Racking systems to hold solar panels sit empty on top of an old strip mine in Portage, Pennsylvania, on Monday, 25 April 2022. The fallout from a trade probe is rippling through the US solar industry, delaying projects and threatening to slow the renewable energy transition. Photo: Justin Merriman / Bloomberg / Getty Images
Racking systems to hold solar panels sit empty on top of an old strip mine in Portage, Pennsylvania, on Monday, 25 April 2022. The fallout from a trade probe is rippling through the US solar industry, delaying projects and threatening to slow the renewable energy transition. Photo: Justin Merriman / Bloomberg / Getty Images

By Ella Nilsen
6 May 2022

(CNN) – The solar energy industry has been thrown into a panic and projects are grinding to a halt after the Biden administration launched an investigation that some solar CEOs worry could tank the industry.

The Commerce Department launched the probe in March into whether four countries in Southeast Asia that supply about 80% of US solar panels and parts — Cambodia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam — are using components from China that should be subject to US tariffs.

The fallout within the industry has been significant.

A survey in late April by the Solar Energy Industries Association, a non-profit trade association, found 318 solar projects in the US had already been delayed or canceled, and several CEOs told CNN they expect more to follow. Industry leaders fear the probe could also have a devastating impact on the solar workforce.

The Commerce Department has defended it as a transparent and necessary process, but several solar industry experts and executives told CNN it has also essentially frozen most solar imports into the US because of the threat of steep, retroactive tariffs.

“With this administration and this much support, we’re in a position where we’re going to be laying off people in the renewables industry,” George Hershman, CEO of utility solar contractor SOLV Energy, told CNN. “While you say all those things we agree with, we’re getting crushed because we literally can’t buy a module today. It’s so frustrating.”

Survey result of solar companies’ business and employment expectations in 2022. This survey result shows the share of 2022 expected solar deployments at risk, with 80 percent of respondents reporting at least half of their current-year solar pipeline at risk. Many report larger risk to their 2023 pipeline. The “Solar Industry Impacts from U.S. Department of Commerce Investigation into Imports of Crystalline Silicon Photovoltaic Modules and Cells from Cambodia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam” survey seeks to measure impacts of Dept. of Commerce’s decision to take up the Auxin anti-circumvention petition on solar companies’ business and employment expectations in 2022. 730 responses collected between March 31 and April 21 from SEIA member and non-member companies. From the 730 responses, we matched 596 business locations from SEIA’s database of companies active in the U.S. solar industry. These responses make up all state-level impact analysis presented. Graphic: SEIA
Survey result of solar companies’ business and employment expectations in 2022. This survey result shows the share of 2022 expected solar deployments at risk, with 80 percent of respondents reporting at least half of their current-year solar pipeline at risk. Many report larger risk to their 2023 pipeline. The “Solar Industry Impacts from U.S. Department of Commerce Investigation into Imports of Crystalline Silicon Photovoltaic Modules and Cells from Cambodia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam” survey seeks to measure impacts of Dept. of Commerce’s decision to take up the Auxin anti-circumvention petition on solar companies’ business and employment expectations in 2022. 730 responses collected between March 31 and April 21 from SEIA member and non-member companies. From the 730 responses, we matched 596 business locations from SEIA’s database of companies active in the U.S. solar industry. These responses make up all state-level impact analysis presented. Graphic: SEIA

The investigation was launched after one small US-based company, Auxin Solar, filed a complaint in February. Auxin CEO Mamun Rashid told CNN that the complaint “was existential” for his company.

“When prices of finished panels from Southeast Asia come in below our bill of materials cost, American manufacturers cannot compete,” Rashid said, adding that “if foreign producers are circumventing U.S. law and causing harm to U.S. producers like Auxin Solar, it needs to be addressed.”

Rashid told CNN it’s “lamentable” that frustration is aimed at his company, rather than the “foreign suppliers” that he says are circumventing US law. Rashid also noted that Auxin is “here and can quickly scale up to meet needs of utilities within 2 to 3 quarters if we have the purchase order today.

“Solar industry leaders have been communicating with the Commerce Department and have also communicated their concerns about the probe to Biden’s top climate officials — including McCarthy and US Climate Envoy John Kerry — a person familiar with the conversations said.”

The administration has been in touch with and is engaging with all kinds of solar stakeholders including the trade associations but also labor, communities, and NGOs,” a White House official told CNN. [more]

Solar energy projects are grinding to a halt in the US amid investigation into parts from China