U.S. President Donald Trump ramped up his efforts in opposition to the U.S. clear vitality sector this week by taking intention at a giant wind farm, a transfer that consultants warn will solely widen the already evident hole between Washington and Beijing within the race for the important thing vitality industries of the long run.
Trump’s choice to abruptly cease development at Revolution Wind—a virtually accomplished large wind farm off the coast of Rhode Island—is the most recent in an avalanche of strikes meant to intestine the U.S. wind and photo voltaic trade and dismantle renewable vitality tasks championed by his predecessor. America is the world’s greatest oil producer and exporter of pure gasoline, 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 intention at a giant wind farm, a transfer that consultants warn will solely widen the already evident hole between Washington and Beijing within the race for the important thing vitality industries of the long run.
Trump’s choice to abruptly cease development at Revolution Wind—a virtually accomplished large wind farm off the coast of Rhode Island—is the most recent in an avalanche of strikes meant to intestine the U.S. wind and photo voltaic trade and dismantle renewable vitality tasks championed by his predecessor. America is the world’s greatest oil producer and exporter of pure gasoline, 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 heart of its vitality coverage and took a really transition-forward stance,” stated Kevin Ebook, the managing director of ClearView Vitality Companions, a consultancy. “The Trump administration is essentially working the playbook in reverse.”
Trump’s vitality playbook additionally stands in sharp distinction to that of China, which is the world’s greatest client 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 go away the USA on the again foot in key vitality sectors within the years to return, vitality and industrial coverage consultants stated.
“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],” stated Joshua Busby, a professor on the College of Texas at Austin who labored on the Protection Division underneath the Biden administration.
“On some stage, it’s giving up on the long run, as a result of these are going to be keystone industries that might be foundational for financial wealth of nations all over the world,” Busby stated.
By the numbers, Beijing’s dominance within the renewable and clear vitality expertise sectors is gaping. Right this moment, China instructions greater than 80 p.c of worldwide photo voltaic panel provide chains and has invested greater than $50 billion in new photovoltaic provide capability—or 10 instances as a lot as Europe, in keeping with the International Energy Agency. (Photovoltaic cells—also called solar cells—are fabricated from semiconductor materials and use sunlight to generate electricity.) In 2023, China accounted for some 65 p.c of worldwide wind capability, in keeping with Wood Mackenzie.
Beijing additionally dominates the worldwide marketplace for batteries, which underpin electrical autos (EVs) and 1000’s of military systems, together with lasers and unmanned submersibles. China produces greater than three-quarters of batteries bought globally, in keeping with the International Energy Agency, and the nation has additionally produced greater than 70 p.c of all EV batteries ever manufactured.
“At this time limit, the Chinese language facet has established a major and irreversible lead vis-à-vis their U.S. opponents,” for necessary low-carbon applied sciences akin to photo voltaic, wind, and batteries, stated Li Shuo, the director of the China Local weather Hub on the Asia Society Coverage Institute.
“The hole between the 2 international locations will solely be widened primarily based on Trump’s insurance policies,” Li added.
In recent times, China has scaled up its world 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 companies to hunt new consumers overseas.
That’s very true for energy-hungry emerging market economies, lots of that are nonetheless scrambling to satisfy surging power demand. In 2024, rising markets have been the vacation spot of 43 p.c of China’s clear tech exports, almost double their market share in 2022, in keeping with BloombergNEF.
Take Pakistan, which has been one of many greatest new markets for affordable 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 yr.
In Africa, the place greater than 600 million folks nonetheless want electrical energy entry, China’s photo voltaic exports have additionally dramatically elevated lately. Between July 2024 and July 2025, African imports of Chinese language photo voltaic panels surged by 60 percent, in keeping with an evaluation by Ember, an vitality monitoring group. The most important clients have been South Africa and Nigeria, in keeping with Ember.
Beijing’s world ambitions have additionally seen Chinese language corporations arrange store outdoors of the nation’s borders. Chinese language producers at the moment are constructing, or have already built, electrical car 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 world growth—its financial integration with some components of the world,” Li stated.
These markets aren’t at all times keen to just 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 lately and finally struck again with its personal tariffs and an anti-subsidy investigation to defend home automakers. A flood of low cost Chinese language EVs in Brazil, too, has sparked appreciable local backlash.
“Honest competitors is nice. What we don’t like is when China floods our market with massively backed electrical automobiles. And we’ve got to sort out this, we’ve got to guard our trade,” European Fee chief Ursula von der Leyen declared final yr.
The Trump administration, for its half, seems decided to ensure that different international locations “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 take care of the European Union, for instance, included the bloc’s dedication to purchase $750 billion in U.S. oil and gasoline in change for lowered tariffs.
Trump has aggressively attempted to rally different international locations to his trigger, 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 international locations that backed a world settlement to curb greenhouse gasoline emissions in worldwide delivery.
However for a lot of international locations, 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 rather more depending on renewables and EVs and batteries,” stated Ilaria Mazzocco, an skilled in industrial coverage and Chinese language local weather coverage on the Middle for Strategic and Worldwide Research.
“The dangers are that the U.S. misses out on a number of the applied sciences of the long run,” Mazzocco stated, later including: “It’s troublesome to see how the U.S. would possibly get again into the sport in a few of these applied sciences.”