Essay by Eric Worrall
According to CCP mouthpiece Global Times, up to 50% of China’s solar panel output this year will be purchased by Europe, in a desperate attempt to replace Russian gas imports.
Demand for China’s solar panels soars in Europe amid energy crisis, green transformation
Europe to take 50% of China’s PV exports in 2022 amid energy crisis
By GT staff reporters Published: Oct 23, 2022 09:04 PM
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Chinese insiders said that the EU is likely to take up to 50 percent of China’s total PV exports this year.
Xu Aihua, deputy head of the Silicon Industry of China Nonferrous Metals Industry Association, told the Global Times on Sunday that the soaring demand for solar panels reflects geopolitical changes in Europe and the region’s green push.
Exports of PV modules have surged. From January to August, China’s exports reached $35.77 billion in terms of value, generating electricity of 100 gigawatts. Both exceeded the whole year of 2021, China Photovoltaic Industry Association data said.
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The numbers are reflected in the performance of domestic PV companies. For example, Tongwei Group on Friday said that its revenue in the first three quarters reached 102.084 billion yuan ($14.09 billion), a year-on-year gain of 118.6 percent.
As of the end of the third quarter, Tongwei’s global market share exceeded 25 percent, making it the world’s largest polysilicon manufacturer, according to media reports.
…
Read more: https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202210/1277756.shtml
Does anyone seriously believe $35 billion spent on solar panels will make a significant difference to Europe’s energy crisis?
If solar panels were any good for solving energy shortfalls, China would have kept the panels for themselves – China is currently suffering energy insecurity. Chinese Premier Xi Jinping understands, he recently announced he has no plans to abandon fossil fuel until renewables were capable of providing energy security.
The problem with attempting to use renewables to solve an energy security crisis is obvious, except maybe to the politicians in charge of Europe.
Solar panels don’t work at night, so massive energy storage capacity would be required to maintain warmth on cold nights. Wind also tends to die down at night.
European winter daytime solar is not much better than night time – Northern Europe especially sees very little sun in winter. Southern Europe also has prolonged periods of bad weather, and sometimes even has snow in winter.
No matter how many solar panels and wind turbines are deployed, fossil fuel backup is still required – more fossil fuel capacity than Europe seems to have access to right now.
The good news is that once the solar panels are tilted to maximise winter input they snow slips off easily.
Russian Gas is only needed because European Gas production is verboten by proclamation.
Russian gas is needed not only for heating but also to generating reliable constant electricity 24/7…which is something solar panels are incapable of without expensive massive batteries or pumped storage hydro backing them up. Not to mention the vast amount of space needed to produce meager quantities of electricity. (But I’ll mention it anyways)
I always disagree with the quote commonly attributed to Einstein. To me, that’s the definition of stupidity, not learning from your (or others) mistakes. Insanity is something else entirely.
They are mad – insane. As Einstein pointed out.
And very, very soon Europe will learn the hard way.
“Solar panels don’t work at night, so massive energy storage capacity would be required to maintain warmth on cold nights.”
No, you can burn gas at night. Or whatever.
The problem that Europe may have is that inability to get enough gas to keep up generation 24/7. They can certainly get enough gas/col to keep generating through the night. Every KWh generated by renewables is a KWh reduction in the fossil fuel needed.
Insanity or stupidity, it doesn’t matter they are loaded with both.
Oh yea! I’m sure that will help them this winter.
I make, from my phone this morn, that to be 35GW of nameplate power and thus for European conditions, thus 3.5GW average over a typical year.
That’s about 10% of UK typical demand.
It’s nothing is it, for all that money!
That’s a lot of money – totally wasted
These last years, Marine Le Pen, financed by Russian banks, so ostensibly working for Putin, defended nukes – after treating the fission tech as dangerous before.
And Macron, ostensibly opposed to Russia, insulting Russian medias (many years ago, before the recent Ukraine war), closed nukes, following François Hollande decision.
