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A 30% margin is probably good enough to build a fully automated solar cell fab locally. Trump is just trying to hurt solar, because he is paid by the dying coa

A 30% margin is probably good enough to build a fully automated solar cell fab locally. Trump is just trying to hurt solar, because he is paid by the dying coal industry. But he can't stop the inevitable, maybe slow it down slightly.

Gibbon1 9y ago
The fossil fuel industry basically can hurt the US at this point and they will hurt the US. While everywhere else is starting to head frantically for the exits. China, Europe, India, and bunch of African countries have make commitments toward solar, wind, and transportation electrification. China's banking system is loaning scads of money to solar manufacturers while in the US the banking system has loaned $1T to fracking, oil and gas companies.
- VVyattPrentice 9y ago
  It's also real-politik. CN is trying to corner the market on PV production. Obama supported fracking to punish Putin (RUS is a petro-state). There's more going on than what is read in the NYT. Take your area of expertise and go read about what is written in non-academic settings on the subject. Then realize that this isn't a one-off for your area of expertise. This. is. Everywhere.
  - Gibbon1 9y ago
    Oh sure, kinda brain dead can't adapt to the new post cold war order of things legacy real-politik. Makes sense if your power and status makes sense in terms of cold war conflict. But the Soviet Union is gone. The neoliberal transformation of Russia is a utter failure. The fossil fuel industry is walking dead at this point do to solar, wind, electrified transportation and the imperative to deal with global warming. It's a classic people and organizations looking out for their short term interest + risk aversion leads to eventual catastrophe. And as I mentioned, countries whose leadership have no particular interest in legacy cold war real politik or the Wests fossil fuel hegemony[1] are going to move and move fast. [1] Other countries leaders absolutely despise being beholden to the oil/gas/fossil fuel industry.
    - mistermann 9y ago
      The world is a complex place. In your analysis, do you think there is anything that you may have overlooked? Is it possible?
  - protomyth 9y ago
    > Obama supported fracking to punish Putin That is untrue, President Obama hated fracking and did much to discourage it.
    - rdtsc 9y ago
      > That is untrue, President Obama hated fracking and did much to discourage it. Maybe he said he hated it. I am not sure about the "did much to discourage" part. http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2016/offshore-fracking-06-28-2016.html http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2016/... --- The fracks occurred in at least 630 different wells off the coasts of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama (see interactive map), and many took place in critical habitat for imperiled loggerhead sea turtles. Oil companies were also allowed to dump about 76 billion gallons of waste fluid into Gulf waters in 2014. --- Not only that, his administration approve fracking with no site-specific analysis of the threats to the environment and also without public involvement.
      - protomyth 9y ago
        https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/23/us/politics/hydraulic-fracturing-interior-department-regulations.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/23/us/politics/hydraulic-fra... He tried and got struck down. He did what he could without Congress to help.
zjaffee 9y ago
Taxes imposed on import do not hurt solar, as much as they will help the American solar industry. Tons of American solar companies have nearly been brought to bankruptcy because china is massively subsidizing the export of solar panels. This problem is also magnified by the fact that Warren Buffet has been using his influence to encourage states to charge panel owners fees relating to grid usage that weren't there prior, as there is a cost associated with continuously switching which direction power from a given houses is flowing.
- cracell 9y ago
  Yeah it's weird to me that this article didn't talk about China's dumping of solar panels. Bloomberg has other recent articles talking about it https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-21/trump-china-trade-clash-fears-flare-anew-a-year-into-presidency https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-21/trump-chi... Reeks of "Trump is for it so it's must be bad" issue that has plagued journalism since he took office. There's pros and cons to this method of fighting dumping but it's certainly a good thing for American solar panel manufacturers just not the installers (in the short term at least).
  - icantdrive55 9y ago
