[HN Gopher] US and TotalEnergies reach 'nearly $1B' deal to end ...
___________________________________________________________________
US and TotalEnergies reach 'nearly $1B' deal to end offshore wind
projects
Author : lode
Score : 277 points
Date : 2026-03-23 17:35 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.lemonde.fr)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.lemonde.fr)
| adriand wrote:
| Fortunately, fossil fuels are a stable and geopolitically risk-
| free source of energy.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| This will not be a learned more robustly in the US until one or
| both of the only two (edit: major) gas turbine manufacturers in
| the world (GE Vernova, Siemens Energy) suffer a tail risk event
| causing their failure. Backlog for new gas turbines is ~7
| years, as of this comment. Continued production capacity is a
| function of how fragile those two companies are.
|
| _The White House's Bet on Fossil Fuels Is Already Losing_ -
| https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2025-10-28/white-...
| | https://archive.today/vpvch - October 28th, 2025
|
| _Gas-Turbine Crunch Threatens Demand Bonanza in Asia_ -
| https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2025-10-07/gas-tu...
| | https://archive.today/z4Ixw - October 7th, 2025
|
| _AI-Driven Demand for Gas Turbines Risks a New Energy Crunch_
| - https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2025-bottlenecks-gas-
| turb... | https://archive.today/b8bhn - October 1st, 2025
|
| (think in systems)
| skywal_l wrote:
| Isn't there Ansaldo Energia too?
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Yes, but their production volume is limited (imho) compared
| to the two companies I mentioned. Good callout regardless.
| I'll have a post put together to share here enumerating and
| comparing.
|
| (i track global fossil generation production capacity as a
| component of tracking the overall rate of global energy
| transition to clean energy and electrification, but some of
| my resources are simply an excel spreadsheet)
| RealityVoid wrote:
| Hah, that's super interesting. How are we looking? What
| under served areas are you seeing? Do you post anywhere
| your numbers?
| bluGill wrote:
| Both of those are big wind tubine manufactres as well.
| tadfisher wrote:
| Luckily, the wind futures market is pretty bullish for the
| foreseeable future
| ecshafer wrote:
| The US (with Canada and Mexico) is self-sufficient with fossil
| fuel energy.
| krige wrote:
| > The US (with Canada and Mexico) is self-sufficient with
| fossil fuel energy.
|
| Oh boy can't wait for the reenactment of third reich
| intervening peacefully in czechoslovakia, for their own
| safety and wellbeing of course, and not at all for the
| resources they're hoarding, the filthy hoarders.
| idle_zealot wrote:
| Sure, if we build out refining capacity for the next ten
| years. Then we're golden until we run out of the _finite
| well_ of combustible dead algae. So if you think we can
| revitalize American manufacturing and resource processing
| starting now, and you 're okay with those investments being
| worthless in a few decades, and you don't give a shit about
| rendering the planet significantly less habitable to human
| life, then yeah, we're totally self-sufficient with fossil
| fuels.
|
| Or we could, you know, pull energy out of the air and sun, a
| strategy which will be viable until our star dies.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| Alberta tar sands have hundreds of years worth of reserves.
| They're also expensive and incredibly dirty to extract and
| emit significantly more CO2 during processing than a light
| oil well will. (The tar is usually melted by heating with
| natural gas).
|
| I'm quite confident cheap renewable alternatives will make
| the tar sands inviable far before they run out.
| munk-a wrote:
| Some good news though, with the war in Iran the spiking
| oil price means that Albertan executives can ramp up
| operations and stay quite profitable! Push the price to
| 200/barrel and we'll just strip mine the entire province
| after airlifting out Calgary and Edmonton.
| mullingitover wrote:
| This assumes that there isn't profound demand destruction
| caused by the stratospheric energy prices.
|
| Fossil fuels were already an inferior energy source when
| oil was $60/barrel. Electrification has been moving fast
| and _accelerating_ , even at the pre-energy crisis
| prices.
|
| Now? Current events are likely to take fossil fuels out
| back and give 'em the Old Yeller treatment with
| surprising speed.
| munk-a wrote:
| I absolutely agree, _in market driven economies_, fossil
| fuels are slowly pricing themselves out of relevancy. The
| issue is that for some reason the US specifically
| subsidizes their usage keeping them artificially lowly
| priced.
|
| So, how many billions of newly printed debt is Trump
| willing to throw at the problem to keep those subsidies
| up so that he can be sheltered from the scary windmills?
| saidnooneever wrote:
| another option is not to shit on all countires who do have
| resources driving the prices up for everyone.
| idle_zealot wrote:
| This is an article about _paying_ private industry to
| _not_ build wind capacity.
| eecc wrote:
| I'd wager the US is self sufficient also in terms of
| renewable energies.
| jwr wrote:
| Unfortunately, we share the planet and the atmosphere with
| it.
| follie wrote:
| If the US taunts someone into a nuclear war, the rest of us
| get to live but should be investing more in cancer
| research.
| Mashimo wrote:
| But it gets traded globally. That means if the price goes up
| in Asia, it also goes up in NA.
| greeneggs wrote:
| It doesn't have to be traded globally. The US could ban oil
| and gas exports, and that would decouple local prices from
| the global market.
| Erem wrote:
| tbh I'm kind of surprised the admin hasn't enacted export
| tariffs on oil and gas already to take the pressure off
| car owners.
|
| Wouldn't do anything to the prices of imported products
| since the entire intl supply chain would be subject to
| even higher prices, but would reduce pressure at the pump
| HDThoreaun wrote:
| The US is unable to implement export controls so consuming
| less than it creates doesnt mean theres enough since
| producers will export if international prices are better
| IncreasePosts wrote:
| Ireland during the famine was self sufficient with food
| production but that didn't stop people from sending food to
| the highest bidders abroad.
| munk-a wrote:
| It's awesome the US hasn't destabilized one of those
| neighbors and alienated the other one by declaring it the
| prospective 51st state. Soft power really is America's super
| power.
