Elon Musk makes this Big Claim about China: ‘Most people don’t realize how much...’

Elon Musk recently shared a Twitter (now X)post pointing out the scale of China’s investment in solar energy. In the post, he said that most people do not realize how much solar power China has installed, adding that it is enough to power half of the United States. Musk was responding to a post by X user Jesse Peltan who wrote”If China's 888 GW of installed solar operated at U.S.capacity factors, it would generate 44% of U.S. electricity.We have a massive irradiance advantage, especially compared to Southeastern China.The U.S. should dominate in solar, but we are getting absolutely smoked.Even with poorer solar resources, China generates 3x as much electricity from solar. China's solar generation now exceeds U.S. nuclear.(and exceeds Chinese nuclear by a factor of 2) Replying to the post, the Tesla CEO wrote Most people don’t realize how much solar power China has installed. Enough to power half of America!Musk, who leads companies like Tesla and SpaceX, has long supported the use of renewable energy sources like solar power. In another post, he wrote “China is deploying vast amounts of solar power” quoting Peltan's data that China has installed 278 GW of solar capacity in 2024. “Solar will obviously be over a billion times more energy than everything else combined,” he wrote in an X post.