandrese•4h ago

It is still subsidized, to the tune of 30%. However, that subsidy is mostly because rooftop installs have very high labor costs in the US. Solar farms pay far less per watt.

The actual hardware, especially the panels, have dropped so much in price that if you're capable and willing to do the work yourself you can have a solar install paid off in 2-5 years, depending on how much sun you get and how expensive your local power is. I've seen homebrew setups down south that were paid off in just over a year, but those were guys who live way out in the desert and were getting ripped off by their power company.

One thing you don't see anymore is fancy sun-tracking mounts. Back when panels were expensive they sometimes made sense, but these days it's pretty much always better to just install more panels instead. You can even point them differently, with half facing SE for morning sun and the other half facing SW for evening sun, flattening your production curve and allowing you to use a cheaper and smaller inverter.

tiffanyh•12h ago

One important point that’s not obvious from this article: U.S. pollution from fossil fuels isn’t actually decreasing.

From what I understand (and please correct me if I’m wrong), overall energy demand in the U.S. continues to grow year over year. Most of the additional energy needed is now being supplied by renewables.

So while we’re adding less new pollution—because the new energy is cleaner—we’re still producing the same amount of fossil fuel pollution as before.

The baseline pollution hasn’t gone down; we’ve just slowed the rate at which it increases.

wat10000•12h ago

Is that a fact or a supposition based on fossil fuel generation continuing to grow? Pollution produced by fossil fuels isn’t necessarily equal. Modern power plants are significantly less polluting, and gas is much better than coal. If coal continued its decline and newer plants replaced some old ones, you could easily have less total pollution from increased fossil fuels generation.

ZeroGravitas•12h ago

In the US greenhouse gasses are down across a variety of absolute metrics:

https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/united-states#what-ar...

In the electricity grid specifically they peaked around 2006 and are 15% below 1990 due to switching from coal to gas and introducing renewables

What you say is broadly true globally but western nations are mostly on the downslope and the globe as a whole is slowing and hopefully going negative soon.

tiffanyh•12h ago

That's one of the most interesting links I've seen in a long time (regardless of subject).

Thanks for sharing because it puts things in perspective much easier due to the data it sourced.

jmknoll•6h ago

If you’re convinced by the materials shared, you may want to consider editing your original content. It’s currently the most-upvoted comment, and is materially incorrect.

tiffanyh•5h ago

I'm unable to edit.

I did though indicate "please correct me if I'm wrong", in my original post.

Which led to this discussion below that I'm sure people then read (like your comment on this sub-post)

Sayrus•12h ago

According to EIA[1] and Wiki[2] fossil fuel electricity production has been rather stable or going slightly down on the last three years. However, US electricity is a small part of the US Energy Consumption. When you take those into account[3], renewables fall from 50% of the energy mix to less than 20% (10% if you don't include nuclear) but overall Fossil fuel usage is stable. The trend is going down if you take a longer time period.

[1] https://www.eia.gov/electricity/Annual/

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_of_the_Unit...

[3] https://www.eia.gov/totalenergy/data/monthly/pdf/sec1_3.pdf

mrweasel•6h ago

> overall energy demand in the U.S. continues to grow year over year.

That probably not unique to the US, but I wonder what that energy is used for. Our appliances use less and less electricity, our homes are better insulated, cars are more fuel efficient, so what is using that additional energy?

inetknght•5h ago

Those new-fangled AI things use a lot of power.

floxy•4h ago

Server farms in general? Up to 46% of Virginia's electric consumption projected to be data centers in 2030:

https://www.epri.com/research/products/000000003002028905

...see Table A1 on PDF page 29.

bornfreddy•5h ago

Bitcoin? "AI"? If this is just electric energy, EV?

stevenwoo•5h ago

It does not attempt to explain it but this lists how much major sectors use: https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/use-of-energy/ This data presentation shows it seems to have broadly plateaued in last few years with some fluctuations that do not indicate an upward trend as of 2023.

mulmen•5h ago

I don’t know but there has been a lot of manufacturing construction after the pandemic. Manufacturing construction has doubled since 2021 to the highest levels since 2005. Presumably these projects consume power for both construction and operation. There’s probably also some amount of new industry becoming viable as energy prices fall.

https://home.treasury.gov/news/featured-stories/unpacking-th...

vikramkr•5h ago

Electrification (converting things that ran on fossil fuels to electricity) is a net decrease in energy demand but massive increase in electricity demand if you're looking at electricity specifically. Past few years have also had a ton of growth in data centers and manufacturing investments. According to the EIA, they're projecting a decrease in energy demand over the next few years: https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=65004

hylaride•5h ago

Commercial and industrial use, as well as increased AC usage. I'm not sure what percentage of the electric market is now for charging cars, but it's not zero.

You see similar use patterns for water. Per capita water use has gone down in many urban areas, especially places like California over the past few decades. You see hard restrictions on watering lawns, showers, toilet sizes, etc. But agriculture just sucks up the rest.

tmnvix•4h ago

> cars are more fuel efficient

This is true when comparing the same class of car to previous models, but is it still true overall when we consider the shift to larger vehicles? The Toyota Camry from 1994 is still more efficient than the current 2024 top selling Ford F150.