| Barrin92 wrote:
| I do find the slow Sovietization of America funny, both
| mentally and economically. The year is 2050, autarky on
| energy has been established, the markets cut off, politics in
| the hands of erratic and geriatric leaders. Americans proudly
| drive 30 year old Fords the way people used to drive Ladas,
| while China exports green energy, cars and infrastructure to
| the world.
| triceratops wrote:
| It didn't look like that at the gas pump today.
| TheOtherHobbes wrote:
| They're a relatively stable and risk-free source of money for a
| certain kind of politician.
|
| The energy part is incidental.
| tsunamifury wrote:
| Is this the biggest Woosh of the year?
| phil21 wrote:
| Is this comment on purpose? The whooshes are getting hard
| to track!
| rapnie wrote:
| And clean. Really, really clean. Just look at coal. A no-
| brainer. Go for it.
| kube-system wrote:
| You mean "clean coal", right? Of course it's clean, it's
| right in the name.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| People laugh at this, but anthracite genuinely is cleaner
| than other coal in every regard save CO2 emissions. People
| just think it's a joke because they've come to believe that
| CO2 is the only coal emission worth caring about, which
| definitely isn't true.
| hatthew wrote:
| "Clean coal" is like saying "a fast snail". Sure it can
| be faster than other snails, but even if it's twice as
| fast as the second fastest snail, it's still a snail and
| I'll still laugh when an ant runs circles around it.
| kube-system wrote:
| No, the criticism isn't because people get caught up
| about CO2 -- it's because "cleaner than other coal" is a
| very low bar to meet to be calling something "clean" full
| stop.
|
| Also "clean coal" is not a type of coal being burnt
| (although that does matter too) but pollution control
| systems added to coal plants.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| Anthracite burns clean enough to use in a pizza oven. If
| your neighbor told you he was going to install a new
| furnace and offered you the choice of it burning wood
| pellets or anthracite, from a smell standpoint you should
| absolutely choose the anthracite.
|
| Anthracite, in these regards, is _very_ different from
| bituminous coal.
| kube-system wrote:
| >Anthracite burns clean enough to use in a pizza oven.
|
| Yeah, so does wood, which is horribly polluting.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| The smell of wood might be nice for flavor, but that's
| beyond the point of anthracite being clean. That
| particulate pollution from wood burning is severe
| compared to the smoke you'll get off anthracite, which is
| virtually nonexistent.
| kube-system wrote:
| Regardless of how good it might be at being the cleanest
| dirty thing, it's not what the US trope of "clean coal"
| refers to anyway. Anthracite is not used in the US to
| generate power because it is too expensive.
| hatthew wrote:
| And both are very different from not burning anything.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| Undoubtedly. Doesn't change the fact that one kind of
| coal burns smokeless with a clean blue flame while the
| other will cover everything for miles in a film of soot
| and tar.
| terminalshort wrote:
| The doesn't cause acid rain version is called "clean" and
| that seems pretty fair to me when the other version
| causes acid rain.
| kube-system wrote:
| It is still dirtier than all of the alternatives we have.
| tadfisher wrote:
| The oxymoronic term "clean coal" refers to carbon-
| capture-and-storage (CCS) technology [0], touted by the
| fossil fuel industry as a way to reduce greenhouse gas
| emissions and continue employing coal workers.
|
| Thus far, it is incredibly expensive, at a time when
| solar and wind generation is cost-competitive with
| fossil-fuel plants which _don 't_ employ CCS. It is
| simply a dead end. You can generate more renewable
| energy, _and store it_ , for far less than it takes to
| equip and operate CCS in conjunction with a fossil-fuel-
| fired plant. Only direct government subsidy makes it
| viable for a vanishingly small amount of GHG emissions.
|
| [0]:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_capture_and_storage
| MikeNotThePope wrote:
| They are also organic, all-natural, and fat-free! And renewable
| on geological timescales.
| skywal_l wrote:
| Contrary to windmills, which slows down the rotation of the
| earth.
| margalabargala wrote:
| Doesn't that depend whether you point them east or west?
|
| Point them north and you'll increase Earth's axial tilt.
| hedgehog wrote:
| I think you just solved both leap seconds and daylight
| savings time.
| munk-a wrote:
| Won't someone think of the ~children~ birds?!
| Garlef wrote:
| No problem: Just build a subterranean boat and launch a few
| nukes close to the core to restart rotation.
| triceratops wrote:
| I personally would like more hours in the day.
| einrealist wrote:
| Simply insane.
| steveBK123 wrote:
| We truly live in the bad place
| jmclnx wrote:
| Sorry, I do not know how else to say this:
|
| Well hopefully when Trump is gone NY remembers this and tells
| Pouyanne to screw when they put out bids to restart the project.
| gmueckl wrote:
| Do I have it right that the two projects that this deal kills off
| haven't seen any construction work yet? These aren't among the
| projects that the stop work orders were issued against in
| December, right?
| 0cf8612b2e1e wrote:
| My quick skim, I think you are right. This is getting them to
| halt new development, by buying them off with the equivalent of
| the subsidies the current administration cancelled.
| munk-a wrote:
| What an amazing deal. We get nothing and the contractors we
| negotiated with get money for it!
|
| Truly, the deals this administration crafts are nonpareil!
| fsckboy wrote:
| > _by buying them off with the equivalent of the subsidies
| the current administration cancelled_
|
| no, the billion that is being "paid" is a refund of what
| Total paid in for the leases. Total paid that into the US
| govt in anticipation of receiving returns on that investment
| in the form of "clean energy subsidies".
|
| it is not clear from what is in the news story whether Total
| is being compensated for the would-have-been future
| subsidies, or whether Total simply expects to make decent
| profits from fossil fuels.
|
| if one's interest is in the "clean energy" angle, then this
| is a "defeat". if one's interest is in reducing govt
| subsidies, this could be "a win", but it's not exactly clear.
| Mashimo wrote:
| These ones no construction had been started yet AFAIK.
|
| If AI summery is to be trusted, a few other windparks got
| stopped that where almost done, but got completed anyway after
| a legal battle. Vineyard Wind 1, Coastal Virginia (CVOW),
| Empire Wind 1, Revolution Wind, Sunrise Wind.
|
| Again, got it from AI, make of that what you want.
