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ICEPT staff and PhD students publish widely in a range of academic journals, policy reports and technical papers.
@article{Senior:2026:10.1016/j.nxener.2026.100766,
author = {Senior, J and Halttunen, K and Staffell, I},
doi = {10.1016/j.nxener.2026.100766},
journal = {Next Energy},
title = {China-US tensions over renewable energy technologies and their potential to delay the energy transition},
url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.nxener.2026.100766},
volume = {13},
year = {2026}
}
TY - JOUR
AB - The war in Iran and Russia's invasion of Ukraine show that energy and geopolitics are locked in a powerful 2-way relationship: fossil fuel supply and demand influence geopolitics, while geopolitics shapes national energy strategies. The energy transition shifts attention to the geopolitics of renewable energy (RE), raising concerns over critical minerals, technological know-how, and manufacturing. However, academic debate largely focuses on how RE impacts geopolitics, neglecting how geopolitics affects RE deployment. This study uses 10 in-depth expert interviews from 2022 to investigate both directions of this relationship. Interviewees identified mechanisms by which solar photovoltaics, wind and battery production increase China-US tensions (particularly regarding manufacturing and critical minerals) and that these tensions already reduce RE deployment (primarily in the US). Recent developments, including the US Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and its partial retrenchment, tariff escalation and Chinese export controls, are broadly consistent with those channels. We develop and apply a framework around ‘pressures’ and ‘tensions’ that distinguishes structural supply-chain vulnerabilities from the observable geopolitical responses they trigger, and traces how these map onto technology-specific deployment risks. Using this framework, the interviews challenge claims that diversification, substitution or recycling will mitigate critical mineral pressures in the near term. They also reveal differentiated vulnerabilities between technologies: batteries face the greatest geopolitical risks, and wind power is most resilient. Both directions of the RE-geopolitics relationship require further research, particularly with continued changes to the US IRA and new trade tariffs. Decarbonisation may intensify certain geopolitical tensions, and the risks identified here pose notable challenges to the technology roll-out required for the energy transition.
AU - Senior,J
AU - Halttunen,K
AU - Staffell,I
DO - 10.1016/j.nxener.2026.100766
PY - 2026///
TI - China-US tensions over renewable energy technologies and their potential to delay the energy transition
T2 - Next Energy
UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.nxener.2026.100766
VL - 13
ER -