Launch Money: 391,570 views Streamed live on Apr 15, 2026: Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman and historian Heather Cox Richardson are joining forces for Lunch Money, a new monthly conversation series. Krugman writes the popular Substack newsletter bearing his name; Richardson’s Letters from an American reaches over 6 million readers every day. Join them for a wide-ranging, thoughtful, and provocative conversation about whatever is on their ever-curious minds.
… But on this one, they are all wrong.
About Battery, for instant, it is efficiency on energy density that matters: 400WH/kg vs 13,000WH/kg. The state-of-the-art Li-Ion Battery has a long way to achieve equal or better than conventional gas or air fuel started in 20th Century (though it was not “19th Century” as the the experts claimed). And, there are so many life-span product or project defects of the New or Renewable or Sustainable Energy concepts and experiments, have increased resource consumptions and pollution, were eventually far worse or backward comparing to the past The so called New Energy. Raising Capitals to these new technological ventures without scientific justification were wrong.
Technically, going forward in 21st century productions and applications supposed to have higher efficiency (about natural resource utilization, labor costs and work condition, materials raw and processed, energy used in manufacture, and environment impacts, dispose waste, and so on, as the whole). Overall solutions upon: (1) the whole life cycle should be considered: of infrastructure construction and equipment manufacture, and disposal of industrial waste; (2) cost to decommission of already-invested conventional infrastructure, facilities and jobs; (3) resource geology: mining, processing, disposal, and pollutions, in all places: cities, rural, lands, mountains and oceans, and populations in poor countries.
To solve such complexity of compound challenges, it is not about government policy, it is about breaking multi-discipline barriers in physics. It is R&D needed to be done, before investing huge amount money for these 21st Century mistakes.
The world’s scientists should all work on in-depth problems in their respective fields to overcome problems that the New-Energy encountered, instead to please politicians in return to get new industries and markets started blindly, counting on government will subsidize costs and give funds, and now involve private sectors to invest.
To fill up some 30 folds of technical gap of energy density is a marathon only just started. What the world government administration are doing now, is to waste resources for a set of too-early applications of the yet-low-tech, not signifying and reflecting a new era of hi-tech revolution.
While politicians should concentrate on feasibility of people’s livelihood in present. The problem is about CURRENT jobs with existing industry, not with future industry to replace existing jobs and industry now. The long process of the industrial transformation is much longer than elected politician’s governing terms.
Government planning, either central or global, China and world vs US, have been all wrong in both basic physics and economic feasibilities. It all needed to be corrected.
Yes, a government should sponsor R&D (technology-to-prototype) on new-energies, but should be in right direction; but leave profitable and beneficial segments of product-to-market for private-sectors when the R&D has concluded being successful. The scientists need to prove the R&D is in right direction and assure results. For example, hydrogen fuel cells, if fully developed into commercial efficiency, will deliver a promising energy density of 33,000WH/kg, with zero pollution and generate zero wastes. Though it still have cost impacts to infrastructure buildout. Energy generation, storage-transportation and engines, all need to be fully in parallel developed and made feasible all together.
Before all those encountered or promised problems solved in R&D, all investments and expenses on industrial development so far, and if keeps pushing, are wastes due to the miss-direction.
For example, a recent “revolution” to replace Li-ion battery with Sodium-ion ones. It promised have shorter charge time and less fire hazard, with trade off of half energy density so that it is double in weight and volume, that intends to solve problems that battery energy started. While this is a “battery revolution” all right, to correct its few problems and then create more problems. Repeating and cycling the problem. Of course people who invented this new product is already dominated stationed battery energy storage market, they just needed higher volume of products to be installed. For fire, that should not be problem when Li-ion battery introduced into application, at the first place.
These popular commentators are so wrong about past, present and future. During 19th Century, there was no automobiles running in the world. Steam Engine? What is she talking criticizing US government intend to go back to, Steam Engine Era? Everybody in the world are not continuing what the 20th Century started: modern coal and natural gas burn power plants, even the “21st Century China” who embraced electric-cars, is also majorly used coal as fuel to generate electricity to build electric cars, then charged car batteries.
Heather Cox Richardson’s marine-biology scientist sister, is so wrong, too. That is the problem about scientists’.
While Paul Krugman sited the current solar, battery and electric cars and wind are technologies of the 21st century and future. He is narrowly focusing on few failing new-energy attempts, trying to categorize them as new-tech, ignored the fact that there are 3/4 of 21st Century of diversified R&D ahead.
Scientists and Experts need to concentrate on inventing and proving technologies that can enable a trendy new industry. Guard their social obligation first. For true benefit and returns, not for illogic results, not for political motivation speeches for flawed approaches under the name of scientific. Like some say to public: “I am Science!” No, certainly you are not, that is a plain logic.
These people, represent and influence Government Plan and Strategy, help the New-Energy Industry with sponsorship, but also create risks. Later, government will withdraw on any ill-positioned fat giant infant startups, and discontinue their subsidize and financial aid. The national policy factors are only startups’ illusion and risk in planning, and allow them to escape from accountability to private-sector investors (the force-majeure in business proposals will provide excuses for their failures). We have seen such patterns in the past of solar battery industry rise-and-fall in US, then in Germany, then now in China. Do people open their eyes to see the fact that China government’s current financial burden had created surplus of electric cars? BYD is in fact hugely in debt: currently $20B; its debt to equity ratio is 0.6, and its debt to EBITDA ratio is 6.3? You’d want all US industries to run business in this way, calling this is the technology and economy of future to pursue?
China, yes, is able to sustain New-Energy Industry with its ultimate power of socialist planned economy. The West can, and is, not able to compete China, due to differentiated major promises. But China is instead complements resource and environment burn-out portion of the New-Energy industry to the West, which the latter has proven could not afford. By giving up these practically high-consumption and high-pollution efforts, such as mining, metallurgic processing and manufacturing batteries and electric cars, and wind mills and electric motors/generators, Western energy industry CAN benefit from China, by keep the land clean and population not polluted. Thus both sides of New-Energy Industries are sustainable by as depending 20th Century fossil-fuel burning energies as the beginning. For the historian titled about 19th Century, that the both have long passed. By then the North America oil tycoons were making money for supply coal-oil burn street lights.
The conclusion on this argument: on the same ecological chain of New-Energy Industry, the West counts on China’s burning out in front-end segments, for its own later segments in applications to be successful. If you call it revolution, yes. It is a rotation of bad burdens. Saving the World, good for Western countries, but let China burn.