    Yea, I want to look at his presidency, and actions, in a objective manner. I've never liked the man, but not everything he is doing is evil. We have gotten so used to Chinese underhanded business practices; it all starts to look normal. I'm almost to the point where why should I even buy my stuff from Amazon, when I can get it cheaper at Alibaba. I know Tartifs can be tricky, but we can't just let them take advantage of us. My hope is he has a group of economists whom are instructing him to slowly test out a few tarrifs, and hopefully, nix any tarrif that's not working. (Yes, I know it's more complicated than deleting a law.) For a long time I have felt our government almost discourages poor/middleclass entrepreneurs. We needed a change. Yes--the wealthy will always be able to make money here. They aren't the problem. I don't understand why they are always bitching about paying taxes. It seems like the only time they shut up is during a world war, but it has to be the right war--I guess? A war where they feel guilty about not signing up. I heard we had a 90% tax rate on the wealthy during/after WW2, and the quality of life was never better for most Americas. My point is I'm shocked at most of Trumps actions, especially the one's will greatly affect the poor. I'm ok with Tartifs on solar panels, and washing machines right now. If he makes our pathetic wefare system worse--I don't care what regulation he enacts; I don't want him around. In my world, that will be the final straw. It was my final straw with Clinton--when he decided to "reform" our terrible welfare system. Actually, he knew the Rebublicsns were about to enact reforms, and decided to take away their thunder. (Thunder--like taking care of the poor, and disenfranchised is wrong? I'm not on welfare, but have friends who are, and shocked at just how terribly they are treated. And whenever a Tariff doesn't work, the naysayers run to the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act. We really haven't had a lot of Tarrifs in the U.S. in the last twenty-40 years? My point is I don't want to throw the baby out the cliche. His presidency will be interesting, and hopefully not too painful. (Sorry--I'm not feeling great today.)
kragen 9y ago
China has much better chances of fully automating their solar cell manufacturing, because they are selling worldwide and so have much higher volumes. Presumably the dramatic declines in cost we've seen over the last few years are in large part due to this phenomenon. The US solar-cell manufacturers will remain in the same kind of high-cost, low-quality ghetto that Argentine air-conditioner manufacturers are in. Trump can definitely cause the inevitable to leave the US playing catch-up in the 2030s, unless he's out of office soon.
souprock 9y ago
Having a fully automated solar cell fab locally would be wonderful. We'd reduce the need for big ships burning sulphur-rich heavy bunker fuel oil. We'd be more resistant to China cutting us off without warning, as they did for rare-earth metals. Even a lights-out factory sometimes needs workers, so that is at least a few jobs. If you want a coal-related motive, try the obvious: Pennsylvania is an important swing state. Mines are hiring again, for both miners and engineers.
- kragen 9y ago
  Shipping solar panels overseas is not a significant source of bunker-fuel emissions, and it probably never will be. Complete solar panel modules, without legs, weigh about 10kg per kilowatt: https://www.amazon.com/ECO-WORTHY-10pcs-Watts-Module-System/dp/B06XXDZV4F/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1516667435&sr=8-2&keywords=1kw+solar+panel https://www.amazon.com/ECO-WORTHY-10pcs-Watts-Module-System/.... So each TEU of solar panels contains about 2.2 megawatts of generating capacity at 22 tonnes net per TEU. If the world installs 150 gigawatts of new solar capacity in 2018, that's about 70000 TEUs. The Emma Maersk carries 11000 TEUs on every voyage, so the amount of solar panels that will be installed worldwide in 2018 is about 6 shiploads. What about the future, when photovoltaic becomes the dominant source of marketed energy? According to the IEO, current total world marketed energy consumption is 20 terawatts (20'000 gigawatts), which would amount to about 90 million TEUs, or 8000 shiploads. Call it 30000 shiploads to account for photovoltaic's low capacity factor, typically in the 20%–30% range (though we can expect that to become more efficient as development moves to more equatorial areas with less clouds). There are currently about 9000 container ships in operation, so current world marketed energy consumption is about three trips for the world's shipping fleet, in the form of photovoltaic panels. Total container shipping volume is already about 470 million TEUs per year: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Container_ship#Container_ports https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Container_ship#Container_ports We can presumably expect panels to become smaller and lighter as time goes on, further decreasing the energy needed for shipping, and eventually the proliferation of solar panels will depress the price of energy so low that not even bunker fuel can compete with syngas, at which point the bunker fuel emissions problem will be over. (Edited to correct order-of-magnitude calculation error.)
- dylan604 9y ago
Terr_ 9y ago
That depends on how long the tariff is in place. It's useless if it's gone by the time you actually get your fab up and running...

