The United States has imposed new duties of up to 3,521% on the import of solar energy equipment from four Southeast Asian countries. On the one hand, this measure promises to benefit local manufacturers of similar goods, but on the other hand, it threatens to become a deterrent to the development of renewable energy in the country, Bloomberg reports.
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The tariffs, announced yesterday, are the result of a year-long trade investigation that found solar equipment makers unfairly received government subsidies and shipped products to the U.S. at prices below the cost of production. The investigation was initiated by U.S. solar manufacturers and began under former President Joe Biden. The tariffs are aimed at supporting U.S. manufacturers of similar equipment, but they will also hurt domestic developers of renewable energy systems that have long relied on low-cost imports, adding to uncertainty in an industry already battered by political upheaval in Washington.
The new tariffs would be on top of those already imposed by Donald Trump, which have upended global markets and supply chains. Anti-dumping and countervailing duties, as they are called, are intended to make up for illegal subsidies and unfair pricing. The promise of subsidies and demand from the Biden administration’s inflation-busting measures have fueled interest and new investment in solar panel factories that have been built across the U.S. But manufacturers have warned that even in these favorable conditions, the new plants are threatened by foreign competitors selling their products at below-market prices.
In 2024, the US imported solar energy equipment worth $12.9 billion from four countries, or 77% of the total import volume in this segment. National duties for Cambodia, whose authorities refused to cooperate with the investigation, were set at 3,521%. Duties of 395.9% were set for some companies in Vietnam, 375.2% in Thailand, and the national duty rate for Malaysia was 34.4%. Jinko Solar is subject to duties of 245% on exports from Vietnam and 40% on exports from Malaysia. Trina Solar’s Thai subsidiary was subject to duties of 375%, while its Vietnamese subsidiary was subject to duties of over 200%. Duties of about 120% are applied to JA Solar equipment from Vietnam. The new measures had only a minor impact on the shares of all these companies of Chinese origin: Trina’s securities lost 1.6%, Jinko’s — 0.9%, and JA Solar’s — 0.1%. The fact is that the decision of the US authorities was largely expected, and the companies themselves transferred part of their production capacities to duty-free countries, including Indonesia and Laos. Therefore, already this year, India, Indonesia, and Laos are threatened with new rounds of duties, experts believe.