It’s hardly a new phenomenon, sadly, when Hollywood stars kiss up to China. Usually, they don’t even try to bother letting facts get in the way.
Ah, but that’s where Edward Norton and Ted Danson went wrong. The “Fight Club” and “Cheers” star decided to simp for Beijing’s energy policy on the latter’s podcast this week, with the two libs declaring that China was on its way to being the “first petro-zero economy.”
The problem there: Not only is China not there yet, it’s the world’s biggest carbon-emitter and its largest user of coal, and it’s only getting worse.
But, you know, other than that…
Norton, apparently not terribly bright without imaginary friend Brad Pitt along with him, was the one who made the “first petro-zero economy” quote in a condemnation of “American exceptionalism,” because apparently exceptionalism equals renewables, or something.
“They are going to be the first electro-superpower,” he said of China.
“Which we could have been,” Danson interjected. “And now we’re going to have to buy it from them when this [Donald Trump] goes away and we come to our senses. We won’t have that industry like China does.”
Are Hollywood stars deliberately ignorant, or do they come by it honestly?
Deliberately ignorant: 38% (8 Votes)
Honestly stupid: 62% (13 Votes)
Norton agreed.
“And by the way, it’s both sides of the aisle,” Norton said. “In the state of California, we have now the most regressive policy toward residential solar, distributed solar collection, and storage… but even under Gavin Newsom.”
Of course, this is because you can’t build a millimeter of air in California without 62 different permits, and you basically can’t change a lightbulb without changing a law, but one digresses. When the People’s Republic of Sacramento is being brought forth as an argument as to why centrally planned Chinese energy policy is kicking our butts, it’s hard to take you seriously.
As Norton went on to point out, “This is a state that should be energy independent… This is a state that should have gigawatts of residential distributed solar.”
To be fair, he gives both Florida and Texas — under Republican governors — credit for getting stuff done. But then he says that “if you get to travel” to other places — assumedly like China — you get to see that stuff can get done on green energy.
“We have this enduring narrative of American exceptionalism, like of, America’s ‘alpha,’ of America’s cultural superiority,” a rambling Norton said.
“And the question is, and I don’t think people fully grasp the degree to which we’re going to ghettoize ourselves as an energy state, in terms of education, in terms of health. We’re not anywhere near the top of what other people are experiencing. And if we embrace this idea of pride in regression, where is that going to take us? It’s not going to take us into a place that we’re happy about for our kids.”
Edward Norton rejects “American exceptionalism” and praises China as more eco-friendly than the West:
NORTON: China is on its way to being the first, petro-zero economy. They are going to be the first electro-superpower.
TED DANSON: Which we could have been. And now we’re… pic.twitter.com/JGObkC3dwR
— Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) June 26, 2026
Wow, man. Wow. Deep. Also? False.
China is hands-down the world’s largest energy consumer, representing about a third of consumption in 2023. According to Our World in Data, most of that — over 25,000 terawatt-hours of the 42,756 terawatt-hours it produces — comes from coal. Only 9 percent of the total comes from renewables of any sort, and that’s including nuclear power.
In the United States, yes, we have a slightly lower percentage of our power from renewables — 8.2 percent. However, most of our energy doesn’t come from coal but from cleaner petro-sources, with oil (9,949 terawatt-hours) and gas (9,022 terawatt-hours) being the top two sources. We consume less than one-tenth of China’s coal — 2,196 terawatt-hours.
So, China is nowhere near becoming “the first electro-superpower.” To the extent they might have more electric cars, those cars are powered by coal consumption. (China only burned up a little over 8,000 terawatt-hours of coal at the turn of the century.) The United States’ reliance on every form of carbon power except natural gas, which is relatively clean, has been either steady or decreasing.
However, “if you get to travel” and you get the Beijing propaganda treatment like Hollywood stars tend to get, you’ll believe anything about the country’s Sinofuturist façade, including the fake news that they’re some green-energy powerhouse. Maybe if Norton spent a little more time in China — like California, where he’s intimately familiar with how central planning ruins everything, including renewable energy — he’d realize this is a hoax and stop rah-rah-ing Beijing’s energy policies.
The difference is that the moment he said this in China, the Chinese government would have him locked up on some specious charges. You can’t make a pretend “first electro-superpower” omelette without breaking a few eggs, after all.
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