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China electricity production from 2000-2020 overlaid on US electricity production from 1950-2023. Seems like it is definitely possible to achieve a steeper slop

China electricity production from 2000-2020 overlaid on US electricity production from 1950-2023. Seems like it is definitely possible to achieve a steeper slope. https://zlnp.net/serve/us_vs_china-electricity_production.png https://zlnp.net/serve/us_vs_china-electricity_production.pn...

roenxi 2y ago
Yes. But that sort of growth wasn't politically feasible in the US. The most economic options at the time were coal and nuclear, both of which were strictly off the table.
- silverquiet 2y ago
  I always think of it like this - what job would you rather have your kid get into, working in construction, or as a lawyer arguing for or against that construction? One job is both a lot cushier and happens to pay multiples better.
  - User23 2y ago
    Ah yes, the “diversified services oriented economy” scores another win.
  - foobarbecue 2y ago
    Fascinating. I often look at our society and wonder why we set it up so that most people are wasting their lives doing unnecessary "bullshit jobs" (sensu Graeber) instead of setting it up so that people can spend their time on meaningful non-work. Your comment gives me a new hypothesis: because people think like that.
    - FredPret 2y ago
      Supply and demand should correct the situation if we get over-lawyered. Looking at university enrollment rates, it seems that’s exactly what’s happening.
      - lotsofpulp 2y ago
        Supply and demand is a concept for when there are buyers and sellers. There is no short term feedback loop for a legal system that gets too bureaucratic/corrupt. That ends up only being visible on a years and decades long scale when the whole country becomes less productive and less trustworthy on the global scale and is outcompeted by other nations with less bureaucracy/corruption. For example, one might say excess lawyers (either as lawyers or political figures or judges) contribute to excessive liability, which then results in everyone spending extra to cover their ass or simply not taking risks, the consequences of which are only visible in the long term. But supply and demand won’t fix this issue in a sufficiently timely manner.
    - silverquiet 2y ago
      To be clear, this is not exactly what I think (my thoughts tend to be a bit less mainstream I believe), but it is what seems apparent to me. I’ve not met a lot of people who dream of their children doing menial labor.
  - sumeno 2y ago
    Median law school grad makes 5 figures with 6 figures of debt. The lawyers making bank are also working absurd hours to get to that point. Construction makes less but without all that debt probably not THAT much less, but the job takes a huge toll on the body. I would not recommend law or construction to my kid
- zbrozek 2y ago
  That's sort of my unsaid point - we've made it politically infeasible to build much of anything in the United States. You can see it in everything from a local planning meeting when someone tries to build a fence or house all the way up to transmission lines and power plants. The process itself kills a huge amount of progress by making it a bad use of lifespan to pursue it.
  - pylua 2y ago
    Arguably, that is a feature. I’m not against coal or nuclear, However, if progress, as it is defined here, includes disregarding the opinion of the minority or does not respect the rules then maybe it is not real progress. Progress must include taking into account the constraints of the rules we have set in place. We are basically making progress, albeit slowly, in trying to solve the issue in a way that is consistent with law and precedent. This includes a lot of debate and rejection, but over a long enough period of time it can be solved.
    - kibwen 2y ago
      > I’m not against coal or nuclear It's $CURRENT_YEAR, we can safely be against coal.
    - vegetablepotpie 2y ago
      To fight climate change, the US needs renewable energy, and fast. Ironically, we already have it, the US has 947 GW of renewable generation capacity that is not hooked up to the grid [1]. To put that number into perspective, the US currently has 1.16 TW of generation capacity in total [2]. We could nearly double our generation capacity today if we could just hook it up. Unfortunately it takes 10 years to build new transmission lines in the US [3]. Changes are going to need to be made to the process, which may include giving more responsibility and agency to FERC to oversee the review process. [1] https://emp.lbl.gov/utility-scale-solar https://emp.lbl.gov/utility-scale-solar [2] https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/electricity/electricity-in-the-us-generation-capacity-and-sales.php https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/electricity/electricity-... [3] https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2022/10/permitting-americas-next-big-climate-conundrum/ https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2022/10/permitting-americ...
- tomatotomato37 2y ago
