U.S. President Donald Trump ramped up his efforts in opposition to the U.S. clear vitality sector this week by taking purpose at a giant wind farm, a transfer that consultants warn will solely widen the already obvious hole between Washington and Beijing within the race for the important thing vitality industries of the longer term.
Trump’s resolution to abruptly cease development at Revolution Wind—an almost accomplished big wind farm off the coast of Rhode Island—is the newest in an avalanche of strikes meant to intestine the U.S. wind and photo voltaic business and dismantle renewable vitality tasks championed by his predecessor. The US is the world’s greatest oil producer and exporter of pure fuel, and the Trump administration has wholly embraced these fossil fuels in its bid to realize what it has called “American vitality dominance.”
U.S. President Donald Trump ramped up his efforts in opposition to the U.S. clear vitality sector this week by taking purpose at a giant wind farm, a transfer that consultants warn will solely widen the already obvious hole between Washington and Beijing within the race for the important thing vitality industries of the longer term.
Trump’s resolution to abruptly cease development at Revolution Wind—an almost accomplished big wind farm off the coast of Rhode Island—is the newest in an avalanche of strikes meant to intestine the U.S. wind and photo voltaic business and dismantle renewable vitality tasks championed by his predecessor. The US is the world’s greatest oil producer and exporter of pure fuel, and the Trump administration has wholly embraced these fossil fuels in its bid to obtain what it has called “American vitality dominance.”
“The Biden administration put local weather on the middle of its vitality coverage and took a really transition-forward stance,” mentioned Kevin E-book, the managing director of ClearView Power Companions, a consultancy. “The Trump administration is basically working the playbook in reverse.”
Trump’s vitality playbook additionally stands in sharp distinction to that of China, which is the world’s greatest shopper of coal in addition to its greatest carbon emitter. But Beijing has additionally poured immense resources into manufacturing renewable and clean energy technologies over the course of many years, permitting it to now command the worldwide marketplace for these cutting-edge systems.
Whereas Washington turns its again on renewable vitality, Beijing has solely been racing full-speed forward—driving a widening technological hole that threatens to depart america on the again foot in key vitality sectors within the years to return, vitality and industrial coverage consultants mentioned.
“The present administration has determined that they wish to hand over on the renewables race that China is main, even though many of the applied sciences have been invented right here [in the United States],” mentioned Joshua Busby, a professor on the College of Texas at Austin who labored on the Protection Division beneath the Biden administration.
“On some degree, it’s giving up on the longer term, as a result of these are going to be keystone industries that will probably be foundational for financial wealth of nations around the globe,” Busby mentioned.
By the numbers, Beijing’s dominance within the renewable and clear vitality expertise sectors is gaping. At present, China instructions greater than 80 % of world photo voltaic panel provide chains and has invested greater than $50 billion in new photovoltaic provide capability—or 10 occasions as a lot as Europe, in response to the International Energy Agency. (Photovoltaic cells—also referred to as solar cells—are product of semiconductor materials and use sunlight to generate electricity.) In 2023, China accounted for some 65 % of world wind capability, in response to Wood Mackenzie.
Beijing additionally dominates the worldwide marketplace for batteries, which underpin electrical autos (EVs) and hundreds of military systems, together with lasers and unmanned submersibles. China produces greater than three-quarters of batteries offered globally, in response to the International Energy Agency, and the nation has additionally produced greater than 70 % of all EV batteries ever manufactured.
“At this cut-off date, the Chinese language facet has established a big and irreversible lead vis-à-vis their U.S. rivals,” for vital low-carbon applied sciences similar to photo voltaic, wind, and batteries, mentioned Li Shuo, the director of the China Local weather Hub on the Asia Society Coverage Institute.
“The hole between the 2 nations will solely be widened primarily based on Trump’s insurance policies,” Li added.
Lately, China has scaled up its international exports of batteries, photo voltaic panels, and different clear vitality applied sciences as overproduction issues have resulted in decrease costs and pushed determined Chinese language corporations to hunt new patrons overseas.
That’s very true for energy-hungry emerging market economies, lots of that are nonetheless scrambling to fulfill surging power demand. In 2024, rising markets have been the vacation spot of 43 % of China’s clear tech exports, almost double their market share in 2022, in response to BloombergNEF.
Take Pakistan, which has been one of many greatest new markets for reasonable Chinese language photo voltaic panels and is now present process a solar boom. In 2024, the nation greater than doubled its photo voltaic panel imports from Beijing in only one 12 months.
In Africa, the place greater than 600 million folks nonetheless want electrical energy entry, China’s photo voltaic exports have additionally dramatically elevated in recent times. Between July 2024 and July 2025, African imports of Chinese language photo voltaic panels surged by 60 percent, in response to an evaluation by Ember, an vitality monitoring group. The largest prospects have been South Africa and Nigeria, in response to Ember.
Beijing’s international ambitions have additionally seen Chinese language firms arrange store outdoors of the nation’s borders. Chinese language producers are actually constructing, or have already built, electrical automobile and battery factories in Brazil, Hungary, Indonesia, Russia, Thailand, and Turkey.
“On the finish of the day, this may then be a part of the story of China’s international growth—its financial integration with some components of the world,” Li mentioned.
These markets aren’t at all times keen to simply accept China’s clear tech exports. One of many clearest examples is Europe, which has railed in opposition to an inflow of low-cost, Chinese language-built electric vehicles in recent times and in the end struck again with its personal tariffs and an anti-subsidy investigation to protect home automakers. A flood of low-cost Chinese language EVs in Brazil, too, has sparked appreciable local backlash.
“Truthful competitors is nice. What we don’t like is when China floods our market with massively sponsored electrical vehicles. And we now have to sort out this, we now have to guard our business,” European Fee chief Ursula von der Leyen declared final 12 months.
The Trump administration, for its half, seems decided to make it possible for different nations “drill, baby, drill” simply as a lot because it plans to, largely by wielding the threat of tariffs and different financial pressures. Trump’s current commerce cope with the European Union, for instance, included the bloc’s dedication to purchase $750 billion in U.S. oil and fuel in trade for lowered tariffs.
Trump has aggressively attempted to rally different nations to his trigger, just lately declaring in a cupboard assembly that governments are “destroying themselves” with wind vitality and saying that he “hope[s] they get again to fossil fuels.” In one other occasion, prime Trump officers vowed earlier in August to retaliate against any nations that backed a world settlement to curb greenhouse fuel emissions in worldwide delivery.
However for a lot of nations, renewable vitality sources could already be firmly of their vitality combine.
“From a purely aggressive standpoint … it’s not clear that the U.S. can actually forestall the remainder of the world [from] turning into way more depending on renewables and EVs and batteries,” mentioned Ilaria Mazzocco, an knowledgeable in industrial coverage and Chinese language local weather coverage on the Heart for Strategic and Worldwide Research.
“The dangers are that the U.S. misses out on a number of the applied sciences of the longer term,” Mazzocco mentioned, later including: “It’s troublesome to see how the U.S. may get again into the sport in a few of these applied sciences.”
