To date, China still cannot produce wind turbines with sufficient quality to compete with Made In Europe/Made in USA ones. And they still use European technology (as does US companies, and most of the US wind manufacturers are European anyway...). But with solar PV, their strategy of using defacto slave labor as well as cheap money/continual bankruptcy (which the Chinese governments just eats) has driven most USA/European manufacturers out of business. But then solar PV is a much higher cost way to produce electricity than wind turbines, anyway, and most of the US and Canada have awesome wind energy resources compared to China. With wind turbines, the cost of transportation is also a big thing. For the USA, the problem is most "liberal" solar PV advocates don't care about paying decent wages for PV manufacturing workers, as well as those in the entire supply chain. All they care about is super cheap modules combined with massive tax avoidance subsides, which are now going away. But even if you zero out the cost of parts for PV, it is STILL a more expensive way to make electricity than for unsubsidized wind turbines... And with so little PV manufacturing in the US, there is not as much political backing as compared to a renewable energy supply business where most parts and most of the supply chain exists in the US....
Your profitability "sources" are wrong. Plastics and petrochemicals are generally MUCH more profitable than are sales of gasoline, diesel and kerosene ($/gallon, $/lb). It's just that the volume of material sold for fuel is so much greater than the volume used for chemicals. Plus, not all petroleum contents are easily made into protitable chemicals (e.g. Hexane, octane, Dodecane). And the source of the hydrogen used to make ammonia is usually methane (nat gas) or water and pet coke. In fact, petroleum refining actually uses a lot of hydrogen to make gasoline ("hydrocracking"), especially for crap grade crude like Tar Sands Sludge... but, nice article, other than those trivial points...
To date, China still cannot produce wind turbines with sufficient quality to compete with Made In Europe/Made in USA ones. And they still use European technology (as does US companies, and most of the US wind manufacturers are European anyway...). But with solar PV, their strategy of using defacto slave labor as well as cheap money/continual bankruptcy (which the Chinese governments just eats) has driven most USA/European manufacturers out of business. But then solar PV is a much higher cost way to produce electricity than wind turbines, anyway, and most of the US and Canada have awesome wind energy resources compared to China. With wind turbines, the cost of transportation is also a big thing. For the USA, the problem is most "liberal" solar PV advocates don't care about paying decent wages for PV manufacturing workers, as well as those in the entire supply chain. All they care about is super cheap modules combined with massive tax avoidance subsides, which are now going away. But even if you zero out the cost of parts for PV, it is STILL a more expensive way to make electricity than for unsubsidized wind turbines... And with so little PV manufacturing in the US, there is not as much political backing as compared to a renewable energy supply business where most parts and most of the supply chain exists in the US....
Your profitability "sources" are wrong. Plastics and petrochemicals are generally MUCH more profitable than are sales of gasoline, diesel and kerosene ($/gallon, $/lb). It's just that the volume of material sold for fuel is so much greater than the volume used for chemicals. Plus, not all petroleum contents are easily made into protitable chemicals (e.g. Hexane, octane, Dodecane). And the source of the hydrogen used to make ammonia is usually methane (nat gas) or water and pet coke. In fact, petroleum refining actually uses a lot of hydrogen to make gasoline ("hydrocracking"), especially for crap grade crude like Tar Sands Sludge... but, nice article, other than those trivial points...