Gibbon1 9y ago

The fossil fuel industry basically can hurt the US at this point and they will hurt the US. While everywhere else is starting to head frantically for the exits. China, Europe, India, and bunch of African countries have make commitments toward solar, wind, and transportation electrification. China's banking system is loaning scads of money to solar manufacturers while in the US the banking system has loaned $1T to fracking, oil and gas companies.

VVyattPrentice 9y ago
It's also real-politik. CN is trying to corner the market on PV production. Obama supported fracking to punish Putin (RUS is a petro-state). There's more going on than what is read in the NYT. Take your area of expertise and go read about what is written in non-academic settings on the subject. Then realize that this isn't a one-off for your area of expertise. This. is. Everywhere.
- Gibbon1 9y ago
  Oh sure, kinda brain dead can't adapt to the new post cold war order of things legacy real-politik. Makes sense if your power and status makes sense in terms of cold war conflict. But the Soviet Union is gone. The neoliberal transformation of Russia is a utter failure. The fossil fuel industry is walking dead at this point do to solar, wind, electrified transportation and the imperative to deal with global warming. It's a classic people and organizations looking out for their short term interest + risk aversion leads to eventual catastrophe. And as I mentioned, countries whose leadership have no particular interest in legacy cold war real politik or the Wests fossil fuel hegemony[1] are going to move and move fast. [1] Other countries leaders absolutely despise being beholden to the oil/gas/fossil fuel industry.
  - mistermann 9y ago
    The world is a complex place. In your analysis, do you think there is anything that you may have overlooked? Is it possible?
- protomyth 9y ago
  > Obama supported fracking to punish Putin That is untrue, President Obama hated fracking and did much to discourage it.
  - rdtsc 9y ago
    > That is untrue, President Obama hated fracking and did much to discourage it. Maybe he said he hated it. I am not sure about the "did much to discourage" part. http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2016/offshore-fracking-06-28-2016.html http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2016/... --- The fracks occurred in at least 630 different wells off the coasts of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama (see interactive map), and many took place in critical habitat for imperiled loggerhead sea turtles. Oil companies were also allowed to dump about 76 billion gallons of waste fluid into Gulf waters in 2014. --- Not only that, his administration approve fracking with no site-specific analysis of the threats to the environment and also without public involvement.
    - protomyth 9y ago
      https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/23/us/politics/hydraulic-fracturing-interior-department-regulations.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/23/us/politics/hydraulic-fra... He tried and got struck down. He did what he could without Congress to help.

zjaffee 9y ago

Taxes imposed on import do not hurt solar, as much as they will help the American solar industry. Tons of American solar companies have nearly been brought to bankruptcy because china is massively subsidizing the export of solar panels. This problem is also magnified by the fact that Warren Buffet has been using his influence to encourage states to charge panel owners fees relating to grid usage that weren't there prior, as there is a cost associated with continuously switching which direction power from a given houses is flowing.