  There is also hydroelectric, which the US can't grow in anymore because it already tapped all the river locations it could use when the US was industrializing, but China can because it is only fairly recently China had industrialized enough to start tapping its own rivers. Of course, once all the river sites in China are exploited, China's growth in that sector is completely done, so it's almost like a temporary boost more so than a long-term growth factor, for lack of better words.
- newhotelowner 2y ago
  USA became a largest oil producing nation within 15 years. Wind and solar is an option
- Retric 2y ago
  It’s more that growth just isn’t needed in the US. Nobody is plugging in an EV and not getting power and our population is only growing at ~0.5% per year. Even with EV’s US electric demand is flat since 2010 while China’s grew 8% in 2023! When things are changing 10+x as fast you need to move faster. https://www.statista.com/statistics/188521/total-us-electricity-net-generation/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/188521/total-us-electric...
  - HPsquared 2y ago
    If the price was lower, people would use more. Supply and demand aren't fixed.
    - Retric 2y ago
      A little, but I’m not going to heat my house to 90f in the winter or install floodlights simply because electricity is cheaper. States have wildly different prices without changing climate and urban normalized consumption that much. https://www.electricchoice.com/electricity-prices-by-state/ https://www.electricchoice.com/electricity-prices-by-state/ Oregon and Washington have nearly identical per capita electricity usage despite a 10% cost difference etc.
      - zbrozek 2y ago
        In much of California, electricity prices are high enough that you shouldn't get an EV and you shouldn't electrify your space or water heating because gasoline and natural gas are cheaper per delivered utility. When my marginal cost of electricity dropped to zero at my single-family home thanks to solar+battery, I dramatically increased my consumption. I got an electric car, two electric laundry units, an induction cooktop, an electric oven, a heat pump pool heater, and am about to switch over to electric space and water heating. I'm using about 4x more electric energy than I did prior to having solar panels, and it's definitely going to keep going up. Note that the winter off-peak rate in PG&E territory is $0.49541 per kilowatt*hour. That's ludicrously high. The summer on-peak rate is $0.62647. See the tariff sheet: https://www.pge.com/tariffs/assets/pdf/tariffbook/ELEC_SCHEDS_E-TOU-C.pdf https://www.pge.com/tariffs/assets/pdf/tariffbook/ELEC_SCHED... And in case anybody doesn't believe me, check out a Bolt vs an ICE vehicle at current electricity and gasoline costs (about $5/gallon in my area): https://zlnp.net/serve/bolt-vs-ice.png https://zlnp.net/serve/bolt-vs-ice.png Any ICE that gets about 35 MPG or better will beat a grid-powered Bolt. So if you don't self-generate in northern CA, get yourself something like a Prius.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
melling 2y ago
China did it with coal, which is highly polluting and emits a lot of greenhouse gas. We have another goal in the world of having Net Zero Greenhouse emissions by 2050/2060
- maxglute 2y ago
  New US energy production since 2000s heavily leans fossil/shale (crude + lng), both ~doubled in past 20 years. Issue is, much of new extracted fossil energy is being exported. US generating more dirty energy than ever, it's just being consumed abroad, not in US. https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/images/2021.05.06/chart2.svg https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/images/2021.05.06/chart2.s... Recent studies on LNG infra leaks show it's potentially no better to much worse than coal in terms of emissions. Meanwhile at least PRC is replacing old dirty coal plants with cleaner coal plants. And they stopped exporting coal overcapacity - stopped building coal plants abroad, vs US propping up global crude/lng use. And will continue to until shale fields run dry. TLDR is US produces a lot excess dirty energy already, it simply prioritizing exporting that dirty energy due to geopolitics than consuming it domestically.
- zbrozek 2y ago
  That's beside the point and misses it entirely. Solar and wind are the cheapest thing to build right now, so it's not going to be coal going forward. We have an absolutely enormous interconnection queue because it's impossible to build infrastructure. We'd be much further along with the energy transition if we could stop tripping over ourselves and get on with erecting pylons and wires.
  - melling 2y ago
    Yeah people have been saying wind and solar are cheaper for a few years now. Texas has gotten to about 30% wind power on a good day. However, the world is still building a significant amount of coal so I’m not sure why this is. We still need better batteries?
    - zbrozek 2y ago

roenxi 2y ago

Yes. But that sort of growth wasn't politically feasible in the US. The most economic options at the time were coal and nuclear, both of which were strictly off the table.