| cwal37 wrote:
| The feds have dropped their attempts to stop those from
| ongoing construction for now, but only one of those projects
| is complete.
|
| CVOW is supposed to flow first power this month, but won't be
| done for ~a year, Empire Wind is also end of '26/early '27,
| Sunrise later in 2027.
|
| Vineyard was completed this month, and Revolution is
| delivering power and targets completion over the next few
| months.
| harmmonica wrote:
| I know this US government is fully-committed to fossil fuels and
| about as rabidly anti-renewables as can be, but I'm still shocked
| to see things like this. And I'm fully aware of Trump's Scotland
| experience and how that contributed or directly led to this, but,
| still, shocked. And then I'm also shocked because I know that at
| least half, if not a good bit more, of US citizens are in
| agreement with this strategy. Not sure how I can still be shocked
| but here I am.
|
| And I say that not as some rabid renewables person. Just the
| insane binary thinking, regardless of the dollars and cronyism at
| work. There's zero room for nuance, which I guess is my biggest
| complaint about the world at large.
|
| Aside: people who think climate change will be the death of us
| all, and sooner than later, I get it, and I fully appreciate you
| pushing for a cleaner and more livable world. At this point I'm
| just going to sit in the corner and hope you, and China, figure
| it out and then it spreads quickly to the rest of the world,
| which I think at this point is pretty much a foregone conclusion
| barring a nuclear war (will refrain from commenting about how the
| likelihood of that has ticked up the past couple of weeks in an
| area teeming with (sarcastically shocked this time!) fossil
| fuels).
| tasty_freeze wrote:
| I'm always gobsmacked when Trump says things like, "We need to
| get rid of all the wind turbines! They are killing all the
| birds! Look at the foot of any tower and you'll see nothing but
| dead birds!"
|
| Is there a single person who things Trump gives a single damn
| about the birds? It is obviously just a pretext.
| foobarbecue wrote:
| And whales, don't forget the whales
| https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/sep/26/trump-
| whale-...
|
| and the noise causes cancer
| harmmonica wrote:
| Never thought about it, but that's a great point and
| comparison. From quick Google search: 365 million and 988
| million birds die every year from window collisions (that's
| US alone). Windmills/turbines: 140,000 and 679,000. Then if
| you do per windmill vs. per building obviously the windmills
| are going to "win," but it's the absolute that would seem to
| matter in this case.
|
| As you said, that has nothing to do with the actual
| preference for fossils vs. turbines, but a great point
| nonetheless.
| tdb7893 wrote:
| Wind turbines are also miniscule compared to issues like
| pollution, land use, windows, and cats. Also you can track
| migration and turn them off at key times if it's a huge issue
| (this is part of the motivation for research I'm going to do
| later as part of my master's dealing with tracking hawk
| flocks via weather radar).
|
| Wind turbines are an issue but approximately 0% of the _30%_
| decline in US birds since the 1970s
|
| Edit: to be specific to Trump, funding for bird conservation
| has been an issue under his administrations and he's weakened
| things like migratory bird treaty act. Obviously he doesn't
| care about birds and the bird community is very frustrated
| with him
| triceratops wrote:
| True Bird Lovers only care about bird fatalities from
| windmills. Oil spills, buildings, and cats don't register.
| throwway120385 wrote:
| This might surprise you, but only a minority of eligible voters
| vote. So while it looks like 50% of people believe this is a
| good strategy and we should do it based on the percentage of
| people who voted for Trump, in reality a minority of people in
| the US believe this is good. The problem is that few of those
| people vote.
|
| So in all seriousness, if we could get a significant fraction
| of the young people who are negatively impacted by these
| policies to actually vote against the people enacting them we
| could see real change. But if we keep telling them everyone
| believes in this stuff and your vote doesn't count and so on
| then nobody will do anything about it until it's too late and
| we're shooting at or throwing rocks at each other.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _if we keep telling them everyone believes in this stuff
| and your vote doesn 't count and so on_
|
| I don't know if you can fix lazy. Turning out new voters
| basically happens once a generation. The rest tell themselves
| tales that their vote could never matter, and in doing that,
| subtly endorse the _status quo_.
| tombert wrote:
| This is kind of why I ultimately find cynicism to be
| inherently lazy. This is coming from a very cynical (and
| often lazy) person.
|
| It takes no effort to be cynical, I can tell myself
| "everything sucks and I shouldn't care because nothing
| matters anyway" and justify _not_ doing anything I want. I
| can justify not voting, I can justify not helping someone
| if I see them struggling on the street, I can justify not
| even improving myself.
|
| In the last couple years I have been trying my best to
| override my cynical tendencies because ultimately I think
| that they are bad for me. I vote in every election I am
| able to because even if it's infinitesimal, I at least
| tried to do _something_ to avoid whom I deem bad people
| getting into office.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| Agree. And look, being cynical and just minding your own
| matters is fine. It means the system is working well
| enough for that person that doing anything isn't actually
| worth it. But those people are also electorally--and more
| broadly, politically--irrelevant. So if you're trying to
| do something, betting on them tends to be a losing pitch.
| yoyohello13 wrote:
| I relate to the feeling. I am extremely cynical. I fully
| believe the world is fucked and we are in for a very
| turbulent 50-100 years. I still work to improve myself
| and the world because WTF else are you going to do? At
| least doing something feels better than doing nothing.
| tombert wrote:
| I've just grown to really respect older people who manage
| to stay excited and optimistic. It's so much easier to
| become a cynic, and I think it required effort on their
| end to try and be a positive person.
| forgetfreeman wrote:
| Your comment is extremely reductionist and reverses
| causality for a large number of voters. Both political
| parties have multi-decade track records of aggressively
| supporting pro-corporate political agendas at the expense
| of their constituency. So in light of literal decades of
| watching prospects decline regardless of which party is
| currently in power many voters (correctly) conclude that
| their vote will not lead to meaningful change.
| root_axis wrote:
| > _in reality a minority of people in the US believe this is
| good._
|
| I'm not convinced. The reason why many of these people don't
| vote is because they don't think Trump is that bad. They
| probably don't agree with everything, but that's true no
| matter who is in office.
