8 ms·
The US climate law is fueling a factory frenzy
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- lukas099 3y agoIt's insane to me that the Democrats got this bill passed, along with the infrastructure law, CHIPS and others. Were any significant laws passed during the previous presidential administration besides Tax Cut and Jobs Act? I feel like nothing happened in those years.
- noknownsender 3y agoSame. I avoided reading up on it too deeply, because it seemed to be much bigger than I was expecting, and I didn't believe they'd get something that big through congressional gridlock. I basically assumed there were some poison pills baked in, and nothing much would come of it.
- Gibbon1 3y agoMy opinion is the Democrats have abandoned neoliberalism. Combine that with the realization that the 50 year long attempt to bring China into the club has failed. And then the 45th president and Jan 6th. Those have sharpened the Democrats mind.
- idopmstuff 3y agoI really thought Biden was the wrong guy for the job, with his old-school style of sitting down at the table and negotiating it out being rather poorly suited for the hyper-partisan world of today. He made me look pretty dumb there, and I couldn't be happier about it. Amazing to see that for all the Republican talk of bringing manufacturing back to the US, a Democrat's the one who actually got that done.
- HDThoreaun 3y agoThe issue is there really is no other choice than negotiating, even if it is poorly suited for the hyper-partisan world of today. The alternative is everything is filibustered and Manchin refuses to override that, meaning nothing passes and the republican strategy of just shutting everything down works.
- jonnycomputer 3y agoI think he's been the most effective Democratic President of my life time. Possibly any President, not just the Republican ones. And he did it by being everything the loudmouth was not. Quiet, serious and disciplined.
- jfengel 3y agoIt's a strong case, but there's also a strong case to be made for his predecessor -- for which he had Biden's help. Biden aptly described the Affordable Care Act as a "big fucking deal". The ACA is severely limited, but getting anything at all passed was a superhuman effort. It was a ton of ground-level politicking, taking advantage of a brief moment of Obama's extraordinary popularity. It might be his only real legislative accomplishment, but it's the most influential piece of legislation in decades. Obama and Biden had somewhat similar styles in that regard. Obama led the country out of the 2007 recession. For the most part it wasn't flashy, just slow and steady growth without drama. (He was known as No Drama Obama among the DC bureaucrats.) He himself was much prettier than Biden and inherently more interesting as a human being, so he got more celebrity. But his actual governance was also similarly "quiet, serious, and disciplined".
- jonnycomputer 3y agoThe ACA is a BFD, for sure. And I do think that the recovery was hamstrung by not going big enough, unlike the most recent one. Though, different kinds of recessions, so who knows. The real issue I see with Obama is that he was not very good at out-reach to Congress. Some of this was not his fault, but it really wasn't his strong point, or something he even seemed to put much effort in to doing. In that way--partly by personality and partly by his long experience in Congress--Biden is simply better. It is possible that Obama would have been a better post-Trump President than Biden--I'm certain he'd win against Trump in a landslide--but we'll never know. Certainly it is the case that sometimes it is the opportunities you have--or what the country is ready for--that makes for the success of a presidency, along with a giant gob of good luck. No Drama Obama, No Cryin' Biden.
- trebligdivad 3y agoIt feels like an easy law to get through 'Would your state like more factories and jobs?' Not many are going to argue.
- foobarian 3y agoIt's insane to me that neither side can come up with a viable candidate that is not an (or nearly an) octogenarian. Do talented individuals just not want the job?
- sarchertech 3y agoA viable candidate in the general election who can also win primaries is a bit of a unicorn.
- nostromo 3y ago> Do talented individuals just not want the job? Correct. It's a job where you get very little done, you're constantly cutting ribbons and going to boring galas to fundraise, your life is put under a microscope, and the other side will investigate you and your family and maybe even try to throw you in jail. Hard pass. No sane person wants the job.
- HDThoreaun 3y agoOld people vote. They vote for old people. Young people don't vote. Fully half of Bidens primary votes were from 65+, that was enough for him to win.
- hellojesus 3y agoHonestly, would you? The pure background someone needs to have to not fall subject to media outings is hard to achieve. Any folks with something to hide become instant blackmail targets of both the public and private sector. One almost needs to destroy their life to get the job, and even then the chances seem to be so low that you'd more likely end up with a destroyed life and not a political office.
- Guvante 3y agoDemocrats had quite a few viable candidates last election cycle. Trump gets over a third of the GOP vote by just lying and so opposition to him as hard as you can't call him out on his lies which makes defeating him impossible, you can't beat the make believe land where everything is possible. Biden will likely be the nominee as typically the incumbent gets first dibs per tradition. Technically he needs to win the primary but at minimum the average person needs to be worse off in 2024 than they were in 2020. Tha might be the case due to inflation and GOP court decisions. But then that leaves the bigger hurdle, who is best to beat Trump the candidate who already did or someone else. It doesn't matter what the real answer is it matters what people feel.
- s3p 3y agoNo, aside from massive deregulation and constant scandal. The Democrats managed to pull off some of the most cunning maneuvers in political history to get their agenda passed. I think Biden's admin learned from the failures of the Obama years, when they had near-supermajorities and tried too hard to get bipartisan support. Plus, they managed to do all of their 2020-22 bidding with 50 seats in the Senate. absolutely mind boggling.