silverquiet 2y ago
I always think of it like this - what job would you rather have your kid get into, working in construction, or as a lawyer arguing for or against that construction? One job is both a lot cushier and happens to pay multiples better.
- User23 2y ago
  Ah yes, the “diversified services oriented economy” scores another win.
- foobarbecue 2y ago
  Fascinating. I often look at our society and wonder why we set it up so that most people are wasting their lives doing unnecessary "bullshit jobs" (sensu Graeber) instead of setting it up so that people can spend their time on meaningful non-work. Your comment gives me a new hypothesis: because people think like that.
  - FredPret 2y ago
    Supply and demand should correct the situation if we get over-lawyered. Looking at university enrollment rates, it seems that’s exactly what’s happening.
    - lotsofpulp 2y ago
      Supply and demand is a concept for when there are buyers and sellers. There is no short term feedback loop for a legal system that gets too bureaucratic/corrupt. That ends up only being visible on a years and decades long scale when the whole country becomes less productive and less trustworthy on the global scale and is outcompeted by other nations with less bureaucracy/corruption. For example, one might say excess lawyers (either as lawyers or political figures or judges) contribute to excessive liability, which then results in everyone spending extra to cover their ass or simply not taking risks, the consequences of which are only visible in the long term. But supply and demand won’t fix this issue in a sufficiently timely manner.
  - silverquiet 2y ago
    To be clear, this is not exactly what I think (my thoughts tend to be a bit less mainstream I believe), but it is what seems apparent to me. I’ve not met a lot of people who dream of their children doing menial labor.
- sumeno 2y ago
  Median law school grad makes 5 figures with 6 figures of debt. The lawyers making bank are also working absurd hours to get to that point. Construction makes less but without all that debt probably not THAT much less, but the job takes a huge toll on the body. I would not recommend law or construction to my kid
zbrozek 2y ago
That's sort of my unsaid point - we've made it politically infeasible to build much of anything in the United States. You can see it in everything from a local planning meeting when someone tries to build a fence or house all the way up to transmission lines and power plants. The process itself kills a huge amount of progress by making it a bad use of lifespan to pursue it.
- pylua 2y ago
  Arguably, that is a feature. I’m not against coal or nuclear, However, if progress, as it is defined here, includes disregarding the opinion of the minority or does not respect the rules then maybe it is not real progress. Progress must include taking into account the constraints of the rules we have set in place. We are basically making progress, albeit slowly, in trying to solve the issue in a way that is consistent with law and precedent. This includes a lot of debate and rejection, but over a long enough period of time it can be solved.
  - kibwen 2y ago
    > I’m not against coal or nuclear It's $CURRENT_YEAR, we can safely be against coal.
  - vegetablepotpie 2y ago
    To fight climate change, the US needs renewable energy, and fast. Ironically, we already have it, the US has 947 GW of renewable generation capacity that is not hooked up to the grid [1]. To put that number into perspective, the US currently has 1.16 TW of generation capacity in total [2]. We could nearly double our generation capacity today if we could just hook it up. Unfortunately it takes 10 years to build new transmission lines in the US [3]. Changes are going to need to be made to the process, which may include giving more responsibility and agency to FERC to oversee the review process. [1] https://emp.lbl.gov/utility-scale-solar https://emp.lbl.gov/utility-scale-solar [2] https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/electricity/electricity-in-the-us-generation-capacity-and-sales.php https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/electricity/electricity-... [3] https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2022/10/permitting-americas-next-big-climate-conundrum/ https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2022/10/permitting-americ...
tomatotomato37 2y ago
There is also hydroelectric, which the US can't grow in anymore because it already tapped all the river locations it could use when the US was industrializing, but China can because it is only fairly recently China had industrialized enough to start tapping its own rivers. Of course, once all the river sites in China are exploited, China's growth in that sector is completely done, so it's almost like a temporary boost more so than a long-term growth factor, for lack of better words.
newhotelowner 2y ago
USA became a largest oil producing nation within 15 years. Wind and solar is an option
Retric 2y ago
It’s more that growth just isn’t needed in the US. Nobody is plugging in an EV and not getting power and our population is only growing at ~0.5% per year. Even with EV’s US electric demand is flat since 2010 while China’s grew 8% in 2023! When things are changing 10+x as fast you need to move faster. https://www.statista.com/statistics/188521/total-us-electricity-net-generation/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/188521/total-us-electric...
- HPsquared 2y ago
  If the price was lower, people would use more. Supply and demand aren't fixed.
  - Retric 2y ago
    A little, but I’m not going to heat my house to 90f in the winter or install floodlights simply because electricity is cheaper. States have wildly different prices without changing climate and urban normalized consumption that much. https://www.electricchoice.com/electricity-prices-by-state/ https://www.electricchoice.com/electricity-prices-by-state/ Oregon and Washington have nearly identical per capita electricity usage despite a 10% cost difference etc.
    - zbrozek 2y ago
      In much of California, electricity prices are high enough that you shouldn't get an EV and you shouldn't electrify your space or water heating because gasoline and natural gas are cheaper per delivered utility. When my marginal cost of electricity dropped to zero at my single-family home thanks to solar+battery, I dramatically increased my consumption. I got an electric car, two electric laundry units, an induction cooktop, an electric oven, a heat pump pool heater, and am about to switch over to electric space and water heating. I'm using about 4x more electric energy than I did prior to having solar panels, and it's definitely going to keep going up. Note that the winter off-peak rate in PG&E territory is $0.49541 per kilowatt*hour. That's ludicrously high. The summer on-peak rate is $0.62647. See the tariff sheet: https://www.pge.com/tariffs/assets/pdf/tariffbook/ELEC_SCHEDS_E-TOU-C.pdf https://www.pge.com/tariffs/assets/pdf/tariffbook/ELEC_SCHED... And in case anybody doesn't believe me, check out a Bolt vs an ICE vehicle at current electricity and gasoline costs (about $5/gallon in my area): https://zlnp.net/serve/bolt-vs-ice.png https://zlnp.net/serve/bolt-vs-ice.png Any ICE that gets about 35 MPG or better will beat a grid-powered Bolt. So if you don't self-generate in northern CA, get yourself something like a Prius.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

