President Joe Biden extended Trump-era tariffs on imported solar energy equipment by four years, but excluded bifacial cells, which increasingly are used in utility-scale projects. The extension doubles the import quota on solar cells to 5 GW, and opens the door for duty-free imports from Canada and Mexico. In May 2017, a group of U.S. solar panel manufacturers filed what is known as a Section 201 safeguard petition with the International Trade Commission (ITC). The petition sought global tariffs in response to what it claimed were unfair trade practices, particularly by China. The ITC unanimously found that the imports had injured U.S. solar panel producers. In January 2018, President Trump concurred with the ITC recommendation to impose a four-year “safeguard measure” on foreign solar panels. The tariffs began at 30% but declined over time to 15%. Last fall, the ITC again unanimously recommended that the tariffs be extended for another four years. The Reuters news agency in late January reported that the administration was weighing a plan to double the amount of solar modules that could be imported before duties were applied from 2.5 GW to 5 GW. The proposal would entirely exempt bi-facial modules. In a statement after the tariff extension was announced, Abigail Ross Hopper, president and CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) expressed disappointment with the decision, but said that administration officials arrived at a “balanced solution” in upholding the exclusion for bifacial panels and increasing the tariff rate quota for cells. “SEIA has been fighting for more than three years to preserve the exclusion for bifacial panels, a product not available in the United States at scale,” Hopper said. The decision recognizes the “importance of this innovative technology” in helping to improve power output and lower costs in the utility segment. via Renewable Energy World https://ift.tt/1FwyDAC
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When Chicago-based Invenergy scored $3 billion from global asset manager Blackstone in January, it was one of the largest renewables investments in North American history. The announcement was one of several recent examples of large, institutional investors dumping money into the renewables sector. In another instance, Goldman Sachs announced it would invest $250 million in Hydrostor’s energy storage projects. Koch Industries is also expanding its solar reach, with a series of investments announced in late-2021: Koch Engineered Solutions acquired Arizona-based DEPCOM Power, which builds utility-scale solar plants. Another Koch venture invested $150 million in GameChange Solar to help it expand in the U.S. and globally. Representing one of the world’s largest pools of capital, institutional investors are a critical driver in the energy transition. A 2020 report from the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) found that deals are generally larger when they involve institutional investment. In the past, institutional investors had been more hesitant to jump in. IRENA analysis conducted in 2020 showed that despite accounting for $87 trillion in assets under management, institutional investors had up to then played a minor role in financing renewables. Institutional capital accounted for just 2% of total direct investment in renewables in 2018. The survey took a sample of over 5,800 institutional investors on their activity over the previous two decades. About 20% institutional investors had invested in renewables indirectly through funds, while no more than 1% had invested directly. IRENA noted that the general trend over the last decade is that these investments are growing, albeit slowly and from a low base. While IRENA has not looked into the latest statistics for institutional investors, the organization acknowledged an overall positive trend for renewable energy investment. That amounted to about $370 billion of investment in renewable energy power recorded in 2021, compared with about $350 billion in 2020 and about $320 billion in 2019. “It is probably safe to assume that institutional investment has also experienced comparable growth in the past few years,” said Rabia Ferroukhi, Director of Knowledge at IRENA’s Policy and Finance Center. What’s driving the increase in investment?Experts believe the hot start to 2022 is not an anomaly, and that investors are now more bullish on renewables than they used to be. Ferroukhi said more recent research suggests institutional investors’ allocation to renewables are set to increase in the coming years. For example, a report published in June by the American Council on Renewable Energy (ACORE) found that most financial institutions planned to increase their investment by more than 10% in 2021 compared with 2020. Its survey covered 62 banks, asset managers and other institutional investors. One main reason for the increased investment is that renewables–notably utility-scale wind and solar projects–are the cheapest to build and to operate over the course of their lifetimes, said David Spence, professor of Energy Law at the University of Texas at Austin. He expects that advantage to grow bigger every year. “I expect wind and solar to continue