chubbs

A number of countries have increasing EV market share with the global share over 20% this year. Link below has EV and plug-in EV market penetration for 61 countries. There's a range between countries with the US and North America a relative low penetration area. Another growing EV market is Heavy-Duty trucks, which are ramping quickly in China (2nd link), reaching a 28% market share there in Aug 25. https://robbieandrew.github.io/carsales/ https://apnews.com/article/china-truck-lng-ev-diesel-transport-70f3d612de4b45b6f954a7f557f7f741

Yea he brought up some good points: our economy and life-style is currently dependent on oil, and oil is running out. However. he's wrong that there is no alternative. Electric vehicles are out competing combustion vehicles in an increasing number of markets and getting cheaper all the time. Meanwhile the best oil reserves are increasingly depleted. Its not going to get better for oil.

Believe the table is calculating electric energy out vs fossil energy in over the powerplant lifetime; i.e., coal (or gas, oil) used to generate power is included. Fossil fuel use during operation of the wind turbine is also included. Agree that society gets an energy payback from use of coal or oil. The problem is that once burned the coal it is gone forever. In-any-case wind has a good energy payback. Here's an extensive study from Europe covering 33 different kinds of turbines. The median payback period is 6 months. Note that the energy payback for wind has to be good. Its the cheapest source of electricity in windy areas like the great plains. If it didn't pay back it wouldn't be cheap. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0196890421005100

An oil industry myth. The bigger the wind turbine the faster it pays out the energy needed to make it. Only 64 days for a 3.4 MW turbine https://pure.sruc.ac.uk/en/publications/life-cycle-analysis-of-the-embodied-carbon-emissions-from-14-wind/ https://www.vestas.com/en/sustainability/environment/energy-payback

I'm open to any non-fossil energy source, let the market decide. In the case of nuclear, the US will need to lower cost to deploy significant volume. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/10/22/climate/china-us-nuclear-energy-race.html?unlocked_article_code=1.vk8.p953.GyoqfHxUqxEK&smid=url-share

Cheap labor is only one part of the story. "China has close to 50 graduate programs that focus on either battery chemistry or the closely related subject of battery metallurgy. By contrast, only a handful of professors in the United States are working on batteries." https://www.business-standard.com/world-news/how-china-built-tech-prowess-chemistry-classes-and-research-labs-124081000019_1.html https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20251110-how-china-won-the-worlds-battery-race

"cheap labor" is an outdated stereotype. The factories producing solar/battery/ev are highly automated. China is kicking our butt in a wide range of advanced technologies. https://itif.org/publications/2025/09/23/how-china-is-outperforming-the-united-states-in-critical-technologies/

Yes, China is a good news, bad news story. China has gone from undeveloped under Chairman Mao to the dominant manufacturing country in the world. That takes energy and the main local fossil-fuel energy source is coal. In part, the developed world has outsourced their emissions to China through the import of manufactured goods. On the flip side, China has rapidly scaled non-fossil clean-energy technology. Driving costs below fossil fuels in many applications and thereby providing a clear path forward to a non-fossil future. It was a gamble on their part and it paid off big time. Now China exports of clean energy equipment provide a large boost to their economy and are reducing emissions around the world. For better or worse we have largely ceded our climate future to China. https://x.com/JessePeltan/status/1989006026520080519 https://bsky.app/profile/laurimyllyvirta.bsky.social/post/3m2jgeqa4es2z

My point was about technology and solar, not China. Let me rephrase. The problem isn't a lack of technology, its a lack of focus or desire (agreeing with Tip). Climate change isn't high enough on humanity's priority list, China included. I think the phase-out of fossil fuels is only a matter of time though. Unfortunately it won't come fast enough to avoid significant climate impacts. https://bsky.app/profile/laurimyllyvirta.bsky.social/post/3m5djg6evmc2l

I don't think the problem is technology. Solar has outperformed expectations for decades. Same for batteries. China has shown that solar can be deployed much faster than any competing energy technology. We could easily match as our solar resource is better than China's. No its the power of the incumbent, misinformation/denial, lack of vision, and geopolitics and others, that are allowing fossil-fuels to linger. https://x.com/JessePeltan/status/1988427201772245459

Yes, China's nuclear generation is increasing rapidly. They are also adding large amounts of hydro and wind. However their biggest source of their new non-fossil power is solar. The solar they are installing this year is roughly equivalent to the entire US nuclear fleet.

Preliminary data for this year, shows global CO2 emissions continue to plateau as clean energy technologies take most of the growth in global energy demand. However to solve climate change, need to see a drop in CO2 emissions, the faster the better. In other words progress on clean energy isn't fast enough as fossil incumbents resist change. This years data also shows a reversal in the CO2 growth trajectories of the two biggest emitters, US and China. China is embracing clean energy technologies while the US doubles down on fossil fuels.

Yes, there are a couple of underwater hills that pin the tip of the ice shelf in place (see chart) Per the article, the pinning points have transitioned from a stabilizing to a de-stabilizing force over the past 20 years.

New paper on the de-stabilization of the Thwaites ice shelf over the past 20 years. Video, linked below, provides a good overview of the changes to the ice shelf over the past 10 years. Other papers have projected the ice shelf's complete collapse by 2030. https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2025JF008352 https://phys.org/news/2025-11-antarctic-doomsday-glacier-ice-shelf.html 10-year video https://scx2.b-cdn.net/gfx/video/2025/cracking-the-code-of-t.mp4

This board has taught me never to underestimate the power of confirmation bias.