melling 2y ago

China did it with coal, which is highly polluting and emits a lot of greenhouse gas. We have another goal in the world of having Net Zero Greenhouse emissions by 2050/2060

maxglute 2y ago
New US energy production since 2000s heavily leans fossil/shale (crude + lng), both ~doubled in past 20 years. Issue is, much of new extracted fossil energy is being exported. US generating more dirty energy than ever, it's just being consumed abroad, not in US. https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/images/2021.05.06/chart2.svg https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/images/2021.05.06/chart2.s... Recent studies on LNG infra leaks show it's potentially no better to much worse than coal in terms of emissions. Meanwhile at least PRC is replacing old dirty coal plants with cleaner coal plants. And they stopped exporting coal overcapacity - stopped building coal plants abroad, vs US propping up global crude/lng use. And will continue to until shale fields run dry. TLDR is US produces a lot excess dirty energy already, it simply prioritizing exporting that dirty energy due to geopolitics than consuming it domestically.
zbrozek 2y ago
That's beside the point and misses it entirely. Solar and wind are the cheapest thing to build right now, so it's not going to be coal going forward. We have an absolutely enormous interconnection queue because it's impossible to build infrastructure. We'd be much further along with the energy transition if we could stop tripping over ourselves and get on with erecting pylons and wires.
- melling 2y ago
  Yeah people have been saying wind and solar are cheaper for a few years now. Texas has gotten to about 30% wind power on a good day. However, the world is still building a significant amount of coal so I’m not sure why this is. We still need better batteries?
  - zbrozek 2y ago