to be the cheapest sources moving forward and continue to be attractive investments, at least relative to the alternatives in the electric generation sector,” said Spence. He said that investors know that whenever a wind and solar plant is built, greater certainty exists in terms of how much money it will generate. That’s because “it’s always going to be chosen first by the operators of the grid,” who dispatch least-cost energy resources first. Ferroukhi said there is almost a “natural” fit between institutional investors and renewable energy, made stronger by economic and policy-related benefits. “Institutional investors have large amounts of long-term ‘patient’ capital seeking relatively predictable, stable and long-term returns,” she said. Compared to more volatile and increasingly more expensive fossil fuel sources, renewable energy power fits the institutional investors’ requirements. Given that interest rates are currently low, she said that institutional investors are also seeking higher returns compared to investments in government bonds, for example. Asset diversification is also a goal. Renewable investments largely meet these requirements, she said. Experts said another driver is the shifting political climate and increased public pressure on institutions to invest their assets sustainably. “Slowly but surely, [Environmental, Social, and Governance or ESG] investing is growing in scale and popularity, and the regulatory requirements to diminish climate-related risks in their portfolios is sure to follow,” said Ferroukhi. Given the power sector’s outsized contribution to climate change, renewables are an “obvious solution” for the ongoing de-carbonization of institutional investors’ portfolios. In states like Louisiana and Alabama, Spence said that utilities that in the past had not invested in renewables are now being pushed by their corporate customers to do so. The renewable energy is “cheap” and large volume users can tell their own customers they are using clean energy, said Spence. Experts weigh in on the futureFor the past seven years globally, more renewable power was added to the grid annually than fossil fuels and nuclear combined. In 2020, a record 260 GW of renewable energy capacity was added, more than four times the capacity added from other sources. Ferroukhi said she expects institutional investment in renewables to continue growing for multiple reasons. For one thing, the economic case for renewables is becoming impossible to ignore, even by the slowest moving companies. According to IRENA, among newly commissioned projects, the global weighted average levelized cost of energy (LCOE) of utility-scale solar PV fell by 85% between 2010 and 2020. At one time, solar PV was more than double the cost of even the most expensive fossil-fuel option for power generation. Now, utility-scale solar PV can compete with the cheapest new fossil-fuel power plant. What’s more, between 2010 and 2020, the global weighted-average LCOE from onshore wind fell by 56%. Over the same period, concentrating solar power (CSP) dropped by 68%. Offshore wind has seen a reduction of 42% in 10 years. Ferroukhi also noted important policy developments and commitments in the world’s largest economies point to governments’ growing commitment to the energy transition. Examples include a raft of net-zero commitments: Canada and the Republic of Korea have proposed net zero goals in legislation; Brazil, China, Italy, Japan, Turkey, and the United States all have included net zero ambitions in policy documents; and Australia, India, Russia, Saudi Arabia, and South Africa have communicated net zero targets in pledges. At COP26, commitments were made to end support for the fossil fuel energy this year. And private financiers joined coalitions aiming to scale up the deployment of capital required for the energy transition. One startup was the launch of the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ). It boasts a growing membership that includes more than 450 firms from 45 countries. As a result, institutional investors increasingly face expectations to invest in a sustainable manner. Renewable energy resources offer an affordable and highly visible path to achieving those goals. via Renewable Energy World https://ift.tt/bNfSLMX FirstLight Power joined the 24/7 Carbon-free Energy (CFE) Compact in partnership with Sustainable Energy for All (SEforALL) and UN Energy. The compact is an effort to speed decarbonization of the world’s electricity systems by working with a global group of companies, policymakers and organizations to develop and scale technologies, policies and solutions. According to a press release, 24/7 carbon-free energy will reduce pollution and improve economic and health outcomes for those most impacted by the effects of climate change. FirstLight is a power producer and energy storage company in New England with a portfolio that includes nearly 1,400 MW of pumped hydro storage, battery storage, hydroelectric generation and solar generation. The company said it is working to enable the conversion to a clean energy future faster by delivering hydropower and by leveraging large-scale storage facilities such as Northfield Mountain to integrate