- riffraff 3y agoThe Affordable Care Act ("Obamacare") seems to have been a pretty significant development.
- 0xffff2 3y agoNot of the previous administration though. That was two administrations ago.
- riffraff 3y agoOh somehow I read it as administrationS, since I recalled a JOBS Act from Obama too.
- giraffe_lady 3y agobruh that was fourteen years ago.
- senkora 3y agoIt’s at the point for me, where I assume that any years where the Republicans control government will be years where nothing happens. The Republican party runs on several broadly unpopular or unwise policy platforms (anti-abortion, anti-weed, anti-welfare, anti-healthcare, anti-immigration, anti-science) and is hesitant to actually implement any of them for fear of igniting opposition. Recently they’ve taken the side-channel of stuffing the courts and then legislating from the bench, since judicial appointees are immune to voter pressure. Time will tell how this all plays out for the Republican party. In the short-term, it causes tremendous damage to our institutions. In the long-term, my best guess is that the current Republican platform will collapse within 10-20 years as the current leadership ages out, and there will be a phase change where the Republican platform recrystallizes around a more modern set of conservative values that appeals more to younger voters. The party itself will likely survive because the two-party system is too stable.
- jimbob45 3y agoSo soon have we forgotten about 2006-2008 and 2018-2020? The most difficult part about all this is that no one on Capitol Hill was talking about bringing manufacturing back to the US before Trump and he was laughed at by every Democrat in Congress for wanting to do so. Then, suddenly, once they gain power, the Democrats want to bring back manufacturing.
- mcculley 3y agoI don't remember Trump pushing any kind of new manufacturing. He was pandering to existing domestic manufacturers with the dumb tariffs.
- mgkimsal 3y agoOh, he talked about it, a lot, but the only effort I ever noticed was, as you say, tariffs. Tariffs seems punitive, and when there's no other option to purchase, you import and pay the tariff anyway. The Biden push for requiring federal purchases to have more 'made in USA' components seems a combination of stupidly simple, long overdue, and easy to understand. Govt requiring more stuff made in the US - and giving some tax cuts to help spur it - seems like it's a basic way to ignite manufacturing stateside.
- rossdavidh 3y agoWell they did put tariffs on imported solar panels, which was intended to (and to some degree did in fact) encourage local production, but there was a lot of opposition. There's a saying: "Only Nixon could go to China", from the fact that only a president renowned for vehement anti-communism could open relations with communist China. The Democrats, at least since Bill Clinton's administration, have been very pro-free trade, after 2016 the Republicans were ready to do this sort of thing, but the Democrats were still pro-globalization. It's because the Democrats were the second party to swing against the idea that all trade is good no matter what the country or industry, that they were able to get stuff passed better. It should also be said that covid closing of borders, post-covid supply chain problems, and Russia's invasion of Ukraine all swayed opinions as well.
- westurner 3y agoDid the solar industry ask for such trade protectionism instead of free trade? Are industries with tariff subsidies competitive at international price points? Given domestic subsidy, will they be efficient enough to compete in international markets? How do non- free-trade, non- fair-trade agreements affect other trade agreements? Trade Protectionism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protectionism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protectionism
- rossdavidh 3y agoYeah, I am a protectionist, for sure. Especially for industries like power generation or semiconductors that impact many other industries, and especially if the nation is in danger of losing that industry entirely, such that the skills necessary to compete in it in the future can be lost.
- westurner 3y agoIs it ever shown that the net effect of subsidy is preferable to competing at international prices? "Can’t build a decent car, can’t make a TV set or a VCR worth a f, got no steel industry left, can’t educate our young people, can’t get health care to our old people, but we can [... war euphemism]" -- George Carlin (1992) Have subsidies saved comparably inefficient [domestic manufacturing] markets, or have trade protectionist subsidies resulted in net unintended consequences when the externalities of "all you peoples' special deals" are accounted for? Are information services and financial services a viable strategy for long-term growth in GDP?
- rayiner 3y agoTrump’s Treasury Secretary was the architect of the CARES Act. Also, Operation Warp Speed. Ending TPP, which was something HN really wanted until Trump was behind it. Raising tariffs. Several border control initiatives that Biden maintained. Signing the deal to withdraw troops from Afghanistan.
- Guvante 3y agoTPP was not loved from the beginning. When it was first listed here it was articles saying expanding US's Copyright laws to other countries was a bad idea...
- nimbius 3y agoas an American its tempting to see this as legislation passed in the service of a progressive advancement of scientific need. This is more of a last-ditch effort to keep up with the joneses for the sake of natinal security, and so it was a pretty easy bill to pass. Of the top 3 battery or solar producing countries, the US isnt one of them. Longi, Chinas flagship battery company, has been doing this for 23 years while the US is just now getting around to starting a domestic plant to compete. Frankly i dont imagine it will be competitive at all, as it would also be competing with other decades old players in Japan and Korea. 15 years ago it would have made sense to buy up one of these competitive players but that time has passed, and the cannibalistic nature of outsourcing in neoliberal capitalism means a domestic industry is seen as a liability, not a strength. heck, owning any means of production instead of a brand is as well so its no surprise Ford's just kicking this one over to China to solve. tl;dr the climate bill is about national security, not climate. edit: not sure why im getting downvoted but honestly this is the 2023 equivalent of the space race. the US is #2 in renewable energy generation behind a communist nation set to overtake it in the next decade on practically all fronts. Batteries and solar are the capital of the renewable economy and the US has basically ignored or avoided it for two decades at their peril.