Jevons paradox is worth considering when reading these stories of increased renewable energy generation and falling prices.

toomuchtodo•6h ago

Texas Attempt to Kickstart New Gas-Fired Power Is Stumbling - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-05/texas-att... | https://archive.today/9jRPq - April 5th, 2025

Solar adds more new capacity to the US grid in 2024 than any energy source in 20 years - https://electrek.co/2025/03/10/solar-new-capacity-us-grid-20... - March 10th, 2025

US is set to shatter grid battery records this year - https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/energy-storage/chart-us... - March 7th, 2025

Solar, battery storage to lead new U.S. generating capacity additions in 2025 - https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=64586 - February 24th, 2025

https://www.interconnection.fyi/ (~1TW of solar in US grid interconnect queues)

(it is expected within the next 12 months we arrive at a deployment rate of 1TW/year of global solar PV capacity)

Workaccount2•5h ago

I strong suspect that Trump fully intends for tariffs to cripple renewables (they will) and boost oil and gas jobs. The dude is hell bent on returning America to the 1950s.

cmrdporcupine•4h ago

Indeed, politicians in the employ of the (traditional) energy sector have gone from mocking renewable projects and decrying them for "requiring subsidies" to demanding their curtailment because they do not.

Alberta's government (whose premier is a former oil&gas industry lobbyist) enacted a "moritorium" on new renewables projects a couple years ago because it had the most active investment in that sector in the country (most sunny days, and very windy). After the moritorium was lifted draconian regulations were placed on potential new sites.

This was done under the cover of "protecting farmland", but this is in a province with a massive abandoned oil well contamination issue, which the private sector got away with and continues to get away with.

And then today/yesterday it came out that the government had hidden the results of public "consultations" on these matters because it was not favourable to them.

The problem with oil&gas is it is prone to the development of parasitical/highway-man type relationships, and all sorts of people get rich quick by inserting themselves in the flow and they will not give up this position without a dirty, dirty fight.

jandrese•4h ago

One of the ironies in the US is that some of the more conservative states with supposedly renewable energy hostile governments are actually deploying more solar than many liberal states. When people want to oppose a solar install for whatever reason they often turn to environmental laws, requiring impact studies or other such red tape, that are much weaker in conservative states. Texas is a champion of renewable installs despite a government that is openly pro-fossil fuel.

floxy•4h ago

https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/blue-states-dont-build-red-sta...

toomuchtodo•4h ago

The US had at least one year of solar PV deployment capacity in reserve before tariffs went into effect, ~50GW. It also has roughly the same amount of domestic manufacturing, but not fully vertically integrated. Gas plants are backordered well into the 2030s and coal plants (which only produced ~15% of electricity in the US in 2024) are teetering near retirement. To push either to failure would not be hard, you'd just have to target (legally, economically) specific parts of the supply chains needed for thermal generation construction (Siemens or GE Vernova) and operations/maintenance.

Tariffs and economic uncertainty are pushing down oil prices. The US O&G industry experiences pain below $70/barrel. It is not having a great time under this admin, as of this comment.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43624269 (citations)

'Unstoppable force' of solar power propels world to 40% clean electricity - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43620007 - April 2025

Shift to Clean Energy Will Persist under Trump, New Analyses Say - https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/shift-from-fossil... - April 16th, 2025

‘Drill Baby Drill’ Is Drowning in Oil: Trump's tariffs are helping to create some of the worst conditions for the industry so far this century. - https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2025-04-15/trump-... | https://archive.today/4Qyno - April 15, 2025

Texas Oil Executives Are Frustrated at Trump for Crushing Crude Prices - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-09/texas-wil... | https://archive.today/oHr2w - April 9, 2025

apercu•11h ago

I'd like to get solar, but I'm starting with a battery pack and a smaller solar install to cover those things that I would normal use a diesel generator for. It's amazing that the "cleaner" energy deniers won't be able to hold back cheaper energy.

bryanlarsen•11h ago

Related: 40% of world's electricity is zero emissions:

https://cleantechnica.com/2025/04/19/zero-emissions-electric...

neonate•6h ago

https://web.archive.org/web/20250421133427/https://ember-ene...

https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/fossil-fuels-generat...

gwbas1c•6h ago

I wonder what next month will be. April / May tends to be the months that I generate more electricity with my solar panels than I consume.

Winter: Not a lot of sunlight, and I heat with a heat pump.

Summer: A lot of sunlight, but my AC eats a lot of the power.

kylehotchkiss•6h ago

Oh man, didn't the president just re-activate coal mining? What are they going to do with all that coal? Asia might of wanted it before the trade war, but not anymore?