renewable energy and store it for times when it is needed. Alicia Barton, president and chief executive officer of FirstLight, said the 24/7 Carbon-free Energy Compact “is in full alignment with FirstLight’s mission to accelerate the decarbonization of the electric grid by owning, operating, and integrating large-scale renewable energy and storage assets to meet the region’s growing clean energy needs and to deliver an electric system that is clean, reliable, affordable and equitable.” The 24/7 CFE Compact is a commitment to the following principles and actions: Local Procurement: Energy buyers commit to moving beyond 100% renewable energy annual matching goals and adopting, over time, 24/7 CFE procurement approaches that lead to new clean electricity generation to match hourly electricity demand on local/regional electricity grids where their consumption occurs. Market Mechanisms: Suppliers and solutions providers commit to provide offerings that enable increasing access to 24/7 CFE, including by developing contractual arrangements, market products or other innovations that enable the delivery of round-the-clock clean electricity. Policy: Signatories commit to publicly advocate and support energy policies that accelerate the decarbonization of electricity grids. This can include policies that: help develop, commercialize and deploy CFE generation and demand optimization technologies; expand and interconnect electricity grids to integrate CFE; expand and enhance electricity markets; and provide direct access to purchases of CFE, among others. Technology: Signatories commit to supporting the advancement of CFE technology to decarbonize electricity grids, including by any one or a combination of the following actions: enabling the deployment of commercialized CFE generation and demand optimization technologies; enabling the commercialization of next-generation CFE generation and demand optimization technologies; developing or enabling supporting electricity grid infrastructure or technology that integrates carbon-free energy; and developing or adopting software solutions that advance decarbonization of the electricity sector. Data and Transparency: Signatories commit to advocate and support widespread access to the energy data required to enable all consumers to set and measure 24/7 CFE goals, support the optimization of CFE technologies to demand and maximize the decarbonization impact of consumer actions. via Renewable Energy World https://ift.tt/1Uyvs6W A lawsuit accuses developer Tom Buttgenbach of misappropriating the University of California system’s money after the latter invested in a collection of solar projects. The complaint, filed by public university regents in January in Alameda County Superior Court, claims that Buttgenbach submitted false claims to the university system to induce solar project investments worth $150 million, which he allegedly used to enrich himself. Buttgenbach is the co-founder and chief executive of 8minute Solar Energy, LLC. The complaint names both him and the company as defendants. The lawsuit details alleged conversations between Buttgenbach and the university system after the executive had a falling out with a business partner in late 2018. That falling out required Buttgenbach to come up with “$100 million to buy out his partner,” the lawsuit alleged. According to the complaint, Buttgenbach told university regents he had a pipeline of solar development projects and had signed contracts with companies that wanted to buy the power generated and operate the projects after completion. At the time, the university system was considering renewable energy investments and was looking for opportunities to help fund pension payments and provide other financial support to the University of California system. The suit says Buttgenbach presented a business plan containing a fixed budget, restrictions on the use of cash, financial projections and project sales timelines. Buttgenbach allegedly touted 8minute’s high success rates on projects that had solar power purchase agreements in place with customers. The University approved a $150 million investment. The lawsuit alleged that Buttgenbach “never intended to execute on the ‘fully funded’” business plan. Instead, he allegedly “sought to enrich himself at the expense of his investors, and ultimately at the expense of over 250,000 California public pensioners.” According to the complaint, Buttgenbach “engineered a financial crisis” after receiving the $150 million investment, delaying project sales, accelerating the development process to increase liquidity needs and misappropriating investors’ cash for personal projects. The lawsuit claims that in August 2021 Buttgenbach demanded more than $4.1 billion, of which the university system’s share would be $1.53 billion, and refused to validate this amount to investors. “This amount was entirely unsupported by the prior representations, financial projections, models, and budget that Buttgenbach submitted to induce the University to approve its $150 million investment,” court documents say. University regents are seeking nearly $1.22 billion in damages. Representatives for Buttgenbach and 8minute Solar Energy called the regents’ allegations “baseless and frivolous.” In a motion filed January 13, lawyers for Buttgenbach and 8minute said the allegations are already the subject of an arbitration hearing initiated by co-investors in the solar projects. 