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Comment by UltraSane | Hacker News Reader

Federal funding for solar farms will stop but private funding will continue because solar electricity is the the cheapest source right now.

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It's more than just funding. There's a lot of regulatory hurdles and desire to use federal lands that will also be killed.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/oct/10/trump-offici...

>The following month, the president said his administration would not approve solar or wind power projects. “We will not approve wind or farmer destroying Solar,” he posted on Truth Social. “The days of stupidity are over in the USA!!!”

Realisitically, solar is dead in America and China is the undisputed worlds #1 solar superpower. The US might hook up a few little projects here or there, but functionally the US is in full retreat on solar, cedeing the industry and technology to China.

The federal government doesn't have to approve solar farms built on private land. Solar is far from dead in the US and there is tons of private land solar farms can and will be built on.

Most the best land for solar farms in the west half of the US is controlled by the federal government. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/1f/Ma...

For example, there basically will not be large scale solar in Nevada, Utah, Arizona, etc under this administration. You know, some of the highest value spots.

Nevada, Utah and Arizona are all low population states with little power demand. While power can be shipped that needs power lines and other complexity. There is a lot of solar potential there, but the lack of demand means they are not highest value.

I’m not sure land is the controlling factor. Look at current fuel mix: the upper Midwest is mostly coal, with all its disadvantages. How was it possible for Iowa, South Dakota, and Kansas to choose wind?

Iowa choose wind because 20 years ago it wasn't an issue and someone put in a clause that made building wind an advantage to utilities so they tried. By the time wind became an issue elsewhere there was too much installed in Iowa for anyone to be able to claim it couldn't work and in turn those who made it political have to be quiet about it when they come to Iowa.

Texas also has a lot of wind power because it is so windy and has a huge amount of land.

Unless it gets outlawed, which I suspect is something Trump might do or attempt as part of his campaign in favour of fossil fuels and/or to own the libs/China.

I'm also not clear how cheaply the US could make its own PV in the event of arbitrary trade war (let alone hot war) between the USA and China.

(The good news there is that even in such a situation, everyone else in the world can continue to electrify with the panels, inverters, and batteries that the USA doesn't buy, but the linked article obviously isn't about that).

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