| tokai wrote:
| 63.45% voted last time. Thats not a minority.
| kakacik wrote:
| People voted in repeatedly a visibly primitive person (plus
| quite a few other things but lets not go there now), then they
| get primitive behavior.
|
| An honest question - what the heck did you expect? Some
| sophisticated rational discussions instead of dumb ego
| tantrums?
| RealityVoid wrote:
| I would have expected them not to vote a primitive person.
| And the most shocking part is people pretending he's got some
| sort of master plan or that the rest of us are just not
| seeing his genius. Absolute cinema, I swear.
| leonidasrup wrote:
| Don't underestimate the power of money spend by the U.S.
| oil,gas,coal industry. For example:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koch_network#Climate_change_an...
| exceptione wrote:
| > I know this US government is fully-committed to fossil fuels
| and about as rabidly anti-renewables as can be,
|
| Don't fall for the political narratives, they are designed to
| distract you while the theft is taking place. The sponsors of
| the circus are rabidly cynical and pro-selfish. They are
| spreading the narratives, not believing in them. There is
| certainly a few conservatives in power who hold that the earth
| is only 6000 years old, who see no other option than burning
| down the town as a way to escape confrontation with progress
| and emancipation. But this is mainly what kleptocracy looks
| like.
|
| The narratives work though, that is the sad reality. News
| anchors and the public are stuck in a loop about "children
| being forced to change sex, woke, climate hoax, but her
| e-mails, but Biden, ...", anything but what is happening at the
| crime scene.
| throwaway5752 wrote:
| x
| morkalork wrote:
| Kidnapping the leader of a sovereign nation to put them on show
| trial and plotting to steal the country's natural resources.
| Blockading and strangling an island country to the point of
| economic collapse. Opining out loud about annexing their
| northern neighbours. The list goes on and on..
| jeffbee wrote:
| We didn't even get the show trial!
| morkalork wrote:
| Save the date!
| https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/article/maduros-next-us-
| court-d...
| MaxHoppersGhost wrote:
| >The US, should it survive this administration
|
| This level of doomerism is absurd. Of course the US will
| survive this administration. I blame the news for making every
| breathe by whichever opposition seem like the next WWIII.
| throwaway5752 wrote:
| x
| buellerbueller wrote:
| The US is dead; it is now a Trumpian shithole.
| specialist wrote:
| Pax Americana is doomed. What the USA looks like post-
| hegemony is TBD.
| blix wrote:
| The Pax Americana was already over when Russia siezed
| Crimea.
| kakacik wrote:
| The land will be there. (most of) people will be there. What
| parent probably meant is losing everything good and positive
| United States of America represented in past 80+ years,
| internally and globally.
|
| That is gone my friend, with the wind like a sulfuric fart,
| for good. US is becoming a global terrorist and enemy #2 of
| free world and certainly whole Europe (right after its
| biggest and only 'friend', russia which coincidentally keeps
| trying to make you a thing of the past). This comes from
| somebody who strongly believed in your role in global
| hegemony despite your numerous well documented fuckups in the
| past. All on the whims of one visibly mentally sick man, with
| absolutely nobody standing up to him despite nobody really
| believing in any of that bullshit. No principles, just plain
| greed and firm fuck-the-rest approach. Right now, if Europe
| needs a strong big ally it will be #1 China, and then...
| nothing.
|
| The fact you voted him in, and he still has massive support,
| and there has been 0 overthrow attempts of the biggest
| traitor to US in its history tells me and everybody else in
| the world many things, but nothing positive. Even if next
| election, if they will happen, will have 98% win of the
| democracts with that ridiculous unfair and undemocratic
| system of yours, it won't change a permanent shift that
| started and keeps happening. US has no real allies, in same
| vein russia or China has no real allies.
|
| Empires rise and fall, inevitably, there was never a reason
| to think US would be an exception.
| jeffbee wrote:
| The United States has already been destroyed. It is no longer
| in question, or in the future tense.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| This is comfortable doomerism. But it isn't accurate.
| Moreover, it's dangerous since the numpties who tend to
| believe it then politically disengage.
| jeffbee wrote:
| None of the institutions function, or do the thing that we
| used to explain to children what they do. The whole thing
| demonstrably does not exist. You're welcome to describe my
| view with whatever pejorative you prefer.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _do the thing that we used to explain to children what
| they do. The whole thing demonstrably does not exist_
|
| Something misfunctioning doesn't mean it doesn't exist. A
| massive economy, industry and war machine are still here.
| Pretending that doesn't exist because it doesn't work the
| way we like is an expression of exasperation, not a
| description of reality.
| elslopista wrote:
| >A massive economy, industry and war machine are still
| here
|
| Those things are exactly what destroyed the nation. The
| military industrial complex and the billionaires who
| removed the teeth from institutions that used to prevent
| the accumulation of power (see also: antitrust litigation
| against Standard Oil). Those entities are now in complete
| control and democracy is nothing but a sham, a clown show
| between two faces of the same coin.
|
| The US as a country didn't fail with Trump. It failed
| when Microsoft got away scot-free. This was the biggest
| sign that the country was no longer a serious entity,
| because a serious entity would try to preserve its own
| power, while the United States of Burgers is something to
| be sold to the highest bidder.
| fn-mote wrote:
| At least it doesn't seem like a direct payoff. So in that sense
| the title is clickbait.
|
| > redirect those funds towards fossil fuel production [...] > US
| interior secretary [says] the deal was worth "nearly $1 billion
|
| The rest of the comments here... yep.
| BigTTYGothGF wrote:
| I'm reminded of Reagan taking down the White House solar panels.
| softwaredoug wrote:
| IIRC those were solar hot water heaters. More of a curiosity
| than something legitimately powering the white house.
| jmward01 wrote:
| The symbolism, and the stupidity, was there though. As time
| has gone on it has been more clear every year how intelligent
| Carter's administration was and how terrible the following
| administration was. Investing in/promoting solar was just one
| of many smart moves by Carter that were attacked purely to
| gain political points that only harmed us in the long run.
