China has flooded the market with so many solar panels that people are using them as garden fencing - eviltoast
  • EnderLaw@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    Part of this is done to kill the US manufacturing sector.

    Edit:

    My point stands. China has been subsidizing their solar industry with massive amounts of government money for over a decade to dominate market share and keep others out. To be fair, the US punishes China by prohibiting the highest end technology from going to China. This is mirrored in various other industries as well.

    “There have been two main reasons for First Solar’s decline. Besides slowdown in Europe, the main reason is the large subsidy the government of China provides to its solar manufacturers. By some estimates, China gave $30 billion to solar manufacturers last year and now China dominates the solar industry with names like Yingli Green Energy, Suntech Power, Trina Solar and LDK Solar.”

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2011/10/25/china-almost-kills-premier-u-s-solar-company/?sh=297c47996e9d

    • taanegl@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      It’s about utelising supply and demand.

      Problem: China needs a lot of solar panels, quickly… and making many things is comparatively cheaper than producing a few things, per unit of course…

      Solution: set up the infrastructure, produce a shit ton of solar panels and sell the excess on foreign markets to make up the difference.

      You save a ton of money and give your own companies and infrastructure a chance to easily implement them. This is important, as China has had industrial smog problems in it’s manufacturing hubs.

      This is something China can do, but the USA can’t do because it’s not government cheese or soda… for some reason.

      • VirtualOdour@sh.itjust.works
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        7 months ago

        Plus the more other counties use solar and not fossil fuels the more likely we are planet won’t boil. I know people like to pretend they’re ontological evil but actualy even the ccp don’t want everyone to die

    • Tarquinn2049@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      Is it? I get that China is “the bad guy”, but does that automatically mean everything China does is intended to hurt the US? Or did they just want to help themselves? Just because the US wasn’t in a position to handle it happening, doesn’t retroactively make it an intentional attack.

      The whole point of mass producing something is to make the process more efficient, which lowers the cost. They also hurt themselves if they accidentally end up oversupplying in the process, as then the price is lowered by a higher ratio than their savings on manufacturing costs.

      • RedditWanderer@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        oye, if America does it, it’s opportunity, if anyone else does it it’s unfair attacks on America’s freedoms. Everyone knows only america is allowed to take profit from capitalism, the rest is just unfair competition.

        • exocrinous@startrek.website
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          7 months ago

          Maybe America would be happier if the rest of us transitioned to communism. That way America would have all the money and all the profits in the world, and all we’d have is free food, free housing, free healthcare, free utilities, and a society where people can pursue their passions without fear of homelessness or bankruptcy.

      • shalafi@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        I’ve heard China is moving idle construction workers into solar production. LOL, they certainly don’t need to build more houses.

        • VirtualOdour@sh.itjust.works
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          7 months ago

          It’s funny how I read so much about housing crisis and climate change and everything else then China does what everyone thinks government should do and they’re the bad guy

    • exocrinous@startrek.website
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      7 months ago

      China has been subsidizing their solar industry with massive amounts of government money for over a decade to dominate market share and keep others out.

      And if the US weren’t losers, they would have subsidized the solar industry too. They made a greedy, selfish, lazy decision not to make an important investment, and now they’re paying the consequences. Maybe the US should pull themselves up by the bootstraps instead of complaining about it and asking for a handout.