Falling panel prices lead to global solar boom, except for the US

80% of the supply chain for solar is based in China[0]. As long as this is the case, it is unlikely there will be as much demand in the US for it due to new Cold War and bipartisan efforts to tariff solar panels from China

The article seems to leave this important detail out, despite talking a lot about China

0. https://www.iea.org/reports/solar-pv-global-supply-chains/ex...

EDIT: it looks like the article does mention it, I just missed it:

> The huge surfeit of production capacity in China, which produced about eight out of 10 of the world’s solar modules in 2024

When one government bet on solar power failed (Solyndra) the message from the right in the US was, "look what a waste it is for the government to invest in solar technology," instead of taking the appropriate lesson. That lesson was that we weren't spending enough backing solar companies.

China shoveled billions into developing solar manufacturing technologies, and as a result they figure out how to cheaply mass-produce solar cells. Solyndra failed because they couldn't compete against the resulting cheap solar cells.