| genthree wrote:
| Carter: "This energy crisis shows us how vulnerable we are
| to foreign autocrats. We should work toward energy
| independence via renewable energy and waste reduction, to
| lead the world away from this risky and unsustainable
| fossil fuel market and secure ourselves a brighter future."
|
| America: _throws a decades-long, ongoing tantrum_
|
| It's fairly reductive... but still kinda true.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| To be fair, he was essentially wrong about the efficiency
| angle because of the Jevons paradox and the "make your
| dryer not actually dry your clothes" kind of thing was
| pretty stupid.
|
| A lot of the methods of subsidizing things were also
| quite incompetent, e.g. Solyndra. If you want to
| subsidize something like this you do it on the consumer
| side, e.g. 75% tax credit for every US-made solar panel
| you install, which drives demand for US-made solar panels
| without opening you up to scandals like that or the usual
| corruption where the money goes to the administration's
| buddies.
| detourdog wrote:
| Here is a summery and where the panels ended up.
|
| https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/carter-white-hous...
| mandeepj wrote:
| The guy is unhinged, hellbent on denial, just to appease his
| base, who are going bankrupt because of his policies. Would he
| pay Sun as well to stop shining over the US?
| kelseyfrog wrote:
| https://fee.org/articles/the-candlemakers-petition/ This feels
| relevant
| tombert wrote:
| The overrated and very annoying "sun", the so-called "star"
| that our planet goes around has been going unquestioned for too
| long! Many people have been asking for a long time, perhaps
| even before Obama, to remove the sun from the sky and replace
| it with our beautiful clean coal towers!
| jpgvm wrote:
| Thankyou for your attention to this matter!
| feurio wrote:
| "Since the beginning of time man has yearned to destroy the
| sun" - Charles Montgomery Burns
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3LbxDZRgA4
| fakedang wrote:
| http://bastiat.org/en/petition.html
| entropicdrifter wrote:
| Relevant power metal song:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z769xf9ET5A
| ripvanwinkle wrote:
| I had this big guy, very big guy with tears streaming down
| his cheeks asking me "Sir can you take down that woke star
| that keeps me awake"
| armada651 wrote:
| It's even stupider than that, it's not even to appease his
| base, it's a personal grudge. Trump sued a wind energy company
| to prevent them from building an off-shore wind farm in view of
| his golf resort in Scotland. He lost that case badly and he has
| been railing against wind energy specifically ever since.
|
| So far Trump hasn't done much to prevent solar farms from being
| built, it's only wind turbines that he's exacting his vengeance
| on like some sort of modern day Don Quixote.
| iso1631 wrote:
| UK should confiscate his golf courses and build on shore wind
| on them as reparations for this Iran war he sarted
| spicymaki wrote:
| > The guy is unhinged, hellbent on denial, just to appease his
| base, who are going bankrupt because of his policies.
|
| In the middle of a war he started over war. No less. If his
| base wanted cheap gas, they are not going to get it.
| cowpig wrote:
| To me, this deal makes it pretty clear who holds actual sway
| iso1631 wrote:
| Even Burns wasn't this deranged
| seydor wrote:
| I feel like Total could have pushed for more, much more.
|
| It's very important that Windmills and 5G antennas do not spray
| Covid19 on proud patriotic americans
| kylehotchkiss wrote:
| I really want to see the legal verbiage guaranteeing this
| right. Like, how many mutations can covid virus get before it
| legally could be sprayed on patriotic Americans?
| terminalshort wrote:
| Depends on the mutation, but it could be as little as 1. A
| single mutation could turn the virus inert, therefore making
| it legal.
| sameergh wrote:
| If this is accurate the US is making itself look unreliable for
| major energy investment
| paxys wrote:
| The US is making itself look unreliable in every aspect
| paxys wrote:
| Serious question, but not entirely related to the topic - how are
| "smart" people in the US preparing for the next 20-30 years?
|
| - Assume everything will be fine and America will remain a global
| economic superpower.
|
| - Plan an exit to a more serious, stable country.
|
| - Some option in the middle of the two to hedge your bets?
| shepherdjerred wrote:
| I'd leave the US if the tech jobs didn't pay so much better
| here.
|
| I mostly like the US but the years since Obama have been rough
| Ylpertnodi wrote:
| Pay may be numerically less in the eu, but rather than me
| trying to convince you, try on youtube: 'why I left the USA
| for europe'. There are very many.!
| tsunamifury wrote:
| Please list the more serious and stable country if America
| collapses.
|
| I'll wait.
|
| On a serious note;
|
| I'm looking at my billion dollar neighbors and they all just
| are citizens everywhere now. No allegiance to anything but
| their own pleasure.
| kakacik wrote:
| Lol thats trivial if you actually know history and politics a
| tiny bit - Switzerland. 800 years of most free citizens in
| the world (lost that armed part but still valid for whole
| Europe with maybe Finland having similar numbers).
|
| Salaries in tech sector still give you higher overall quality
| of life than most of US can ever offer. Then you have -
| extremely beautiful nature at your doorstep, more top notch
| destinations like Italy and France just at the border, very
| low criminality compared to US, very good free healthcare,
| very good free education including top notch public
| universities, very well functioning social programs. One
| doesn't have to be ashamed their taxes go to killing innocent
| civilians half around the world (although at this point US
| population including folks here seems fine with that). And so
| on and on and on.
|
| Also, you don't spend your whole active life getting it and
| (almost) burning out for that, 40h/week and then you can live
| your life and chase dreams and passions.
| tonfa wrote:
| > very good free healthcare
|
| Quite a few swiss residents would be happy to have this (or
| at least some more cost control).
|
| There's mandatory health insurance with preexisting
| condition coverage, but it's not free (tho it's partially
| tax supported, depending on location and income).
| tsunamifury wrote:
| Switzerland would likely be one of the first to collapse
| financial institutions due to a US fallout.
|
| It's amazing how poorly you understand their financial
| situation. They are possible the most privately leveraged
| entity on the planet by ratio
|
| Their banking systems against their gdp is at 600%.
|
| You couldn't pick a worse place
| nxor2 wrote:
| Swiss people are quite rude and unaccepting of foreigners,
| even foreigners who grow up there. I don't think they have
| room for Americans wishing to leave.