8minute Solar told Renewable Energy World the company hired a private arbiter to conduct a review of the fraud accusations. A company spokesperson sent us a statement that reads in part: “After a comprehensive review comprised of over three thousand man hours, Brown Rudnick and its consultants collectively concluded that the UC Regents’ claims against 8minute and Dr. Buttgenbach are meritless. In fact, Brown Rudnick concluded that there is evidence of impropriety by UC Regents’ investment agent in the transaction, which was ultimately found by the Arbitrator as well.” “8minute will vigorously defend itself should the UC Regents continue to pursue these baseless and frivolous claims,” the spokesperson added. Buttgenbach founded 8minute with a business partner in 2009. In the following years, 8minute expanded to have one of the largest project pipelines in the country, including more than 50 utility-scale projects in California, Texas and the Southwest. The company’s collection includes more than 18 GW of solar and 24 GWh of storage under development, according to its website. In 2020, 8minute announced power purchase agreements with Monterey Bay Community Power Authority (MBCP) and Silicon Valley Clean Energy (SVCE) for a 250 MWdc / 200 MWac Aratina Solar Center that includes 150 MWh of energy storage. via Renewable Energy World https://ift.tt/20uG4AF A research team at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory has developed a system capable of converting waste from sewage, food crops, algae and other renewable carbon sources into hydrogen fuel. PNNL’s electrocatalytic oxidation fuel recovery system turns waste carbon from farms, sewage and other sources into high-grade bio-based fuels, while simultaneously generating hydrogen. Until now, progress had been made converting waste to useful fuel but not completing the cycle using clean energy, researchers said. PNNL said the key to making it all work is a catalyst that combines billions of immeasurably small metal particles and an electric current to speed up the energy conversion at room temperature and pressure. “The currently used methods of treating biocrude requires high-pressure hydrogen, which is usually generated from natural gas,” said Juan A. Lopez-Ruiz, PNNL chemical engineer and project lead. “Our system can generate that hydrogen itself while simultaneously treating the wastewater at near atmospheric conditions using excess renewable electricity, making it inexpensive to operate and potentially carbon neutral.” The research team tested the system using a sample of wastewater from an industrial-scale biomass conversion process for almost 200 hours of continuous operation, without losing any efficiency in the process. The only limitation was researchers running out of their wastewater sample, PNNL said. The patent-pending system solves several problems that have hindered efforts to make biomass economically viable, according to Lopez-Ruiz. “We know how to turn biomass into fuel,” Lopez-Ruiz said. “But we still struggle to make the process energy efficient, economical and environmentally sustainable—especially for small, distributed scales. This system runs on electricity, which can come from renewable sources. And it generates its own heat and fuel to keep it running. It has the potential to complete the energy recovery cycle.” Lab researchers said one effective process for converting wet waste carbon to fuel is called hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL). This process essentially compresses the natural, fossil fuel-production time, converting wet biomass into an energy-dense biocrude oil in hours instead of millennia. But researchers noted the process is incomplete in that the wastewater produced needs further treatment to obtain added value from what would otherwise be a liability. “We realized that same (electro)chemical reaction that removed the organic molecules from wastewater could be also used to directly upgrade the biocrude at room temperature and atmospheric pressure as well,” Lopez-Ruiz said. As part of PNNL’s new process, unrefined biocrude and wastewater can be fed into the system directly from an HTL output stream or other wet waste. The PNNL process includes a flow cell, where the wastewater and biocrude flows through the cell and encounters a charged environment created by an electric current. The cell itself is divided in half by a membrane. The positively charged half, called an anode, contains a thin titanium foil coated with nanoparticles of ruthenium oxide. From here, the waste stream undergoes a catalytic conversion, with biocrude being converted to useful oils and paraffin. At the same time, oxygen and nitrogen-containing compounds undergo a chemical conversion that converts them into nitrogen and oxygen gasses. The wastewater that emerges from the system can then be fed back into the HTL process. On the negatively charged half of the flow cell, called a cathode, a different reaction takes place that can either hydrogenate