The current wars in Europe and the Middle East paradoxically push the world towards non-fossil enery like few things did before. Both oil and natural gas prices have skyrocketed on global markets, and will likely rise more, as Ukraine continues to target Russian oil infrastructure, and Houtis continue to stymie Saudi oil exports.

Nothing hampers solar, wind, and batteries though; at worst it takes longer to ship the key components from China to Europe around Africa.

At least they haven't relaxed restrictions on sulfur dioxide emissions, etc.. yet. Making rain acidic again would be completely on brand for this administration.

The Gulf countries paid handsomely to get Trump in there to keep the United States as the buyer of last resort once the rest of the world goes renewable.

Problem is that installing a bunch of sick sons of bitches to do your bidding can backfire when those some morons lose a war to Iran in a matter of months.

Fossil fuel power plants are unfortunately still profitable for their owners (billionaires...). The cost of building them has mostly been written off a long time ago. None of this is about what is good for America in the long run...

I have to wonder if this is a play towards coal miners, who are part of the conservative base - and they need every vote they can get. Coal is an awful source of power, and a really big source of pollution.

Translated to American: "fuck you, I got mine"

A thought is that from 'their' perspective the potential loss of power and status on the tip top of things is to them existential. Consider a certain Senator being wheeled into the Senate to vote. Why even subject ones self to that. Because to step down is annihilation. There was another Senator in 2023 being wheeled around the same way.

So all of this is performative asserting power in order to punish anyone seen as a threat to the current system.

And it should be noted that "déluge" is more often than not used to refere to the biblical flood, not just any flood.

Because it'll create value.

Value which won't bring anything to anyone. I mean, a couple of people can be more richerer, but we and them won't have a planet to spend or enjoy these theoretical riches at the end.

So, no biggie.

Normally I would be concerned, but these days, we are well on our way to 3.5C. All this will do is cancel out progess China and Europe is making on renewals.

It is to bad these people do not care how much of a sucky life they are handing their grandchildren. Wait to see what happens when millions of desperate people living south of the 40th parallel start heading north in mass. No wall will stop that.

Après nous, le déluge!

US energy usage is flat in real terms since 2000 despite skyrocketing population growth. In per capita terms, it's plummeting.

China builds hundreds of coal plants a year while they are exempt from scrutiny.

1) The Roof Explanation

US homes are stick built. The roofs are not concrete, they are shingles. This is the single biggest bottleneck. On concrete, its super easy to add a simple steel frame, add panels and done.

Shingles have a shelf life of ~25 years. Most people buy old homes. And the roof is somewhere in the middle of its life. Its usually better to replace the roof and add solar at the same time.

The people who buy new homes have already maxed out their budget (people buy the biggest home they can afford, maxing out the downpayment) and they aren't thinking of adding solar rightaway.

2) Americans are pro fossil fuel (thanks to fossil fuel shills). Installers spend a third to half the money on door to door salesmen. This cost is absent in other countries.

3) US govts make solar unbelievably costly, by regulatory capture, tarriffs, banning panels from China. And they create perverse incentives of subsidies which make the installation costlier because it has to go through licensed installer to avail of the subsidy. The licensed installers always charge top dollar because its a captured market.

Rooftop solar in the US is incredibly expensive from most installers even as panel prices have come down and energy prices are typically low enough that the payoff time and up-front cost are seen as not worth it for many people. The US also has a lot of homes where (cheap) natural gas is used for cooking, heating, and hot water, which you'd have to continue paying for even after you installed solar panels or pay a lot of money to convert to electrical equivalents.

That said, I know a lot of people who have recently installed solar panels on their roof and it's increasingly worth it from a financial perspective. The other thing worth noting though is that while cool, rooftop solar really isn't the best approach to installing solar capacity compared to grid scale solar farms on land which also tends to be abundant in the US.

Some speculative answers based on what I know:

1. A lot of single family dwellings are occupied by renters. In this scenario, the renter has no ability to install rooftop solar, and the owner has no incentive to install rooftop solar because the renter is paying the energy bills. (The same goes for things like installing high-efficiency heat pumps etc.)

2. HOA regulations can block things like rooftop solar depending on where you live.

3. The up-front investment involved in rooftop solar can be prohibitive for many people. Things like tax incentives can help but we've been getting rid of those under the current administration, and tax incentives only go so far if your tax return is 6+ months away.

Most houses are old and many in shit condition, you'd want at least replace shingles before installing solar.

Everything becomes harder and expensive - no more standard gutter cleaning fee (200-300 bucks per average roof). For damp subclimates no more moss treatment possible.

For many houses you'd need structural engineer assessment to make sure roof can add such a load.

Many vents and outlets need to be relocated to cover large and nice area with the panels.

Dealing with contractors on standard things is such a pain already in US - expensive, many unskilled, trying to get more money out of your pocket. When they see someting expensive or non-standard their attitude changes even more.

The data that I've seen shows that the barriers to solar adoption for the average American home are high installation cost, low grid power cost, unfavorable net metering agreements for grid interconnect, and even some pushback from neighborhood committees (homeowners association aka HOA).

There are exceptions such as Hawaii where grid power is expensive and sunshine abundant, but the US is big, geographically diverse, and because of that adoption varies greatly on regional dynamics.