- Guvante 3y agoNational Security tends to get GOP votes yet those bills got zero.
- jonnycomputer 3y agoIt wasn't an easy bill to pass. It is a climate bill. It is also about re-industrializing America, decoupling from China, securing supply chains, and national security. All of those things.
- Ericson2314 3y agoNope, between LBJ and COVID, the federal government was pretty lame and didn't do anything interesting. End of a shitty era.
- pers0n 3y agoFamily leave act, probably the last worker right we got
- RupertEisenhart 3y agoI hope the good news keeps coming, and very looking forward to whatever new tech is going to come of this. I'm most excited by people such as Terraform Industries and others who I've heard talk about direct synthesis from atmospheric carbon. Though I just looked them up here and there seems to have been surprisingly little traction: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30202155 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30202155
- seatac76 3y agoRemarkable how many of these are on the East Coast, particularly the southern states.
- shallowbay 3y agoyeah there is a good in-depth piece on it via the same site: https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/clean-energy-manufacturing/the-south-is-building-the-most-vibrant-ev-and-battery-hub-in-the-us https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/clean-energy-manufactur...
- Ericson2314 3y agoIt's basically all in Red states. The irony...
- jonnycomputer 3y agoYes, part of that is by design: its not a "blue state" bill--that's Trumpian thinking. It's an American bill. But the other part, is well, because southern states have fewer regulations getting in the way of building things. For my part, I'm happy enough with it. Get those states invested in green tech, and they'll defend their industries.
- Ericson2314 3y agoYes me too. Not an accidental irony, but a very shrewd one about attacking the root cause of resentment that stems from regional variations in development.
- TheCoelacanth 3y agoAlso cheaper labor is a big draw.
- zelias 3y agoWhat tickers are we buying to get in on the American manufacturing renaissance?
- RobRivera 3y agowaffles, fresh tasty waffles
- numbers_guy 3y agoSeeing the US economy _just_doing_things_ is a thing of wonder. Even European companies prefer to setup shop there instead of having to deal with all the nonsense and bullshit in the old continent. Making me really jealous, not gonna lie.
- jonnycomputer 3y agoWell .. we still have a regulations problem. Its damn hard to build. The number of solar and wind projects just sitting in the pipeline waiting for approval is mindblowing.
- twoodfin 3y agoAs opposed to, like, iPhones, Google, the Marvel Cinematic Universe & Covid vaccines?
- bitsage 3y agoThe IRA is really just accelerating a trend rather than inducing it. The South had already became our hub for EV manufacturing investment due to business friendly laws. Even if Europe attempts the same subsidies, there won’t be the same enabling environment the South has which will likely lead to any initiatives falling flat.
- jokoon 3y agoDoes it also concern nuclear energy? Because if it doesn't, I doubt it will really matter in the long term. Renewables are great to remove coal/gaz electricity, but at some point, energy must be stored, and apparently there is not enough lithium on earth to store renewable electricity. So I would say it really allows US to offset coal/gaz, but nuclear is still the best solution to entirely remove coal.
- darknavi 3y ago> apparently there is not enough lithium on earth to store renewable electricity Any source for that? Also what quantity of power are we talking? I am all for nuclear though.
- TinyRick 3y agoI'm not the OP, but Simon Michaux (working with the Geological Survey of Finland) is one person I follow who is doing good research in this field. I would recommend his paper "Assessment of the Extra Capacity Required of Alternative Energy Electrical Power Systems to Completely Replace Fossil Fuels" as an introduction to some of the estimates of rare earth materials available/required for a zero-carbon transition.
- TinyRick 3y ago> but at some point, energy must be stored Green hydrogen is one option for storing excess renewable energy.
- jokoon 3y agoElectrolysis is very very inefficient.
- planet_1649c 3y agoLithium is not the only technology for storing energy at large scale. We have multiple options. I believe one strong point of lithium is the ability to respond almost instantaneously to changing demands which other technologies are still not that good at.
- rotexo 3y agoI was reflecting at lunch today on how grateful I am that we are at least trying to decarbonize. All of this activity still seems fragile to me--Trump (or a similar Republican) could win and implement Project 2025, the geopolitical situation with China could deteriorate and we find that we can't produce things domestically and economically after all, etc. And it seems there is more momentum on decarbonizing power and transportation than industry, chemicals, building and ag. Maybe a carbon tax and dividend could move things along on that front (it is interesting to contemplate the possibility of an old-style Republican winning the presidency, reading the room. and going for a cabon tax--probably a fantasy, though). And maybe this is all too little, too late. But I'm glad we are trying.