organic molecules (such as the ones in treated biocrude) or generate hydrogen gas—an emerging energy source that the flow cell developers see as a potential source of fuel. Researchers said the process’ speed was a bonus. They said they obtained more than 100 times higher conversion rates with the electrochemical system at atmospheric conditions than with the thermal system at intermediate hydrogen pressures and temperatures. These findings were published in the Journal of Applied Catalysis B: Environmental in November 2020. You can read more on PNNL’s electrocatalytic oxidation fuel recovery system here. Portions of the research were conducted as part of an agreement with Southern California Gas Company. via Renewable Energy World https://ift.tt/xb1QNKidh Indiana Michigan Power Co. proposed adding more than 2,000 MW of wind and solar energy capacity by 2028. I&M’s proposal, submitted to the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission, details planned actions from the near future through the next 20 years. The first step will occur in coming months, when I&M issues a request for proposal (RFP) for approximately 800 MW of wind and approximately 500 MW of solar to meet customer needs, with half of those resources generating energy in 2025 and the remainder by 2026. A second RFP is planned for a later date seeking proposals for about 800 MW of solar, 60 MW of battery storage and 1,000 MW from natural gas peaking units to meet system needs by 2028. Together, the new resources would more than quadruple I&M’s current solar and wind generation capacity. With the scheduled retirement of I&M’s coal-fired Rockport Plant by 2028, the natural-gas peaking units would generate power only during periods of high energy use and could potentially use hydrogen as a future fuel source. I&M’s proposal is included in its Integrated Resource Plan (IRP), which usually provides more detail about specific project proposals and timelines. However, the utility requested the document be kept confidential, according to docket information accessed on the commission’s website. Indiana Michigan Power is a unit of American Electric Power (AEP), which has a goal of achieving net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. I&M said that including Cook Nuclear Plant, wind and solar resources as well as power from six water-powered hydroelectric plants, 85% of the energy it generated in 2020 was carbon-emission free. The utility said that resource decisions beyond 2028 will be based on future decisions regarding the potential license extensions of the Cook Nuclear Plant. The IRP assumed that Cook Unit 1 and 2 would continue operating through 2034 and 2037, respectively. via Renewable Energy World https://ift.tt/sLo5SBtw6 By Samuel Petrequin BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union on February 2 proposed including nuclear energy and natural gas in its plans for building a climate-friendly future, dividing member countries and drawing outcry from environmentalists as “greenwashing.” The green labeling system from the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, would define what qualifies as an investment in sustainable energy in the 27-nation bloc. Under certain conditions, gas and nuclear energy could be part of the mix, making it easier for private investors to inject money into both. The plan will please the EU’s two most powerful nations: France is reliant on nuclear power, which raises concerns about long-term impact on the environment, and Germany depends on gas, a a fossil fuel many consider a bridge to renewables. EU members like Austria and Luxembourg already have raised the possibility of legal disputes as they challenge the green notion of nuclear. The commission says including nuclear and gas as transitional energy sources does not amount to a free pass and aims to accelerate efforts to reduce carbon emissions. “We are setting out strict conditions to help mobilize finance to support this transition away from more harmful energy sources like coal,” said Mairead McGuinness, the commissioner in charge of financial services. Critics call it a big blow to climate goals. “This anti-science plan represents the biggest greenwashing exercise of all time. It makes a mockery of the EU’s claims to global leadership on climate and the environment,” Greenpeace EU sustainable finance campaigner Ariadna Rodrigo said. With the EU aiming to reach climate neutrality by 2050 and to cut greenhouse gas emissions by at least 55% by 2030, the bloc says the so-called taxonomy classification system is crucial to direct investments into sustainable energy. Energy use accounts for about three-quarters of the greenhouse gas emissions produced in the EU. Commission officials believe that as long as there are not enough renewables available, gas and nuclear will help phase out more harmful energy sources. Under the plan, gas projects must meet emission thresholds and achieve reduction targets. They also should replace existing coal facilities that cannot be substituted with renewables and switch to renewable or low-carbon gases by 2035. For nuclear, the commission said research, development and use of advanced technologies reducing waste and improving