"China’s turn to green energy dwarfs any other country’s, as a parade of astonishing numbers attests. In 2024 alone it installed new solar and wind generation equivalent to roughly 100 nuclear power plants, and the pace quickened early this year. Dozens of new, ultrahigh-voltage power lines are marching thousands of kilometers from western deserts where much of the solar energy is generated to the eastern cities where it is used. Hungrily awaiting the bounty of clean energy are millions of electric cars and a sprawling network of high-speed electric trains that can zip between cities 1000 kilometers apart in a morning."
The article also mentions that China produced more than 12 million electric cars in 2024, 70% of global production. "China now dominates global production of renewable energy technologies. It makes 80% of the world’s solar cells, 70% of its wind turbines, and 70% of its lithium batteries, at prices no competitor can match."
You can compare the early US with present china. Both countries had/have great potential for economic growth, and everything went well for its citizens as long as the pie got bigger. The interests of the elites and the working class were aligned by that. Once the interests of these two groups diverge, democracies become relevant again. That's why the tech oligarchs are so afraid and politically engaged, to distract us with the have-nots below us.
Today, china just has the better aligning plan, while the west is struggling to keep it's democracies. IMO any reasonable trajectory for sustainability and social stability is a contradiction to western elites, who cannot think outside their status quo, while china just builds it. I really wish china well and that they dont develop such an arrogant international stance like the west.
Inside the country at least...
It's the largest western, ostensibly democratic nation that is run by some combination of occult neoreactionaries, techno-elites and pseudo-royalty all of which seem to have lost connection to immediate reality in pursuit of annexing territories, bringing about the singularity or what have you. It is ironically China who is more short termist and notably better off for it
I would actually much prefer if the US was run by people who fix potholes in the streets than something that resembles Dune's House Harkonnen
That's the exact opposite of democracy and capitalism.
They have small gas and oil reserves if I remember. Unfortunately, if they were sitting on Venezuela or Russian style reserves or oil/gas the story might be different. But unlike Europe, the Chinese can see that being beholden to foreign states to keep the lights on is asking for trouble.
They seem to have avoided the ideology the big fossil fuel companies push in the west to make fossil vs green a political/class discussion, not a rational one. Rationally it makes most sense for a nation to generate their energy needs in a way they control with wind/solar/nuclear.
[0]: "2024年，中国...石油对外依存度71.9%，同比下降0.5个百分点。" (In 2024, China's ... dependence on foreign oil was 71.9%, a year-on-year decrease of 0.5 percentage points.)(https://finance.sina.cn/2025-01-24/detail-inefzsek2941040.d....)
Are you ignorant or just deliberately ignoring the genocide of the Palestinian people with an estimated 680,000 dead (~30% of Gaza) that occurred with widespread support of almost every western democracy?
China may be an authoritarian state but I would argue their large scale human rights abuses are far tamer than what these so called western democracies have been doing for the past 2 years and the direction we're headed.
The West's post-colonial exploitation and suppression of the global south does strike me as a feature of unfettered capitalism more than the political systems "back home".
It's pretty biased to highlight only the increases in renewable energy.
https://www.science.org/content/article/global-carbon-emissi...
Also, like others have pointed out, kilowatts and kilowatt-hours are most certainly not used on grid scale projects. Mega- and giga- are the standard throughout.
A journalist is reporting on something they don't understand.
Interesting, I thought above a certain distance DC is more viable. Or are they just describing the UHV term in general, not really that particular 700km line.
> ANSI C84.1-2020 defines high voltage as 115 kV to 230 kV, extra-high voltage as 345 kV to 765 kV, and ultra-high voltage as 1,100 kV.
There's a decent high level summary on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-high-voltage_electricity...
Ember Energy: China Cleantech Exports Data Explorer - https://ember-energy.org/data/china-cleantech-exports-data-e... (updated monthly)
China’s Oil Hoarding Clouds Outlook for Slowing Demand Growth - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-12-11/china-oil... | https://archive.today/YLDHL - December 11th, 2025
> China’s oil demand growth is forecast to be 150,000 barrels a day next year, according to the median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of analysts. Energy Aspects was the most bullish, expecting daily growth at 320,000 barrels, mainly on rising petrochemical demand. Still, the prediction is a year-on-year drop.
> “It’s an irreversible path,” said Ye Lin, vice president of oil markets at consultancy Rystad Energy, which also forecasts demand growth falling in 2026. “The market is now feeling the impact of China’s fast-growing EV fleet.”
Rhodium Group: Electric Trucks and the Future of Chinese Oil Demand - https://rhg.com/research/electric-trucks-and-the-future-of-c... - July 1st, 2025
> Analysts have been discussing “peak oil” for decades. We’re hardly equipped to wade into that debate ourselves, even as Chinese demand will be a critical variable in future global oil demand. But the ongoing electrification of China’s vehicle fleet, especially in trucking, suggests long-term headwinds to diesel and gasoline demand. We estimate the total electric vehicle fleet is already displacing over 1 million barrels per day in implied oil demand—equivalent to roughly the daily oil production of Oman. That level is likely to rise by around 600,000 barrels per day over the next 12 months.
(TLDR At current electrification rates, China is destroying ~1M barrels/day of oil demand every 24 months)
HN Search: china electrostate - https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
HN Search: china renewables - https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
How are they "easily blockaded"? I thought their shipbuilding capacity exceeds that of the US, and their navy is now larger.
So overland is their best option, but Russia is huge, lacks infrastructure (no oil pipelines in the far east), and anyways, isn't always China's friend. Western China abuts some Central asian countries with oil (and Iran in the middle), but again, not so friendly, lots of mountains to get trains through, and it is still far away from East China where the oil is actually needed.
So...they have lots of coal and are really pushing into renewables and nuclear. Nuclear is the kind of thing where you can stockpile a few thousand years worth of fuel with a few ships from Australia in peacetime. And if your economy relies more on electric trains and cars, you are going to be ok if someone cuts off or restricts your oil supply.
If China can build lots of ships, it can build lots of warships. I'm skeptical the US Navy would have it that easy.
Also, as the US Navy ships trying to enforce a blockade would be getting pelted by land-based anti-ship missiles.
[1] https://i.ibb.co/0jDyB6mX/Crude-Price-Forecasts-Are-Below-Le...
That's more than 6 DeLorean Time Machines worth of power!
(~6.6 at 1.21 gigawatts per flux capacitor)
