Solar Tariffs News

The office of the U.S. Trade Representative has removed the exemption of bifacial products from Section 201 tariffs, effective October 28.

U.S. manufacturers First Solar and SunPower could be among the winners following the announcement that the Trump administration will impose a 25% tariff on bifacial panels, although analysts warned that the new tariffs could be an overall negative for the industry.

The US government has extended its solar import tariffs to bifacial modules, in a policy u-turn set to partially redraw the global trade flows of the fast maturing technology.

The U.S. Trade Representative has not responded to claims it will end the exemption from Section 201 duties. If true, the development could be a big hit for Asian PV manufacturers and an annoyance for the U.S. market – but a positive for First Solar.

The Norwegian polysilicon and silane gas producer has announced it will listen to offers for its production facility in Butte Montana after mothballing its other manufacturing operation – at Moses Lake, Washington – in the summer.

Power purchase agreements may be voluntarily renegotiated by extending the 20-year deals or enabling independent power producers to add more efficient PV components, thus increasing plant generation capacity.

The US state of California has witnessed yet another claim of ultra-low solar prices, recorded in the context of a major contracting exercise by a community energy group.

The Swiss Federal Council intends to increase competition in the solar sector and set fixed tariffs for large PV projects using tenders. The electricity market will be fully opened up in a move industry association Swissolar says will discriminate against PV and threaten the rapid expansion of renewables.

Hanwha Q Cells officially opened its 300,000 square foot solar panel factory in Dalton, Georgia last week, claiming it is the largest such manufacturing facility in the western hemisphere.

Jetion Solar and Risen Energy have made the latest in a fast-growing series of moves by Chinese operators to service reviving European markets, aided by last year’s scrapping of EU tariffs.

Los Angeles’ municipal utility has tripled the size of its rooftop solar feed-in programme (FiT), growing it from 150MW to 450MW.

Solar project milestones helped Neoen achieve a marked profit boost in the first half of 2019, culminating in the addition of more than 1GW to its clean energy portfolio.

The world is witnessing an “organic nuclear phaseout” partly precipitated by a drop in solar and wind costs, according to a new report that posits that nuclear power is too slow to build and too expensive to run to effectively fight climate change.

The tariff for rooftop PV will be maintained at $0.0935/kWh but payments for ground-mounted and floating solar could be cut to $0.0709/kWh and $0.0769, respectively. The previous FIT scheme, according to government figures, has driven the deployment of around 5 GW of solar generation capacity.

The Ethiopian Electric Utility is seeking proposals for 25 mini grid projects which are being backed by the African Development Bank.