safety will be included. New nuclear plants producing electricity or heat are allowed until 2045. France, which derives about 70% of its electricity from nuclear energy, led the charge for its inclusion with several other EU countries that operate nuclear power plants. A low-carbon alternative to fossil fuels, nuclear energy represented around 26% of the electricity produced in the bloc in 2019. Germany, Europe’s largest economy, demanded that gas be part of the plan. It shut down half of the six nuclear plants it still had in operation in January, a year before the country draws the final curtain on its decadeslong use of atomic power. Gas, while a fossil fuel, is considered by the EU to be a bridge to a cleaner energy future, and officials said its inclusion in the taxonomy aligns with the international goal of trying to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 F) above pre-industrial times. German officials said at a regular government news conference that they hadn’t yet had time to read the decision and couldn’t comment on it. Spokesman Steffen Hebestreit noted that the government has at least four months to examine the proposal but made clear that Germany’s position hasn’t changed. “The position of the German government remains that we are against nuclear energy being judged sustainable,” he said. In Brussels, protesters from the Avaaz network wore masks of European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz as they posed in front of a tombstone reading, “RIP EU Green Deal. Killed by Gas and Nuclear.” “What is happening today is the commission are labeling gas and nuclear as green energy, and in doing so, they are going to be channeling billions of euros away from renewables and towards dirty climate projects,” activist Sam Ryan said. The commission’s plans still need the backing of a large majority of the 27 member states and a simple majority in the European Parliament. ___ Associated Press writer Geir Moulson in Berlin contributed to this report. via Renewable Energy World https://ift.tt/qCixzy2O9 Independent System Operator (ISO) compliance plans for FERC Order 2222 are on their last stretch, with PJM and ISO-NE filing coming up here in February and MISO and SPP plans due in April. Voltus, an energy aggregator, petitioned FERC for a technical conference on these compliance plans. Stakeholders have until February 7th to support the need for this conference. Have you read: via Renewable Energy World https://ift.tt/seTcQnk2r Solar company Altus Power Inc. and module manufacturer Heliene Inc. signed a three-year agreement under which Altus Power will be able to buy up to 250 MW of solar modules from Heliene for use in solar generation projects across the U.S. In connection with the supply agreement, Altus Power also plans to invest up to $5 million in Heliene as part of that company’s anticipated take-over transaction with Buzz Capital 2 Ltd. and listing on the TSX Venture Exchange. In late January, Renewable Energy World reported that more than a year after global solar energy markets were rocked by credible allegations of forced labor’s use in parts of in China, supply chains are increasingly shifting away from those conflict regions. The shift is being aided in part by growing global demand for solar energy equipment. New sources of supply across the entire solar production supply chain are being added, offering alternatives to solar developers in the U.S. and elsewhere. “Many U.S. solar developers are currently facing supply and trade volatility risks, causing potential project delays,” said Martin Pochtaruk, CEO of Heliene. “Altus Power’s proposed investment in Heliene enables us to better capitalize on growing demand for domestic solar products and make good on our commitment to generate more well-paying manufacturing jobs in the U.S.” Heliene’s solar modules will be manufactured at the company’s recently expanded facility in Mountain Iron, Minnesota. As reported last September, the Mountain Iron facility will become the second-largest solar module manufacturing plant in the U.S., with production expected to begin in June. The campus will grow to 95,000 sq. ft. and will feature advanced automation technologies. Production will focus on M6, M10 and M12 size super high efficiency monocrystalline PERC cells, which the company says reduce cell-to-module losses through their half-cut design and can withstand weather and mechanical stresses. Heliene has three production facilities located in the U.S. and Canada, which are expected to total 900 MW of total manufacturing capacity and are planned to be online by Q3 of 2022. Last August, the company launched a new facility in Riviera Beach, Florida, taking over a facility previously occupied by SolarTech Universal. via Renewable Energy World https://ift.tt/sNZC9mXSw A solar market analysis firm said that the 25 GW of utility scale capacity expected to be deployed in 2022 may end up closer to 15-20 GW as supply chain-related issues continue to challenge the industry. In a note to clients, Roth Capital Partners said that three Tier 1 suppliers–Jinko, LONGi, and Trina–face ongoing import challenges. Those challenges largely stem from federal action taken in response to allegations