Bill McKibben Is Right — Here Comes The Sun!

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Bill McKibben, the tireless environmental advocate, first came to prominence with his book, The End Of Nature, in 1989. His new book, Here Comes The Sun, pays homage to the George Harrison song of the same name. On McKibben’s website, you will find this description:

“Here Comes the Sun tells the story of the sudden spike in power from the sun and wind—and the desperate fight of the fossil fuel industry and their politicians to hold this new power at bay. From the everyday citizens who installed solar panels equal to a third of Pakistan’s electric grid in a year to the world’s sixth-largest economy — California — nearly halving its use of natural gas in the last two years, Bill McKibben traces the arrival of plentiful, inexpensive solar energy. And he shows how solar power is more than just a path out of the climate crisis: it is a chance to reorder the world on saner and more humane grounds. You can’t hoard solar energy or hold it in reserves—it’s available to all.”

We have been having quite a discussion about solar lately here at the funhouse we call CleanTechnica, fueled by lots of thoughtful and insightful comments from readers. Yesterday we discussed the surge in personal solar installations in Pakistan and what it may portend for the traditional utility model in which the company owns the electricity and only shares it with others if they can pay for it. Solar has the potential to upend that model or skip right over it in some cases.

Solar Surge In Africa

Today, a report by Ember Energy says much the same thing that is happening in Pakistan is happening in Africa as well. It says Africa’s solar panel imports set a new record in the 12 months from June 2024 to June 2025. In that 12-month period, 15,032 MW of solar panels were imported to Africa — a 60% increase over the 9,379 MW imported in the preceding 12-month period.

Much of the increase in the last 12 months took place in countries other than South Africa. In the rest of the continent, imports of solar panels tripled from 3,734 MW between June 2023 and June 2024 to 11,248 MW in the 12 months from June 2024 to June 2025.

“The increase in imports is more than a single month spike,” Ember says. “Monthly imports jumped to a record in December 2024, but have consistently elevated since. While the December surge initially raised questions — potentially driven by Chinese manufacturers meeting year-end sales targets — the data now indicates this is part of a broader, structural trend.”

The surge did not occur only in one country. Algeria rose 33-fold in the 12 months to June 2025, compared to the previous 12 months. Zambia rose eight-fold, Botswana seven-fold, Sudan six-fold, and Liberia, DRC, Benin, Angola, and Ethiopia all more than tripled.

China Passes 1000 GW Of Installed Solar

China exports a lot of solar panels, but at the same time, it is installing more domestically than any other nation. In the first six months of 2025 alone, China installed new solar systems with a total capacity of 210 GW, according to Renewable Energy Industry News. That makes it the first nation to reach that level.

China’s economic and industrial policy consistently focuses on renewable energy, battery storage, and electric transportation. The Chinese government wants to reduce the high import risks and geopolitical dependencies associated with fossil fuels such as oil, gas, and coal in order to operate on global markets from a position of industrial strength.

CleanTechnica readers are all above average and so they know that China also has the dubious distinction of building more coal-fired generating stations than any other nation. How does that square with its clean energy intentions? A partial answer is that coal is a tactical strategy to keep the economy humming until the strategic goal of renewable energy can catch up. Is that cynical? Perhaps, but it may also be seen as practical.

The way China operates, all those coal-powered facilities don’t have to continue in operation for the entirety of their useful life. If they get shuttered prematurely because they are no longer needed, that will happen. China has a plan to be 100% renewable by 2060. That is ten years later than other countries. The difference is, China can be expected to actually meet its target, while those other nations will still be doling out truckloads of good intentions in 2060 with no real progress made between now and then.

According to China Daily, the expansion of renewable energy will continue in the coming years. Based on the country’s 15th Five-Year Plan (2026–2030), the CEC expects an annual increase of 200 to 300 GW in renewable energy capacity.

In total, China’s installed power capacity is expected to rise to around 3.9 TW by the end of 2025 — up 16.5% compared to the previous year. At the same time, it expects electricity consumption in 2025 to increase by about 6%. By the end of 2025, total solar capacity in China is expected to reach 1,300 GW.

“The solar power produced in China in 2025 alone will already account for about half of the annual electricity generation of all nuclear power plants operating worldwide,” said Dr. Norbert Allnoch of Internationales Wirtschaftsforum Regenerative Energien (IWR).

By the end of the decade, the IWR expects solar capacity in China to reach as much as 2,500 GW — more than the total of all global nuclear power production. “But that’s merely a side effect,” Allnoch emphasized. He said China aims to further expand its leading position in the future sectors of renewable energy technology, storage technology, and electric transportation, while gradually reducing its dependency on fossil fuels. If only other nations would sign on to that sort of policy goal.

Bill McKibben Sees Solar Rising

All this good news about solar energy meshes well with what Bill McKibben has to say in a recent interview with Newsweek, which asked why more people are not aware of the rise in solar power. He said,

“I think it’s because we’ve spent so long calling this stuff alternative energy that it got stuck in a corner of our brain and became difficult for people to imagine. You read endless stories about all the different kinds of possible alternatives, small nuclear reactors and tidal power and geothermal, all of which are interesting, but none of which are scaling in any significant way.

“Meanwhile, this is so obviously the economic way forward that it’s, almost without people paying attention, has just snuck up on everyone. It happened very fast—that’s the other thing. You know, it’s only maybe five years ago that we crossed some invisible line where this stuff became cheaper than burning coal and gas and oil. So, this is a different world than the one we’ve lived in.”

He talked about how people for a long time have been trying to find ways to make fossil fuels more expensive — after all, they pay nothing for the waste products they produce. “Now we’re in this upside-down world where renewable energy is cheap and fossil energy is comparatively expensive. And I think the first people to really figure out the true dynamics of this world were in the oil industry, who understood it for the threat that it was.”

What gladdens the heart of this Vermont-based environmental campaigner is that California is burning 40% less methane to generate electricity that it did just 2 years ago, thanks in large measure to the abundance of solar energy produced within its borders.

“You’ve got to figure that for the oil industry, that’s a scary number. That really indicates the kind of pressure that they’re starting to feel.

“And I think that that explains more than anything else their unprecedented involvement in our political life. And so, to me, that’s sort of the ultimate back-handed compliment to the renewable energy boom — the fact that big oil is clearly freaked out and doing everything they can to slow it down.”

The cracks are beginning to appear in the fossil fuel business model. As Michael Barnard reported earlier this month, “Wall Street’s six largest banks have cut their financing to oil, gas and coal projects by 25 percent year-on-year through August 1, 2025. In dollar terms, that means about $73 billion this year versus roughly $97 billion in the same period in 2024.”

Take all this news and tie it up and what have you got? A glimpse of the future that includes a lot less fossil fuels, despite the efforts of the current administration to drag the US back to the 19th century. Somewhere, Adam Smith is smiling, as his economic theory is being proven to work exactly as he said it would — cheaperer is betterer.

The age of fossil fuels is not already over mostly because of the enormous political influence the industry has bought with its bribes campaign contributions. But in the end, none of that will matter. You can stick a fork in the fossil fuel industry. It’s done.