| mothballed wrote:
| Americans have a twisted outlook because despite _muh
| racism_ USA has allowed more foreigners in than any other
| country, a quite sizeable chunk of them via overstay or
| illegal immigration, so we think we could do the same
| thing and just as an average person up and move somewhere
| else because we see that it _can_ be done and _most_ of
| the time it is at least _possible_ to get away with it
| unless you have bad luck or do something stupid.
|
| Argentina and Brazil are about the only other countries
| where you can almost get away with this and legalize your
| existence (Argentina in particular has constitution that
| says essentially if you survive 2 years, you are
| basically citizen) , although most of Africa wouldn't
| bother to enforce it (South Africa in particular has
| almost as much illegal immigration per capita as USA
| although with a wide band of possible error in estimates,
| and they can't meaningfully enforce it).
|
| Otherwise you need investments (usually 50k+), permanent
| pension, top-tier education, a professional job offer,
| cultural/family ties, or connections with the political
| apparatus. Switzerland in particular is on extreme hard
| mode for a non-EU citizen to get citizenship.
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| Switzerland?
| Ylpertnodi wrote:
| > Please list the more serious and stable country if America
| collapses.
|
| Chinahhhh.
| senordevnyc wrote:
| _Please list the more serious and stable country if America
| collapses._
|
| Uh, anywhere that hasn't collapsed?
| onlyrealcuzzo wrote:
| I'm investing in property in places that will allow me to get
| permanent residency without jumping through too many hoops.
|
| You theoretically lose yield compared to the S&P average - but
| if you're hedging your bets against the US _possibly_ going to
| shit - the S &P is unlikely to perform as well as its historic
| average _IFF_ that scenario unfolds.
|
| Seems like a better hedge than gold, but my crystal ball isn't
| working.
| bluGill wrote:
| I live in iowa - all my electric comes from wind, and I drive
| an ev or bike. I'm not worried
| baggachipz wrote:
| D) Die. I'll reach my expected lifespan by then. If possible,
| move to a serious, stable country before then.
| terminalshort wrote:
| Smart people know that you can't predict or plan for anything
| on anywhere close to that time horizon. The only plan is be
| adaptable.
| RealityVoid wrote:
| You can build contingencies and hedge bets. You can plan. You
| just can't predict what will happen so it's playing the odds.
| kilroy123 wrote:
| I don't know if I qualify for "smart" but my plan has been to
| keep one foot in the US and one foot in Europe.
|
| I saw the writing on the wall long ago. I predicted all of this
| happening many years ago. I left the US back in 2015.
|
| Currently in the UK, and I hope to eventually get dual
| citizenship. My partner is European, so that is possible too.
| detourdog wrote:
| I'm somewhere in the middle and bought an ocean going sailboat.
| Ajedi32 wrote:
| HN title (currently reads "US govt pays TotalEnergies nearly $1B
| to stop US offshore wind projects") is editorialized and it's
| unclear to me whether it's accurate. The article says:
|
| > We're partnering with TotalEnergies to unleash nearly $1
| billion that was tied up in a lease deposit that was directed
| towards the prior administration's subsidies
|
| What's the deal with this lease deposit and how does "freeing it
| up" equate to the US govt "paying" TotalEnergies that amount?
|
| Is this a situation where TotalEnergies put down a 1B deposit to
| lease the seashore from the government and the government is now
| canceling that agreement and giving them their money back? How
| does it relate to "subsidies"?
| sheikhnbake wrote:
| Not sure how it relates to subsidies, but it is what you said.
| The government is cancelling wind shore projects leased to
| TotalEnergies under the Biden admin for ~$930 million.
|
| The Trump admin is paying them back with the understanding that
| TotalEnergies will reinvest the money into oil and gas
| operations in the US
| cwal37 wrote:
| You could go to the source and see[1].
|
| > TotalEnergies has committed to invest approximately $1
| billion--the value of its renounced offshore wind leases--in
| oil and natural gas and LNG production in the United States.
| Following their new investment, the United States will
| reimburse the company dollar-for-dollar, up to the amount they
| paid in lease purchases for offshore wind. Under this
| innovative agreement driven by President Donald J. Trump's
| Energy Dominance Agenda, the American people will no longer pay
| for ideological subsidies that benefited only the unreliable
| and costly offshore wind industry.
|
| > For its part, TotalEnergies will invest $928MM, on the
| following projects in 2026:
|
| The development of Train 1 to 4 of Rio Grande LNG plant in
| Texas; The development of upstream conventional oil in Gulf of
| America and of shale gas production. Following TotalEnergies'
| $928 million in investments in affordable, reliable and secure
| U.S. energy projects, the United States will terminate the
| following leases and reimburse the company
|
| [1] https://www.doi.gov/pressreleases/interior-and-
| totalenergies...
| Ajedi32 wrote:
| Thanks, that's helpful. Pretty annoying the original article
| didn't link to its source given that it was just repeating
| the contents of a press release.
|
| Anyone know what these "ideological subsidies" are that
| they're referring to? Were they part of the agreement that
| was just terminated? Or was that just a vaguely related
| talking point they inserted into the press release for
| political reasons?
| cwal37 wrote:
| "ideological subsidies" for this administration means any
| policy supporting non-thermal and non-battery (to a lesser
| extent, although their lobby has pretty successfully
| extracted them from previous renewable associations they
| relied on) generating units.
|
| To get more specific, you could say everything rolled back
| from the IRA as part of the BBB.
| Ajedi32 wrote:
| If it's just BBB they're referring to then I would call
| that a political talking point since that doesn't seem
| directly related to this deal.
|
| Unless the subsidies being repealed explains why
| TotalEnergies seems happy to get out of the lease now
| even though they presumably thought it was a good deal
| for them back when they originally agreed to it. If
| that's true though then I don't know why neither the
| article nor the press release say anything about it other
| than in this vague allusion.
| beepbooptheory wrote:
| Unclear to me what would satisfy this complaint.. You
| wish La Monde speculated _more_ on some glaring omission
| of motive here? You 're original point is that they
| seemed to speculate too much!