of forced labor in parts of the solar supply chain that originate in China. The research note said that the three companies represent on the order of 40-50% of annualized module supply, or around 10-13 GW. One question is how much of that supply could be met by Tier 2 suppliers, such as Znshine and Talesun. The firm said that one industry contact reported that 70-80% of the shortfall involving projects that have not yet started construction could be met by Tier 2 suppliers. Another industry source it contacted suggested that as many as 4 GW of projects in 2021 did not receive modules at all, but were unlikely to shift suppliers as they wait. Moving to a new supplier presents its own set of problems, however. Successfully adding Tier 2 vendors to approved vendor list and bankability lists of tax equity lenders. Those processes can take more than a year to achieve, Roth said. What’s more, if an extension of the federal Investment Tax Credit is included as part of a revived Build Back Better legislative package, then even more gigawatts of solar project capacity could be pushed from 2022 and further depress 2022 volumes. The supply chain disruptions stem largely from action taken by Congress and the Biden Administration to address allegations of forced labor in a number of supply chains, including solar. And it comes as the administration nears a decision on whether or not to extend tariffs on solar modules imported from China. In May 2017, a group of U.S. solar panel manufacturers filed what is known as a Section 201 safeguard petition with the International Trade Commission (ITC). The petition sought global tariffs in response to what it claimed were unfair trade practices, particularly by China. The ITC unanimously found that the imports had injured U.S. solar panel producers. In January 2018, President Trump concurred with the ITC recommendation to impose a four-year “safeguard measure” on foreign solar panels. Last fall, the ITC again unanimously recommended that the tariffs be extended for another four years, effective in early February. The Reuters news agency in late January reported that the administration was weighing a plan to double the amount of solar modules that could be imported before duties were applied from 2.5 GW to 5 GW. The proposal would entirely exempt bi-facial modules, which are increasingly popular in utility-scale projects. The tariff extension, if approved, would maintain pressure that has been building since last year on Chinese imports. In June, a Withhold Release Order (WRO) directed U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents to ensure that products imported to the United States did not contain components suspected of being manufactured with the use of forced labor. Credible reports have surfaced over the past 18 months that such labor is being used in the Xinjiang region of China, a center of polysilicon production, a key component in solar modules. Modules may be detained at U.S. ports of entry until the importers are provided traceability documents that prove no forced labor was used. A major stumbling block is that Beijing denies that any forced labor exists within China. The government has passed legislation penalizing companies that cooperate with U.S. and other western governments’ efforts to trace supply chains. The WRO gained added teeth in December when President Biden signed H.R. 6256, the Uygher Forced Labor Prevention Act. The Act bans imports from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region and imposes sanctions on foreign individuals responsible for forced labor in the region. In January, the Ultra Low-Carbon Solar Alliance told Renewable Energy World that evidence was mounting that supply chains are diversifying away from those conflict regions such as those in Xinjiang. The shift is being aided in part by growing global demand for solar energy equipment. New sources of supply across the entire solar production supply chain are being added, offering alternatives to solar developers in the U.S. and elsewhere. “We are seeing a supply chain realignment,” said Michael Parr, executive director of the U.S.-based Ultra Low-Carbon Solar Alliance (ULCSA). “The pace has been faster than expected.” In late January, polysilicon manufacturer Daqo New Energy Corp. said that its subsidiary, Xinjiang Daqo New Energy, said it planned to raise more than $1 billion for a proposed 100,000 MT polysilicon expansion project in Baotou, Inner Mongolia. The project is expected to break ground in March and be completed in the third quarter of 2023. Parr said in an interview with Renewable Energy World that deployments in the range of 20-22 GW of capacity are likely this year. An emerging worry early in 2022 is the extent to which the Omicron variant of the Covid-19 virus will impact China, and the variant’s ability to disrupt manufacturing and exports alike. Supply chain worries were confirmed in part by a report from analyst firm IHS Markit, which said that the “highly synchronized global supply chain system developed over the past 30 years is under strain like never before.” The firm said that resolving the disruption will likely run well into 2022. via Renewable Energy World https://ift.tt/biP5gSOYq |