So which one is it? Which one is pro Russia?
Also, ostensibly pro Ukraine propaganda promotes the inept Russian soldiers ill from Chernobyl radiation hoax, going to more extreme radiation p*rn than not even pro Gazprom RT talking points ever went (re: Fukushima radiation and evacuations).
“If solar panels were any good for solving energy shortfalls, China would have kept the panels for themselves – China is currently suffering energy insecurity.”
A shrewd observation.
If solar had been an answer to our enery problems then our innovative ancestors would have been all over them with a rash. Same with wind. But they persisted with building powerful generators running many times more efficiently than so called free energy ever could. Why are so many contemporary western leaders and politicians apparently dead from the neck up?.
Solar does not work at night — or underwater. From Queensland’s Sunshine Coast. Geoff S
http://www.geoffstuff.com/wetfarm,jpg
We have an energy crisis due to a spike in world natural gas prices, made worse by Putin’s actions in cutting gas supplies.
Not because we are going renewable.
you will note German gas storage is at 97% capacity, when it was at 72% this time last year.
But the level of CO2 in the atmosphere doesn’t matter.
Follow the money…
I still remember when Germany was going to be the premier solar cell manufacturer in the world. Unfortunately, China showed that you needed inexpensive and reliable power 24/7 to accomplish that.
On a Sunday walk down a country lane, my son and I noticed a large house with nearly the whole roof covered in solar panels. My son commented that the owner evidently did not do his homework. By the end of the lifetime of the panels, which degrade each year, they will nowhere have covered their cost, certainly not in this part of Ireland. Sadly the politicians will not be held accountable in this life.
You are conflating two issues. I don’t believe that we have a climate emergency or that renewables will make a difference at the national level.
But they DO make a difference at the personal level. I installed panels on my SW facing roof in SE England 3 years ago. They cost me about £9K, but I have been saving about £900pa even before the energy pricehikes, so I will get payback in less than 10 years. Not only that but they increase the value of the house by a similar amount.
I have looked into getting a battery too but that does not make financial sense, even for the small 2kWh battery that would give me 75% of the max savings. That calculation may change if we start getting blackouts, but we’ve only had 1 of those in the last 4 years.
‘Dangerous delusion’: High demand for oil, gas impedes green transition, expert says
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPLgXFWH7lg
The guest on the talk show explains how the world, especially the EU has really f*****d up with its green plan.
The social cost of the Greenhouse blight effect.
Demos-cracy shivers in darkness. h/t WaPoo in trickle-down economies (i.e. single/central/minority/monopolistic) or top-down (e.g. socialist) constructs.
The transition to renewables is not meant to work it is meant to force people to accept a relentless reduction in their standard of living.
The COVID measures were unnecessary & unsuccessful, the Ukraine war is unnecessary and instigated by NATO, CO2 global warming was long ago proven false; what they all have in common is that they are lies which legitimize the relentless impoverishment of the average person.
Our elites hate us.
Fossil fuel backup will not be required should they ever finish the engineering and deploy modern Gen IV or Gen V nuclear reactors. In fact they likely wouldn’t need any renewables.
Scoundrels in charge.
(Bloomberg)
Russia Ships Record Volumes of Gas and Steelmaking Coal to China
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/russia-ships-record-volumes-gas-042902797.html
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This is how it works:
(1) Russia produces and sells actually valuable materials to China.
(2) China converts those actually valuable materials through industry and manufacturing into actual products that are sold to Europe and the U.S.
(3) European and U.S. politicians, radical environmentalists, clueless journalists and “progressives” convince voters of the existence of perpetual motion, Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny, thereby making it impossible to efficiently produce or manufacture useful goods in Europe and the U.S. thus necessitating the further creation of wealth in China and Russia along with additional transfer of wealth from Europe and the U.S. to China and Russia.
(4) Repeat until all wealth is transferred to China and Russia.