| nieve wrote:
| They were stuck in a never-ending series of legal battles
| because the current administration is trying to block all
| wind power, so their money was not actually going
| anywhere useful. Coincidentally Trump hates wind power
| and is still bringing up his golf course having some
| offshore wind near it after years.
| while_true_ wrote:
| NY Times phrases it as a reimbursement to TotalEnergies for
| relinquishing wind leases that they paid for. The US made the
| reimbursement contingent on them investing in fossil fuel
| projects. "The deal is an extraordinary transfer of taxpayer
| dollars to a foreign company for the purposes of boosting the
| production of fossil fuels."
|
| Total waste of $1 Bil of taxpayer dollars. If the oil and gas
| industry want to shut down wind projects let them pay for it.
| entropicdrifter wrote:
| Why would they do that when they already paid for a corrupt
| new regime to do it for them?
| BoiledCabbage wrote:
| So TotalEnergies agreed to invest 1 billion is offshore wind
| during thr last Administration. The current Administration
| doesn't want any investment in renewables so they attempted
| to block it. A judge said the attempted block was unlawful.
| So then immediately the admin said something new and that
| instead there were "national security concerns" with building
| wind plants - (Which doesn't pass the smell test to me at
| all) and the project would be held up while untangling those.
|
| My _assumption_ is the company started getting upset at being
| toyed around and having their 1 billion investment completely
| stalled for so long. So the admin said we 'll kill the wind
| if you do our fossil fuels instead. So shift your investment
| away from wind (we kill it and pay you back for what you
| investws) if you instead do fossil fuels. And that's what's
| being done.
|
| So previously the company was spending 1billion on wind and
| getting some subsidies. Now they spend 2 billion, and get
| paid 1 billion from the tax payer. For them it's at best a
| wash, though likely a loss since I haven't heard they get
| subsidies with the fossil fules. And the tax payer instead of
| paying for tax credits or low interest loans or other
| subsidies that were part of wind power portion of the
| Inflation Reduction Act instead pay a full 1 billion dollars
| to the company.
|
| > The Trump administration will pay $1 billion to a French
| company to walk away from two U.S. offshore wind leases as
| the administration ramps up its campaign against offshore
| wind and other renewable energy.
|
| 1. https://apnews.com/article/trump-offshore-wind-energy-
| climat...
| standardUser wrote:
| They are taking money committed to a wind project and
| redirecting it towards burning fossil fuels - because what
| other lesson can we take from a global energy shock other than
| to increase our exposure to the next one? The company itself
| (France's Total) had already committed to the wind deal, so now
| the Trump admin is letting them off the hook, and using Trump's
| irrational refusal to issue licenses for wind power as the
| excuse for why the deal wasn't working out as originally
| planned.
| alephnerd wrote:
| Total is also committed to expanding LNG - Total [0] and Oil
| India [1] are collaborating on a $20 Billion LNG extraction
| megaproject in Mozambique which was paused due to an Islamist
| insurgency during which Total-and-Oil India-funded
| paramilitary allegedly committed massacres against civilians
| [2] while putting down an Islamic State insurgency in Cabo
| Delgado.
|
| The US, France+India, and China have been competing over this
| project for decades.
|
| These are businesses - no one cares about morals, only
| interests. And it is in France's interest to unlock these
| kinds of LNG projects.
|
| [0] - https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/mozambique-
| says-tota...
|
| [1] - https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/oil-india-sees-
| resta...
|
| [2] - https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4gw119ynlxo
| TheSpiceIsLife wrote:
| I drive commercially.
|
| There are no fully electric, or even hybrid, options for the
| type of vehicle I drive.
|
| And even if there were, are you (tax payers) prepared to buy
| it for me, because I'm not due for an upgrade for about
| another 400,000 kilometres.
|
| Can't put wind generated watt-hours in my diesel tank.
|
| Can't put wishful thinking in my cars petrol tank.
| mindslight wrote:
| It seems like you should want the types of vehicles that
| can avoid using fossil fuels to do so, to keep your own
| prices down?
|
| What is with this attitude of reflexively interpreting the
| development of _alternatives_ as if they are _mandatory_ ?
| TheSpiceIsLife wrote:
| Whether I wanting them or not is irrelevant to the fact
| that they presently don't exist, and that I'm not due for
| a new vehicle for years.
|
| I did try to make that clear in the comment you replied
| to.
|
| The battery technology doesn't exist.
| mindslight wrote:
| I think you misread my comment. I'm asking why you
| wouldn't want _other_ types of vehicles _that can_ be
| electrified to be electrified, such that there is less
| demand for the diesel that yours requires.
|
| For example I've got a tractor that burns diesel, for
| effectively homeowner use. I too am not going to be
| replacing this piece of capital equipment any time soon
| (even though electrical would actually be better in a lot
| of regards). But since trucking is reliant on diesel and
| quite demand-insensistive, the Epstein war recently made
| diesel prices jump 60%. Whereas the fewer economically-
| critical vehicles there are being powered by diesel (even
| just the short range ones), the less that price would
| have spiked.
| brewdad wrote:
| This deal has zero to do with someone like you. This
| impacts our electrical grid. Now instead of harvesting
| renewable wind energy we will be burning LNG to power that
| portion of the grid.
|
| I suppose there are still some diesel generators out there,
| so they might burn that instead. Of course, that only makes
| you worse off.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > And even if there were, are you (tax payers) prepared to
| buy it for me, because I'm not due for an upgrade for about
| another 400,000 kilometres.
|
| 400,000 km is around two years for a commercial driver,
| isn't it?
| lovich wrote:
| You know if demand goes down for fossil fuels because the
| grid is powered by renewables then the cost would decrease
| right?
|
| Also "kilometers"? "petrol tank"? Thanks for holding three
| fingers up and letting me know you're cosplaying as an
| American
| jmyeet wrote:
| We don't know some important specifics about the deal but
| (IMHO) that's on purpose and is telling, meaning you only end
| up obscure deal details because you have something to hide.
|
| So I don't know what stage the project was at but by
| withdrawing from the deal or cancelling it, the government is
| going to have to pay a penalty. Is that penalty $10 million? Is
| it $500 million? We don't really know.
