this post was submitted on 28 Sep 2026
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They were water heating panels. Not photovoltaic. They did not produce electricity. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_at_the_White_House
Yes, that was the technology at the time. By creating a wedge issue like "solar panels are unsightly" or "wind farms kill birds", politicians undermine good science and good economic ideas to please their donors.
every joules the heating panels used to heat water is 1 joules not needed to be burned with fossil fuels.
Thanks for the details. Still good and saving fossil fuels.
PV wasn’t economically feasible at smaller scale until relatively recently, but that doesn’t mean that preheating water for heating or domestic hot water is a waste of time. It can save considerable costs and fossil fuel consumption.
Yes but it was still a step in the right direction that could have led to more steps. Who is to say even Bush wouldn't have looked at those every day before deciding "let's do the new electric ones" or whatever.
I swear some people are just "100% perfect progress NOW or NOTHING, ITS SHIT WHY THESE PEOPLE ARE ALL TERRIBLE.
That's not how anything works. Bush didn't oppose green energy because he just never saw a solar panel, he opposed green energy because it went against the vested interests of the oil companies he represented.
That is the reason why we're "terrible," because we're aware of the deeper systemic forces that are causing the problems, and of the fact that symbolic gestures don't actually fix anything. We are terrible for the same reason your mechanic is terrible when he says that getting a car wash won't actually fix your engine.
Except, it is the way it works to some extent.
People are influenced by things around them all the time.
If you see some outdated solar panels on your office roof and have the power to update them to be more useful, eventually it might happen.
It's like shit like "rainbow capitalism", that people bitch is "just corporations trying to make money". Yeah, but it's money off positive things and makes it all more visible to larger portions of the population.
And who knows, maybe in this hypothetical scenario Bush updates solar panels as a fake will of good, while still supporting oil. But then the parts of the larger population sees it, and says "Oh, the white house has solar, that's nice, maybe I should try solar."
In that case, perhaps you should simply send a heartfelt letter to President Trump explaining the benefits of solar power.
It is still energy independence. To heat water, you can either use the sun for free or buy/extract petrochemicals
Which, had they been left in place, would have been replaced by PV panels when the tech became viable. And, there would have been another photo op.
Obviously, this was meant to illustrate the position of the administration on this subject. The same way removing them illustrates the Republican position.
Remember when Bush said he didn't like broccoli? Like it or not, our politicians are influences, some would say the OG influences.
I mean, they were.
Bush put solar panels on the White House in 2002. Two solar thermal systems and a 9kW PV system. 167 panels in total.
Obama added even more in 2013.