Author Topic: ‘The Supply Chain Does Not Exist’: Green Energy Industry Is In For A Rude Awakening  (Read 341 times)

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Daily Caller by Thomas Catenacci 5/1/2022

•   Wind and solar companies have reported massive profit declines over the last year as clean energy prices have risen and new installations have been delayed thanks to supply chain shortfalls, market uncertainty and the Ukraine crisis.

•   “One of the problems with this industry as a whole is that, since at its very foundation it is based on government subsidies and government mandates, its market value is never truly known,” said Daniel Turner, the executive director of Power the Future.

•   “90% to 95% of the supply chain does not exist,” RJ Scaringe, CEO of electric vehicle maker Rivian, told reporters in April, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Renewable energy prices have skyrocketed while new wind and solar installations have plummeted over the last year, even as governments continue to forge ahead with ambitious climate plans.

While the U.S., European Union, other Western nations and international organizations have all pursued aggressive climate agendas that involve expanding renewable energy technology and infrastructure, prices have surged and profits have declined, according to industry reports and corporate earnings reviewed by the Daily Caller News Foundation. President Joe Biden has made a series of climate pledges, including a commitment to decarbonize the grid by 2035 and achieve net-zero economy-wide emissions by 2050, while pushing a long list of anti-fossil fuel policies.

Commodity markets tied to global renewable energy development have been roiled by inflation, supply chain issues stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic and, more recently, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Even as project demand has stayed high, industry profitability has declined because of these factors.

“One of the problems with this industry as a whole is that, since at its very foundation it is based on government subsidies and government mandates, its market value is never truly known,” Daniel Turner, the executive director of Power the Future, told the DCNF in an interview.

“It’s a big lie when the environmentalists say, ‘it’s cheap’ — we don’t know what it actually costs,” Turner continued. “It may be, I’m not denying it could be, but the fact is we don’t actually know what wind and solar cost.”

The average price for renewable energy technology in North America increased an “astounding” 28.5% between early 2021 and early 2022, according to an April 13 report from renewable industry marketplace LevelTen Energy. Development costs, supply chain issues and market uncertainty are to blame for the setback even as demand for green energy climbed, the report added.

In addition, wind and solar project completions in the U.S. have plummeted over the last two years with the total investment value of such projects falling from $46.2 billion in 2019 to $7.5 billion in 2021, an Industrial Info Resources report published on April 21 showed. In that same time span, the number of wind and solar project completions has decreased from 240 to just 66, a 73% decline.

“Difficulty in obtaining financing, regulatory challenges, or a shortage of available capacity on the transmission grid are three longstanding challenges to getting renewable generation built,” Industrial Info Resources Vice President of Research for the Global Power Industry Britt Burt said in a statement.

“As long as these myriad headwinds persist, we can expect elevated [prices] across North America,” Gia Clark, a senior director at LevelTen Energy, said earlier in April.

More: https://dailycaller.com/2022/05/01/renewable-energy-industry-prices-supply-chain-joe-biden/