|
| So it could be that TotalEnergies is still getting paid $1
| billion but now they have to spend $600 million on some fossil
| fuel project. But in doing so the government has essentially
| paid a $400 million break penalty. You see what I mean?
|
| I don't believe for a second that the government didn't lose
| money on this political cancellation. The fossil fuel project
| is just a way to hide that and save face (IMHO).
| angelgonzales wrote:
| This seems like a good thing considering the "TotalEnergies CEO
| Pouyanne said offshore wind was "not the most affordable way to
| produce electricity" in the US, which he identified as being
| natural gas-fired power plants."
|
| Not sure why we're building offshore wind plants when land based
| gas plants provide cheaper energy. We need to be reducing the
| cost of living for working people and not raising it. Our goal
| should be to reduce people's cost of living and we should align
| our actions towards those goals.
|
| Most people are cost sensitive!
| rockooooo wrote:
| the dollar cost he's talking about does not include the large
| dollar cost the externalities burning gas creates
| angelgonzales wrote:
| Does the offshore wind energy costs include externalities of
| fabricating, assembling, shipping, installing, maintaining
| and decommissioning the turbines? Does it also include bird
| losses and whale harms?
| bjourne wrote:
| Yes.
| thunfischtoast wrote:
| The project life cycle cost: yes. The birds and whales: no.
| But neither do the fossil power plants.
| triceratops wrote:
| Does the gas turbine include externalities of fabricating,
| assembling, shipping installing, maintaining, and
| decommissioning oil drilling rigs? And of shipping,
| storing, and burning the gas? And the climate change caused
| by gas leaks? And the harms to humans, the fishing
| industry, and bird losses and whale harms by oil spills (I
| know you really care about those)?
| IshKebab wrote:
| Uhm, I dunno if you just time travelled here from the 60s but
| there's this thing called global warming.
| while_true_ wrote:
| Wind and solar are consistently the cheapest forms of new
| energy generation. Pouyanne knows that. He is being a
| politician here, saying what he knows will play well with the
| current administration. When in Rome...
| mikkupikku wrote:
| If the government would like to pay me to also not build wind
| turbines, hit me up. I mean, I wasn't going to build any in the
| first place, but I think this makes me qualified to continue not
| building any.
| softwaredoug wrote:
| I think it's in part returning money this company paid the
| government
| stared wrote:
| > [Major Major's father's] specialty was alfalfa, and he made a
| good thing out of not growing any. The government paid him well
| for every bushel of alfalfa he did not grow. The more alfalfa
| he did not grow, the more money the government gave him, and he
| spent every penny he didn't earn on new land to increase the
| amount of alfalfa he did not produce. Major Major's father
| worked without rest at not growing alfalfa. On long winter
| evenings he remained indoors and did not mend harness, and he
| sprang out of bed at the crack of noon every day just to make
| certain that the chores would not be done. He invested in land
| wisely and soon was not growing more alfalfa than any other man
| in the county....
|
| Catch 22 by Joseph Heller
| mothballed wrote:
| Shit like this has been happening since the first colonists
| came to the US. On of the first thing the Massachusetts Bay
| Company did in the 1630s was subsidizing the Winthrop
| Salthouse for decades ... which never successfully produced
| salt. Another thing commonly done was the English government
| or charters would gift land and then turn right around and
| buy it back at market price.
|
| Just look at it as America going back to the colonial ages
| and then everything that's happening makes sense. The bad
| news is that people were willing to put up with that for over
| 100 year so there's no guarantee anyone will do anything for
| a long time.
| andyjohnson0 wrote:
| > "TotalEnergies CEO Pouyanne said offshore wind was 'not the
| most affordable way to produce electricity' in the US, which he
| identified as being natural gas-fired power plants. [...] So it
| was a win-win dialog," he said."
|
| Pouyanne is only 62 years old. If, as I hope, there are criminal
| trials in the future for those responsible for recklessly
| endangering life on this planet, then I hope that he is still
| alive and that statements like this form part of the prosecution.
| Unfortunately Trump will almost certainly be long dead by then.
| jiggawatts wrote:
| If we all lived on a space station these are the kind of people
| that would buy Oxygen futures and veto fixing the leaks in the
| hull.
| softwaredoug wrote:
| It's not as big of a deal as it sounds.
|
| Theses wind farms have not even started construction yet. Once
| Don Quixote is out of office, some future administration
| undoubtedly will start wind farm construction.
| evan_ wrote:
| I'm actually less concerned about the continued non-existence
| of a bunch of windmills, vs the billion-dollar payout to ensure
| that they continue to not exist.
|
| I've spent my entire life not building any windmills and
| nobody's paid me a billion dollars for it yet.
| sgt wrote:
| How about Equinor? They are suing the US govt for stopping the
| wind projects.
| standardUser wrote:
| Trump wrecks the global energy economy and his next move is to
| increase our dependence on it? They don't make enough dimensions
| for the type of chess this brainiac is playing.
| speedgoose wrote:
| Total doesn't greenwash anymore.
|
| Perhaps they try to please the US government. A previous total
| CEO "maintained complicated relations with the United States". He
| died in a plane crash accident. Was it an accident or a murder,
| perhaps the current Total CEO prefers to be safe than dead.
|
| https://www.france24.com/fr/20160714-margerie-deces-enquete-...
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unijet_Flight_074P
| alephnerd wrote:
| Total doesn't care.
|
| They've funded massacres in 2021 [0] in order to unlock the $20
| Billion Cabo Delgado LNG deal [1] in Mozambique. Greenwashing
| is the least of their worries.
|
| I've found French business culture to be extremely refreshing
| compared to their DACH peers - French business norms tend to be
| much more pragmatic, and will try to maintain strategic
| autonomy by hook or by crook.
|
| [0] - https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4gw119ynlxo
|
| [1] - https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/mozambique-says-
| tota...
| markm248 wrote:
| Idiocracy
| mpalmer wrote:
| The president - in his personal capacity - hates windmills. That
| is probably the entire reason this happened, in addition to
| hurting blue states.
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