Climate Denial Crock of the Week

Memo to Fox News: If you are concerned about your credibility going in the dumper, maybe you should review items like this.

Media Matters:

Fox News claimed that the future of solar power in the U.S. is “dim” because we have less sunlight than countries like Germany, the current world leader in solar generation. But Fox completely reversed the facts: the U.S. receives far more direct sunlight, but has been outperformed due to Germany’s superior solar policies.

On Fox & Friends, co-host Gretchen Carlson claimed that the U.S. solar “industry’s future looks dim.” The show brought on Fox Business reporter Shibani Joshi, who said that Germany’s solar industry is doing “great” because “they’ve got a lot more sun than we do,” before adding,  “In California, it’s a great solution, but here on the East Coast it’s just not going to work.”

The U.S. is lagging behind Germany in solar power generation, but it doesn’t have anything to do with our solar potential. In fact, the Southwest has “among the best photovoltaic resources in the world,” according to a report by GTM Research. And even the East Coast states have greater solar potential than Germany, as illustrated by this map from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory:

Just for reference, Germany is at approximately the same latitude as Newfoundland.