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Economy

Solar panels and money.
Energy

How Solar Could Lose Its Cost Advantage

Tariffs and the loss of Inflation Reduction Act incentives could realign new power pricing, according to Morgan Stanley.

Economy

AM Briefing: Permitting Goes Paperless

On modernizing permitting, IRA funds, and a revolt at BP

Yellow
Podcast

What Happens to Global Decarbonization in a Trade War?

Rob and Jesse assess the climate geopolitics of Trump’s latest trade moves.

Economy

How the Trump Trade War Is Hitting America’s Plastic Industrial Complex

There is one area where China depends on U.S. imports: the building materials for plastics.

Blue
China’s Minerals Pause All Pain, No Gain for U.S.

AM Briefing: China’s Pause All Pain, No Gain

On China’s export pause, BrightDrop demand, and fighting wildfires

Yellow
An Impulse stovetop.

Why American Manufacturing Is So ‘Disincentivized,’ According to a Hardware CEO

Impulse Labs founder Sam D’Amico breaks down the reasons tariffs won’t help.

Yellow
Economy

AM Briefing: Tariff Turmoil

On stock selloffs, coal production, and shipping emissions

Trump’s Tariffs Are Here, and Financial Markets Are in Turmoil
<p>Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images</p>

Current conditions: States left flooded from recent severe storms are now facing freezing temperatures • Firefighters are battling blazes in Scotland due to unusually warm and dry weather • Hospitals in India are reporting a 25% rise in heat-related illnesses compared to last year. Yesterday the country’s northern state of Rajasthan reached 115 degrees Fahrenheit, about 13 degrees higher than seasonal norms.

THE TOP FIVE

1. Markets in turmoil as Trump’s new tariffs come into effect

President Trump’s sweeping new tariffs came into effect at 12:01 a.m. on Wednesday, rattling the world’s markets and raising the risk of a global trade war. The levies, which include a 104% tariff on Chinese imports, triggered a mass sell-off in U.S. Treasury bonds, hiking yields as investors worry about a potential recession and flock to alternative safe-haven investments. The price of oil fell for the fifth day in a row to its lowest since 2021, with Brent futures at about $61 per barrel, well below the $65 level that oil producers need in order to turn a profit drilling new wells nationwide. As Heatmap’s Robinson Meyer explained recently, the tariffs are an outright catastrophe for the oil industry because they threaten a global downturn that would hurt oil demand at a time when oil cartel OPEC+ is increasing its output. Trump’s slate of tariffs will impact the cost of just about everything, from gasoline to e-bikes to LNG to cars. China imposed retaliatory tariffs, increasing them from 34% to 84% in response to the U.S. escalation. Meanwhile, the European Union will vote today on whether to impose its own retaliatory fees. European shares plummeted, as did Asian and Australian stocks.

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Podcast

How China’s Industrial Policy Really Works

Rob and Jesse get into the nitty gritty on China’s energy policy with Joanna Lewis and John Paul Helveston.

Xi Jinping.
<p>Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images</p>

China’s industrial policy for clean energy has turned the country into a powerhouse of solar, wind, battery, and electric vehicle manufacturing.

But long before the country’s factories moved global markets — and invited Trump’s self-destructive tariffs — the country implemented energy and technology policy to level up its domestic industry. How did those policies work? Which tools worked best? And if the United States needs to rebuild in the wake of Trump’s tariffs, what should this country learn?

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