cracell 9y ago
Yeah it's weird to me that this article didn't talk about China's dumping of solar panels. Bloomberg has other recent articles talking about it https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-21/trump-china-trade-clash-fears-flare-anew-a-year-into-presidency https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-21/trump-chi... Reeks of "Trump is for it so it's must be bad" issue that has plagued journalism since he took office. There's pros and cons to this method of fighting dumping but it's certainly a good thing for American solar panel manufacturers just not the installers (in the short term at least).
- icantdrive55 9y ago
  Yea, I want to look at his presidency, and actions, in a objective manner. I've never liked the man, but not everything he is doing is evil. We have gotten so used to Chinese underhanded business practices; it all starts to look normal. I'm almost to the point where why should I even buy my stuff from Amazon, when I can get it cheaper at Alibaba. I know Tartifs can be tricky, but we can't just let them take advantage of us. My hope is he has a group of economists whom are instructing him to slowly test out a few tarrifs, and hopefully, nix any tarrif that's not working. (Yes, I know it's more complicated than deleting a law.) For a long time I have felt our government almost discourages poor/middleclass entrepreneurs. We needed a change. Yes--the wealthy will always be able to make money here. They aren't the problem. I don't understand why they are always bitching about paying taxes. It seems like the only time they shut up is during a world war, but it has to be the right war--I guess? A war where they feel guilty about not signing up. I heard we had a 90% tax rate on the wealthy during/after WW2, and the quality of life was never better for most Americas. My point is I'm shocked at most of Trumps actions, especially the one's will greatly affect the poor. I'm ok with Tartifs on solar panels, and washing machines right now. If he makes our pathetic wefare system worse--I don't care what regulation he enacts; I don't want him around. In my world, that will be the final straw. It was my final straw with Clinton--when he decided to "reform" our terrible welfare system. Actually, he knew the Rebublicsns were about to enact reforms, and decided to take away their thunder. (Thunder--like taking care of the poor, and disenfranchised is wrong? I'm not on welfare, but have friends who are, and shocked at just how terribly they are treated. And whenever a Tariff doesn't work, the naysayers run to the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act. We really haven't had a lot of Tarrifs in the U.S. in the last twenty-40 years? My point is I don't want to throw the baby out the cliche. His presidency will be interesting, and hopefully not too painful. (Sorry--I'm not feeling great today.)

kragen 9y ago

China has much better chances of fully automating their solar cell manufacturing, because they are selling worldwide and so have much higher volumes. Presumably the dramatic declines in cost we've seen over the last few years are in large part due to this phenomenon. The US solar-cell manufacturers will remain in the same kind of high-cost, low-quality ghetto that Argentine air-conditioner manufacturers are in. Trump can definitely cause the inevitable to leave the US playing catch-up in the 2030s, unless he's out of office soon.

souprock 9y ago

Having a fully automated solar cell fab locally would be wonderful. We'd reduce the need for big ships burning sulphur-rich heavy bunker fuel oil. We'd be more resistant to China cutting us off without warning, as they did for rare-earth metals. Even a lights-out factory sometimes needs workers, so that is at least a few jobs. If you want a coal-related motive, try the obvious: Pennsylvania is an important swing state. Mines are hiring again, for both miners and engineers.

kragen 9y ago
Shipping solar panels overseas is not a significant source of bunker-fuel emissions, and it probably never will be. Complete solar panel modules, without legs, weigh about 10kg per kilowatt: https://www.amazon.com/ECO-WORTHY-10pcs-Watts-Module-System/dp/B06XXDZV4F/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1516667435&sr=8-2&keywords=1kw+solar+panel https://www.amazon.com/ECO-WORTHY-10pcs-Watts-Module-System/.... So each TEU of solar panels contains about 2.2 megawatts of generating capacity at 22 tonnes net per TEU. If the world installs 150 gigawatts of new solar capacity in 2018, that's about 70000 TEUs. The Emma Maersk carries 11000 TEUs on every voyage, so the amount of solar panels that will be installed worldwide in 2018 is about 6 shiploads. What about the future, when photovoltaic becomes the dominant source of marketed energy? According to the IEO, current total world marketed energy consumption is 20 terawatts (20'000 gigawatts), which would amount to about 90 million TEUs, or 8000 shiploads. Call it 30000 shiploads to account for photovoltaic's low capacity factor, typically in the 20%–30% range (though we can expect that to become more efficient as development moves to more equatorial areas with less clouds). There are currently about 9000 container ships in operation, so current world marketed energy consumption is about three trips for the world's shipping fleet, in the form of photovoltaic panels. Total container shipping volume is already about 470 million TEUs per year: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Container_ship#Container_ports https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Container_ship#Container_ports We can presumably expect panels to become smaller and lighter as time goes on, further decreasing the energy needed for shipping, and eventually the proliferation of solar panels will depress the price of energy so low that not even bunker fuel can compete with syngas, at which point the bunker fuel emissions problem will be over. (Edited to correct order-of-magnitude calculation error.)
dylan604 9y ago

Terr_ 9y ago

That depends on how long the tariff is in place. It's useless if it's gone by the time you actually get your fab up and running...