not until we actually stop using fossil fuels. we are still using more fossil fuels than ever. And when/if renewables actually start eating into the fossil fuel market, then fossil fuels will get cheaper. So either we are going to burn through most of our fossil fuels regardless, or we will eventually need to take some kind of punitive actions against using them.

anyway, you'd think republicans would be on board with renewables for exactly the same reasons as china. it makes economic and national security sense if that's all you care about.

And thanks to Trump, the US is perfectly placed to be entirely left behind.

anyway, you’d think republicans would be on board with renewables for exactly the same reasons as china. it makes economic and national security sense if that’s all you care about.

Not for them, and not for the horizon they care about. They're (and the US as a whole) heavily invested in fossil fuels, so economically for them it makes the most sense to squeeze as much profit from those investments as possible.

Not only the US , Germany is also far behind

Jeff Daniels was right in Looper. “Go to china!”

Don't get my hopes up

don't worry, you can start shutting down france's nuclear generators once you run out of your own

China's electrification efforts are substantial and to be applauded and encouraged.

The problem is when you tell one sided stories, the important details get lost.

This is the most recent figure on China's total energy mix from the IEA. They have a stupid long way to go on emissions.

It sounds nice to say they installed more solar in a month that australia has ever in it's history. Let's look at the trends...

Coal is up. Way up. Why did this article lose the narrative so badly? Because it's a fluff piece, not an informed, intelligent discussion on emissions.

my dad once said that if he was in Bush's position, he would have used 9/11 to justify decoupling from Saudi oil and push for more solar and wind development

I still think about that. So many missed off-ramps to this...

Man, they're twisting the data hard to try to make China look good here. They're falling back on per capita, and cumulative to try to hide that they're the largest emitter of carbon by far, much of it is from burning coal, which they are still doing much more than any other country.

This is greenwashing, nothing more.

Except the anchor that is America will keep fossil fuels going forever.

Fund Ukraine to bomb Russian refineries. Huge win for the environment

Oh, but Germans can just buy their electricity from French nuclear plants.

If the US has tried that, SA would have tanked the dollar.

Maybe... but... remember ten years ago when there were all those articles about how "China is building train stations to no-where!" and today those same train stations are now in the center of new bustling cities? Isn't this what we'd expect to see, right at the start of a pivot to green energy?

National emissions should be approached per capita. It'd be silly to expect that Luxembourg and France should have the same total emissions

Perhaps. At the same time, we also had a better reputation then. A lot of countries were quick to jump on board when we decided who was gonna get invaded. Maybe they would have been just as eager to pull together and go green? Not that we'll ever really know, of course.

Germany is worse than average for Europe, but it's far better than America and about on par with China. Per capita emissions are a little lower than China's, but China is a bit better if you look at consumption-based emissions instead

This moron doesn't understand that green energy was a new sector where US could dominate for decades.

A lot of countries are forced to import fossil fuels as they can't produce their own so replacing that with local alternatives actually increases national security.

Do people think China went into renewable energy because suddenly Xi became a tree hugger?