Oh. I guess we can feed it into the AI data center generators.

r00fus•6h ago

Trump can say what he wants, but the market has moved on from coal.

chrisco255•5h ago

Except in India and China: https://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/fossil-fuels/chin...

porphyra•5h ago

At least the percentage of renewable energy generation in China is steadily increasing. It has gone from 17% back in 2008 to 32% in 2024. And solar and wind are growing at a rapid pace.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy_in_China

bamboozled•4h ago

Both countries are smart enough to know that being reliant on foreign oil and coal for everything is stupid, they are moving away to solar and wind, not just for security reasons but also because they produce most of the panels already so they supply their own demand then use the extra capacity to profit via exports.

It's done.

bamboozled•3h ago

If you go look at the price of some of the mid-high end Chinese panels, you could pay 200% in tariff costs and still be getting a bargain. Check out LONGi for example.

I'll be ordering a bunch of these for a renovation I'm doing this year and I'll be installing quite lot of capacity, it's a no brainier to go solar, especially considering the price of energy now days.

Maybe people doing this will be labeled radical, extremists or activists for installing panels on their roof soon but I don't care, it's my roof.

ein0p•3h ago

Note also that tariff is paid on the _import price_, which is a fraction of retail. Many people do not understand this.

toomuchtodo•3h ago

This is why Chinese social media is communicating to consumers to buy direct and cutout the developed world middle man.

https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/chines... | https://archive.today/rVvix

https://x.com/abby4thepeople/status/1911238808018014587 | https://archive.today/dwyw7

bamboozled•2h ago

That depends on what the retail markup is on any item?

I don't think it really matters because if I buy $2000 worth of panels directly, I'm still getting hit with ~ $800 of tariffs.

You point out an interesting point here though, this plan will backfire even harder for the USA in my opinion because it sounds like American middlemen are now absolutely screwed. We will all just be buying from China directly and boosting their online retail capability.

ein0p•2h ago

The implication being that those panels aren't really $2K when they cross the border. They're more like $500, at most. And that's what the tariff gets applied to. People think 100% tariff means the price doubles. But it shouldn't, especially on the various tchotchkes which are bought for a buck and sold in the US for $5. Note that "shouldn't" ≠ "won't". Greed is a thing.

bamboozled•2h ago

You're still paying the tariff...nothing negates the fact that you're now paying $800 extra for the panels for no reason at all.

I'm already buying direct anyway...I don't see why you're bringing greed into it. It sounds like you might be trying to help people feel positive about paying more in taxes?

I can still pay the tariff and get great panels at an affordable price anyway...

chickenbig•5h ago

Last month 18.2% of the US's electricity was generated by nuclear (61.8TWh), according to the media pack "All electricity sources data.csv".

Renewables (110.6 TWh) = Wind (51.6 TWh) + Solar (31.1 TWh) + Hydro (27.9 TWh)

Clean = Nuclear (61.8 TWh) + Renewables (110.6 TWh)

ein0p•5h ago

Amazing what can happen once you shift most of your industrial pollution to China and pretend it's not yours.

tranchms•5h ago

And Energy prices are at an all time high— go figure!

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CUSR0000SEHF01

DoctorOW•5h ago

Correlation is not causation. Energy companies have increased their prices largely to increase profits.

vikramkr•5h ago

not sure if you meant to link a different chart - that chart is the electricity component of CPI-U (an inflation measure) meaning it's by definition not inflation adjusted - you'd probably want to find a chart of nominal values for electricity spending and adjust for inflation to see whether or not it's at an all time high. Which, recently it's run ahead of inflation because of the overall surge in demand and investment in upgrading aging infrastructure/adding new capacity, but long term it's pretty flat/down

NooneAtAll3•5h ago

What happened in 2022? Does the graph not account for inflation?

vikramkr•3h ago

that graph is of one of the components that is used to calculate inflation

foobarbecue•4h ago

What does "clean" mean here? Wind and solar are 24.4% and "fossil" is 49.2% so what's the remainder? Are they counting natural gas as "clean"? It's not...

vel0city•4h ago

They're not counting natural gas, and I imagine they also don't include "clean coal". The remaining 26.4 is probably a mix of nuclear and hydro. Which lines up with historical US generation percentages.

jandrese•4h ago

Nobody includes "clean coal" because it is a myth the fossil fuel industry made up to try to keep their business alive and to give politicians cover.

There are around three tiny "clean coal" plants in the world, all together producing only a tiny fraction of a percent of the energy on the grid.

vel0city•4h ago

Fully agreed on all points!

zahlman•4h ago

Natural gas is considered a fossil fuel, per Wikipedia. Unless you mean biofuels like methane, at least - but as far as I know, those are scarcely used anywhere on a large scale, certainly not the US.

"Clean" sources are generally anything that isn't burning hydrocarbons. This includes nuclear, hydro and geothermal.

Edit: See also a previous comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43755528

hinkley•4h ago

Hydro is a big slice out west and they’ve likely included nuclear.

nojvek•33m ago

Drill baby drill. 401k retirement savings being drilled right now.

There's less oil drilling than Biden's time. Weirdly a good thing for the planet, just like Covid allowed many ecosystems to recover.

I am no degrowth fan. However I do believe we ought to use our brains to build technology that allows us to live sustainably with the planet while harnessing more energy and automation.

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