- The Department of Energy, led by oil-and-gas veteran Chris Wright, claimed renewables are “worthless” without sun or wind, drawing widespread criticism and a viral two-word clapback from Elon Musk that pointed out the existence of massive energy storage projects that can continue feeding electricity into the grid.
President Donald Trump’s Department of Energy sparked backlash last week after posting on X that “wind and solar energy infrastructure is essentially worthless when it is dark outside, and the wind is not blowing.”
The message echoed recent remarks from Energy Secretary Chris Wright, a longtime oil and gas executive, who defended Trump’s claim that renewable energy is driving up electricity costs, though he acknowledged the picture is more complicated.
He also argued that wind and solar are “intermittent” and, without large-scale batteries, “worthless” when the sun isn’t shining or the wind isn’t blowing. Greater reliance on renewables, he added, effectively creates “a whole separate grid” that raises overall costs.
Still, the DoE’s X post drew millions of views and many mocking replies, including a community note reminding readers that batteries exist to store power when the sun isn’t shining or the wind isn’t blowing.
Among the most prominent replies was from Elon Musk, who cut through the noise with just two words: “Um … hello?”
Alongside his reply, the Tesla CEO boosted his company’s large-scale battery business, which had recently touted a 370-megawatt-hour storage project in Australia designed to stabilize the grid and expand renewable use. His post garnered a little over half a million views. Tesla also has a solar panel business for use in homes.
The Department of Energy didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Several users also pointed out Musk’s extensive campaign support for the president last year despite Tesla’s focus on green energy.
Musk spent nearly $300 million on Republican candidates in the last election cycle, endorsing Trump after he survived an assassination attempt. After he was elected, Trump installed Musk to head the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE,) and the two men seemed inseparable, with Musk writing in February that he loves Trump “as much as any straight man can love another man.”
But the two also had clear ideological differences from the start, particularly around renewables. Musk heads one of the world’s leading electric-vehicle companies, and has long supported all kinds of renewable energy, including solar and wind.
The alliance unraveled in a very public break-up earlier this year over the One Big Beautiful Bill, which sparked Musk’s fierce opposition because it ended Biden-era tax credits for renewable energy and is expected to add to U.S. Debt.
In a now-deleted X post, Musk escalated the feud even further, accusing Trump of being named in the Epstein files and of blocking the release of more details. Since then, Musk has said that he’ll do “a lot less” political spending in the future.
“I think I’ve done enough,” he said in a video interview with Bloomberg News at the Qatar Economic Forum.
Meanwhile, Trump’s administration has sought to cripple clean energy, blocking nearly $19 billion in renewable energy projects and announcing that it will not approve any wind or solar projects.
The president himself has used various justifications for his anti-renewable stance, saying that wind mills kill birds and are ugly, while he wrote in a Truth Social post that solar panels are “farmer destroying.”
“The days of stupidity are over in the USA!!!” Trump added.