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Even though I'm dubious about government being too involved in business, a couple things stood out to me: the Chinese government has launched a sweeping effort

Even though I'm dubious about government being too involved in business, a couple things stood out to me: the Chinese government has launched a sweeping effort to increase the country’s dominant market share. “This is about industrial policy. The Chinese government sees lithium-ion batteries as a hugely important industry in the 2020s and beyond,” That’s a huge opportunity, and China doesn’t want to miss it. While its entirely possible that people in the government make the totally wrong decision and end up wasting taxpayer dollars, this kind of forethought makes me feel that the US is going to be left in the dust in terms of renewable technology. I know there is a patchwork of federal and state money that probably goes into things like the gigafactory in Nevada, investment on this scale by the government seems like a total pipe dream here, it hurts to see how backwards our government is moving on energy. I can see how people will just say "let the market handle it" but when the best case scenario is you save the world for future generations and the worst case is you simply lose some money it seems like a no-brainer.

Brakenshire 9y ago
On the other hand, tying government and industry together like that is likely to lead to bad outcomes from regulation. If everyone is pulling together, there will be pressure on environmental regulators to look the other way when there's an issue which will cost money. Even somewhere like France you had issues with nuclear, and expectations of transparency in China should be a lot lower.
- okreallywtf 9y ago
  Agreed, there are bad examples and good examples. Government trying to hold the leash and control companies: bad. Government using massive purchasing power and national and international leverage: good. With more direct government involvement we could have a Manhattan project for renewable energy, or apollo program. Instead we get crony capitalism and talk about the free market, when entrenched industries have a clear advantage. With regulated monopolies providing power nationwide, I think it is far too up to the individual power companies to implement renewables. I imagine the day that we find out we did too little too late, and have to look back and wonder why the hell we more or less left it up to purely market forces (which don't factor environmental damages in almost at all). We might wish that we had put some of the money we wasted in the middle east into reforming our power grids.
ghaff 9y ago
What was true at one time isn't necessarily true at another of course. But it may be worth observing that in the 1980s there was a huge amount of hand-wringing over how Japan's government and industry partnerships around industrial policy were going to make the US uncompetitive. This led to projects like SEMATECH in the semiconductor field. I do think government has a role to play in research and encouraging technology development generally. I'm far less convinced that it has to or should play a large direct role.
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ajross 9y ago
Tesla has been spinning their gigafactories for years now, though. The fact that the federal government doesn't do the planning doesn't really have any bearing as to whether the "US" is being "left in the dust". Those factory plans are real, they're being built (with a huge infusion of capital from a bunch of different sources). It's happening. Now, it might be the case that the PRC government's resources are superior, that they'll end up being able to outproduce Tesla et. al. in volume and undercut them in price, and that they'll ultimately "win" this battle. But that's not due to a lack of planning or resources in the US.
Jyaif 9y ago
"the US is going to be left in the dust in terms of renewable technology" China is already dominating the battery and solar panel industry. You really have to stop thinking of the US as being #1.
- mac01021 9y ago
  The parent never said that the US is #1. He just implied that they're not "left in the dust" yet, whatever that might mean.
- conjecTech 9y ago
  They have the cheapest panels, sure, but that's because they're being actively subsidized in an attempt to kill of competition. To my knowledge SunPower still has the highest efficiency production panels and First Solar still has the lowest demonstrated cost per watt for anything over moderate insolation.
- okreallywtf 9y ago
  Granted that is a common misconception in my country (luckily it is showing some wear) but that wasn't really what I meant. We have the capacity to be #1 in renewable energy in terms of capital and knowledge, but unfortunately we don't have the drive and we have a population where a fair percentage of us would burn coal just to spite the rest of the world.
samstave 9y ago
This is why all the freaking dinosaurs in government should be set out to pasture. They are all self serving douchebags who have no vision of the future.
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Brakenshire 9y ago

On the other hand, tying government and industry together like that is likely to lead to bad outcomes from regulation. If everyone is pulling together, there will be pressure on environmental regulators to look the other way when there's an issue which will cost money. Even somewhere like France you had issues with nuclear, and expectations of transparency in China should be a lot lower.

okreallywtf 9y ago
Agreed, there are bad examples and good examples. Government trying to hold the leash and control companies: bad. Government using massive purchasing power and national and international leverage: good. With more direct government involvement we could have a Manhattan project for renewable energy, or apollo program. Instead we get crony capitalism and talk about the free market, when entrenched industries have a clear advantage. With regulated monopolies providing power nationwide, I think it is far too up to the individual power companies to implement renewables. I imagine the day that we find out we did too little too late, and have to look back and wonder why the hell we more or less left it up to purely market forces (which don't factor environmental damages in almost at all). We might wish that we had put some of the money we wasted in the middle east into reforming our power grids.

ghaff 9y ago

What was true at one time isn't necessarily true at another of course. But it may be worth observing that in the 1980s there was a huge amount of hand-wringing over how Japan's government and industry partnerships around industrial policy were going to make the US uncompetitive. This led to projects like SEMATECH in the semiconductor field. I do think government has a role to play in research and encouraging technology development generally. I'm far less convinced that it has to or should play a large direct role.

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ajross 9y ago

Tesla has been spinning their gigafactories for years now, though. The fact that the federal government doesn't do the planning doesn't really have any bearing as to whether the "US" is being "left in the dust". Those factory plans are real, they're being built (with a huge infusion of capital from a bunch of different sources). It's happening. Now, it might be the case that the PRC government's resources are superior, that they'll end up being able to outproduce Tesla et. al. in volume and undercut them in price, and that they'll ultimately "win" this battle. But that's not due to a lack of planning or resources in the US.

Jyaif 9y ago

"the US is going to be left in the dust in terms of renewable technology" China is already dominating the battery and solar panel industry. You really have to stop thinking of the US as being #1.

mac01021 9y ago
The parent never said that the US is #1. He just implied that they're not "left in the dust" yet, whatever that might mean.
conjecTech 9y ago
They have the cheapest panels, sure, but that's because they're being actively subsidized in an attempt to kill of competition. To my knowledge SunPower still has the highest efficiency production panels and First Solar still has the lowest demonstrated cost per watt for anything over moderate insolation.
okreallywtf 9y ago
Granted that is a common misconception in my country (luckily it is showing some wear) but that wasn't really what I meant. We have the capacity to be #1 in renewable energy in terms of capital and knowledge, but unfortunately we don't have the drive and we have a population where a fair percentage of us would burn coal just to spite the rest of the world.

samstave 9y ago

This is why all the freaking dinosaurs in government should be set out to pasture. They are all self serving douchebags who have no vision of the future.

deleted 9y ago

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