US solar panel manufacturers are pushing for fair trade enforcement

A group of US solar panel manufacturers is calling on the US administration to impose retroactive tariffs on cheap imports from Vietnam and Thailand to protect American businesses and jobs.

The Trade Committee of the American Solar Manufacturing Alliance, which includes major solar panel manufacturers, has filed a complaint The US Commerce Department asking it to consider retroactive tariffs on the two Southeast Asian countries.

Solar panel exports from Vietnam and Thailand have surged in recent months after the US began investigating China’s unfair trade practices and its efforts to evade taxes by relocating subsidized production to Southeast Asia.

The US solar panel maker said in its complaint, reported by Reuters, that the volume of solar energy imports from Vietnam and Thailand rose in the second quarter by 39 percent and 17 percent, respectively, from the first quarter of the year.

Vietnam and Thailand have increased their exports of solar panels to the United States ahead of potential US tariffs. Those increased imports could represent “critical circumstances” that could warrant retroactive tariffs, the U.S. solar manufacturers’ group said.

The same group petitioned US President Joe Biden in April impose import tariffs on panels imported from Cambodia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam. The reason: low prices that destroy the petitioners’ raison d’être.

“America’s solar industry is on the cusp of tremendous growth that will create jobs and change the trajectory of our clean energy transition for decades to come,” the petitioners. said at the time.

“We seek to enforce the rules, remedy the harm to our domestic solar industry, and signal that the U.S. will not be a dumping ground for foreign solar products,” said Tim Brightbill, co-chair of Wiley’s International Trade Practice and senior counsel. to the petitioner.

In May, the US Administration launch more actions to protect US solar manufacturers from China’s trade practices, including “monitoring import surges and oversupply.”

“Imports of solar modules from Southeast Asia, where PRC producers were found to be evading anti-dumping and countervailing duties, have increased over the past year,” the White House said.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

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