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Comment by vablings | Hacker News Reader

I have made this argument several times that capitalism literally solves the issue of solar panels if the market allows arbitrage and true dynamic pricing.

Good to see now a working example that capitalism is an excellent system of rewarding those who solve inefficiencies in markets

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Solar panels were made in China. The reason that solar panels are so cheap there is that the state has bankrolled these companies to produce them at a massive scale.

Good for them. They really can’t win: if they don’t modernize they get blamed for high CO2 emissions and used as an excuse for the US to shirk its responsibilities to the Paris Agreements. If they do, and help the rest of the world at the same time, they get accused of dumping.

If only everyone else had the guts to follow their lead.

Wasn't accusing them of dumping. I was saying that it wasn't capitalism that fixed this issue.

I just want to point out that this isn't something that is uncommon in capitalist societies (see CHIPS act) and the price delta is somewhere between 150%-200% more expensive for a western manufactured product which gets heavily diluted over the 25-year curve.

I think you misunderstood the point I was making. Solar panels are incredibly cheap and provide a large swathe of power, the problem being that it depresses daytime prices meaning there is significantly less capacity at nighttime causing an increase in pricing, this delta in the form of time delayed arbitrage is the juice to be squeezed for home battery technology, The free energy market is what allowed this to happen and that is a capitalist function

The broader point here is that solar is here, it's very very cheap and the raw materials and manufactring processes are actually incredibly simple.

This only makes sense way downstream of massive subsidies, not the least of which is China determining at a federal level that they wanted to produce an obscene amount of solar panels.

And now it's complicated because the ideal move would just be to say "thank you" and buy all the cheap panels and batteries, but that hollows out your own industry.

Speaking of subsidies it is often the case that fossil fuel industries are very heavily subsidised, yet they are still losing out to solar panels.

There is very little in the way of domestic manufacturing of solar panels at least in the USA.

There were significant state subsidies and regulation changes to encourage home battery installation. That's a lot less "free trade" driven than the GP post indicates. Is that still capitalism being an excellent system?

Subsidy in capitalism is not contrary to capitalism and free market, quite the opposite infact. Often capitalism has the tendency to stay locked in on a current sub-optimal path due to risk profiles of various transitions and regulations, the point of government in this case is to allow that state transition to have a more appealing risk profile to allow furtherance of X goal.

There are several thousands of examples of everyday technology that has been driven into your hands directly as of a result of government spending and investment that has markedly made your life more livable and enjoyable

When is true dynamic pricing being prevented??

a $3,000 battery subsidy is the opposite of free trade.

No it isn't. The 3k goes to the consumer to buy the battery from their preferred/cheapest global supplier, not to Australian manufacturing.

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