China Warms Up to Solar Industry

ZhongHuaRising ^ | June 12, 2006 | Dr. Bill Belew

[G. Stolyarov II]

Will the list never end of what China has the most of, does the most of, or is growing the quickest at?

The number of rooftop solar water heaters in China exceeds that of ALL the rest of the WORLD combined!

It is also changing the way Chinese live their daily lives.

Cell phones now allow farmers to get up-to-the-minute crop prices. Solar hot water heaters now allow those in the outer districts to take a bath more regularly. Hah!

But, I guess it isn't funny if you are one of those who had to wait to take a bath every couple of weeks because it was such a hassle to heat water each time.

Much of China gets about 2000 hours of sunlight each year - in spite of its latitude. Were they to build a giant solar panel and put it in the Gobi desert, they could supply power to the rest of the world!

Solar power is big and growing in China-- but then, so is everything else.

What do you think?

[G. Stolyarov II]

This is most interesting news; we know that solar energy is inefficient and not worth the cost in the West-- but its popularity in China indicates that many Chinese think otherwise. Resource availability (including regularity of sunlight) in China might be different from that in the West; fossil fuels might be more expensive relative to the earnings of the average Chinese worker, for example. So it is possible that solar energy might actually be genuinely profitable in China-- which might mean that the Chinese will develop and improve solar energy technology without the need for massive subsidies from Western taxpayers. See Dr. Belew's blog at ZhongHuaRising

[stylin19a]

Their fresh water supply is already crap.
More people takin more baths ?
ok....

[atomicpossum]

This sounds like old Soviet-style propaganda.