China is building, domestically deploying, and exporting solar, wind, batteries, and EVs so fast that the world will have no choice but to rapidly move towards net zero simply due to economics. Existing excess atmospheric carbon emissions remain to be sequestered. China deployed 277GW of solar in 2024 and is accelerating, having deployed 212GW in the first half of 2025. 1GW of solar is being deployed globally every 15 hours. Clean energy and global electrification flywheel go brrrr.
I hope so, but to do that it isn't enough to make renewables economical.
You also have to make carbon uneconomical. China's CO2 emissions have continued to increase rapidly along with renewables.
Energy is really useful and we don't have enough to fulfil demand. Unless renewables + nuclear are cheaper than carbon and not supply constrained I'd expect both sources to increase in tandem.
> Energy is really useful and we don't have enough to fulfil demand.
Enough sunlight falls on Earth in ~30 min to power humanity for a year. There is currently a capture constraint, not a supply constraint, which is currently being solved for.
> Unless renewables + nuclear are cheaper than carbon and not supply constrained I'd expect both sources to increase in tandem.
Renewables are cheaper than carbon, even when accounting for storage, unsubsidized. Some will say "what about seasonal!?" Not solved for yet; fossil gas for the gaps until solar, wind, transmission, batteries, and demand response/orchestration keep closing that gap. Nuclear will never be cheap unfortunately.
I'd love for CO2 to be peaking, but the comments on that link suggest this is a single month's measurement and that month is not representative as there was a policy cutoff for end of the month that frontloaded solar investments.
It's for 2025 up to May, and not just for a single month. Fair point about front loaded investments that may have moved the numbers. Nevertheless it's a positive sign.
CO2 emissions haven't yet peaked but global coal use has, all countries have significantly dropped their coal usage with the exception of India and China.
Per annum total global coal use has peaked and is projected to fall from this year forward.
China's use is becoming "better" (closing many small dirty old coal power stations, opening fewer but larger and more efficient less polluting new ones) while having a set long term plan to phase out coal while using it now to power a transition to renewables (wind turbines and solar panels don't make themselves yet, nor do they yet power their own production).
Ultimately cost is just one factor to prime driver like energy, energy security most overwhelming priority in energy trilemma (security, cost, sustainability)... Having dispatchahble power not tied to weather with abundance fuel source is always going to trump all other considerations for any serious grid. PRC got burn going ham on renewable a few years ago, few heat events that fucked over hydro production, increased AC demand and all of sudden you're dealing with opportunity cost of rationing factories that currently far exceeds $ differences in generation. Theoretically countries can size renewable rollout that minimum intermittent power + storage can reliabily power grid even with current tech, but that's like... multidecade megaproject.
> China is building, domestically deploying, and exporting solar, wind, batteries, and EVs so fast that the world will have no choice but to rapidly move towards net zero simply due to economics.
I can't help but read "we're going to produce and consume more than ever" and I really don't see how it ends in a good way...
Take transportation alone, 1.3 billion ICE vehicles to replace by EVs, there is nothing green about that. Not even talking about the absolutely massive mining operations we'll need to build solar and batteries. What about cement? Steel? Petrol derivate chemistry, medicine, fertilizers,...
And then what? We continue building and consuming more and more shit forever? Who believes this can be "net zero"?
Well, not forever. Global population will peak end of century (sometime between 2055-2084) and then begin to rapidly decline based on fertility rate curves. Solar PV panels can be recycled 100% today, trivially, as can lithium and sodium batteries (these materials are abundant in the Earth's crust, but only so much will be needed to establish a circular supply lifecycle loop). I suppose we can argue about the scale of mining operations. Certainly, low carbon powered mass transit whenever possible vs light vehicles and aircraft. This is Africa and India's opportunity to "do better" based on what China has accomplished (having had the chance to ride their high speed rail and ride in their autonomous vehicles) with regards to urban planning, civil engineering, and infrastructure investment, being the last parts of the world that will develop.
50%+ of the world population is low to low middle income, and they're all going to want to increase emission by 4x for parity high income life styles. Realistically 8x since developing = catching up on infra build out, i.e. extremely emissions intensive fuckton of steel and concrete. IIRC 50% more than current consumption by 2050, i.e. consuming much more is basically locked in and that's based on presumption that developing countries are fucking inept and slow rolling development because they don't have a system to do a PRC modernization push otherwise we'd be looking at 200/300/400% increases in steel and concrete. Net zero is pipe dream, it's not going to happen. We can try to make the transition greener, but it's not going to be green. Ultimately, enviroment pilled brains need to remember, development/poverty reduction is going to be a net good that benefits far more people than climate change will fuck over / displace.
Incorrect; energy dependence on a nuclear power with a general desire to displace existing hegemons isn't a wise or tenable policy.
If you care about America using carbon-light power you should throw your weight behind nuclear, geothermal, and some wind/solar/battery manufactured domestically, by allies, or within our sphere of influence.
The United States had a chance to lead, they tried to build domestically (Inflation Reduction Act), and it was sabotaged by governance choices. Someone else has demonstrated their ability to execute and deliver. Elections have consequences. Better luck next time.
Cool, I do, and I care more about her than about carbon because I and my people live here. So I will oppose any policy that cedes leadership or hegemony. See you at the ballot box, I guess.
So how's that going? Your unreliable leader is dissolving alliances left and right and tries to bully countries into submission. Faced with that, they'd rather deal with other assholes who are, although assholes, at least keep their promises. Leadership, hegemony, hah, how deluded do you want to get...
https://ember-energy.org/data/china-cleantech-exports-data-e...
https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/china-energy-transi...
https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/china-is-quietly-saving-the-wo...
https://foreignpolicy.com/2025/08/21/china-clean-renewable-e...