davidzaikinuk

@davidzaikin · 10 Jun 2024

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How China’s Solar Industry Is Set Up To Be the New Green OPEC - David Zaikin

I write about global business and
investing in emerging markets.

That’s right. China is preparing
to be the world’s Green OPEC. Who’s ready to challenge them on that?

As the West kicks fossil fuels to
the curb, it is turning to only two sources of energy to generate electricity:
wind and solar. Wind is still a European business, but that will change. Solar
used to be a European business. It used to also be an American one. Now it’s a
Chinese industry. Of the top 10 solar companies in the world, 8 are Chinese.
None are European (Norway’s REC Group used to be there, but it’s now owned by
ChemChina). One is American — First SolarFSLR +5.8% of Ohio. They also
manufacture in Asia, though their technology is different than most so a lot of
their supply chain is local.

“One of the biggest mistakes the
West has done on green policies to cut CO2 emissions and trying to reduce
dependence on oil and gas producing nations is that the transition to renewable
energy puts the West at the mercy of China,” says David Zaikin, an energy industry
consultant and founder of Key Elements Group in London.

The Biden Administration wants to
reduce fossil fuel use and the President has said on his campaign trail that he
was aiming to have upwards of 500 million solar panels installed nationwide.
Where will they be made?

Competing with the 8 behemoths of
China will be a tough slog. The economies of scale there are tough to beat.

Worse yet, China continues to
raise the stakes with large subsidies supporting billions of dollars of Chinese
solar industry expansion. “Beijing’s goal is global dominance of this
industry,” says Jeff Ferry, chief economist for the Coalition for a Prosperous
America (CPA) in Washington. They published a 19 page report on China and the
solar industry last week. In it, Ferry said that Chinese dominance along solar
supply chains threatens U.S. energy independence and U.S. technology leadership
in solar and other clean energy technologies. Read more---->>>>>