| 26 May |
Hope For Solar Future Via JA Solar & China-U.S. Cooperation(Follow-Up On Anti-Dumping Duties For Chinese Solar Modules: Its Connection From The Past To The Future) |
Dear Readers,
(Please click onred linksbelow)
There has been much discussions regarding the anti-dumping duties for Chinese solar modules. My post of May 21, 2012, simply stated the basic facts and definitions to help readers to improve understanding of what anti-dumping duties mean. What I would like to invite you all to think about now is to ask your/ourselves if the human society is capable of learning from history and prescribing the necessary preventive medicine for undesirable events (such as war) from occurring.
If I were a humanoid from the future, studying modern human history, based on all observable events and historical records, I would have arrived at some very definitive patterns and precursors for “modern human war“:
credit over-extension—>economic recession—>tariffs—>retaliatory tariffs—>trade war—>decreased international trade—>increased unemployment—>economic depression—>WAR (repeat each generation, about 60 year cycle or Kondratiev wave/cycle or however long it’d take human memory to fade)
This was the pattern observed that led to WW II and its sequential pattern starts to show up again. The difference is that we now have much more information, gathered data, and intelligent decision makers…so do you think we will be able to avert the threat of seemingly inevitable war ?
Certainly, the tariffs have increased trade tensions between U.S. and China, as Beijing considers whether to retaliate by slapping its own duties on U.S.-made polysilicon raw material for solar cells. Last Friday, Beijing filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization against import duties on U.S. products including solar panels that China claims are unfairly priced or subsidized.
Instead of simply repeating the pattern of tariffs leading to retaliatory tariffs–>trade war–>decreased international trade–>–>–>WAR, JA Solar Holdings Co., a Shanghai-based business is currently leading the pack by having already purchased manufacturing equipment at auction in CA, and searching in Western states (U.S.) for potential plant locations. This would definitely help to avoid the anti-dumping duties. At the moment, Jonathan Pickering, the company’s president for America, told the Oregonian that managers are expected to reach a decision within few months. Pickering also indicated that JA Solar is attracted by the growing market size of U.S. market, plus the fact that a U.S. factory would enable the company to meet domestic content requirements imposed by military, universities, schools, and hospitals. Even though Pickering did not feel that duties would be the sole driving force for the company’s factory decision, he agrees that the duties would drive up prices, cutting solar panel sales, throwing U.S. installers out of work, and slowing the market growth. Below is a clip of JA Solar:
The manufacturing equipment bought by JA Solar (enough to outfit a small factory with about 75 megawatts of production), originally belonged to Calisolar Inc. Calisolar fired 80 Sunnyvale, CA workers in September and backed out of a $275 million government loan guarantee and reinvented itself in Mississippi, where local governments is providing $94 million in incentives. Renamed Silicor Materials Inc., the company is building a plant to supply raw materials to China’s Suntech Power Holdings Co.
It is hopeful that all solar companies within both China and U.S. will find ways of cooperating with one another, optimizing their respective local incentives and subsidies while fulfilling the needs of international trade. After all, the most sunny disposition is keeping one’s eyes on increasing the profit, creating jobs, providing the clean and renewable energy without completing the pattern/cycle of war. Let’s also pass along the sun, pass along the energy, and embrace the dream of gathering the love and hope of all people to harness the sun, with its warmth and light.
~have a bright and sunny day~
Gathered, written, and posted by sunisthefuture-Susan Sun Nunamaker
Any comments and suggestions are welcomed at sunisthefuture@gmail.com
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