Are You Ready to Buy American-Made Solar Panels?

Renewable energy sources are providing an increasing share of electricity in the U.S., with solar sources making up 13.5% of that share in 2021, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. But the infrastructure needed to supply solar energy comes primarily from overseas. President Biden is trying to change that by invoking the Defense Production Act (DPA) to support manufacturing of solar panels and other technologies here at home.

“For too long, the nation’s clean-energy supply chain has been over-reliant on foreign sources and adversarial nations,” explained U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm in a Department of Energy (DOE) press release. “With the new DPA authority, DOE can help strengthen domestic solar, heat pump, and grid manufacturing industries while fortifying America’s economic security and creating good-paying jobs, and lowering utility costs along the way.”

Biden’s June 2022 authorization of the DPA allows the federal government to offer loans and grants to manufacturers to boost domestic production. The invocation includes support for the following:

• Photovoltaics
• Transformers and grid components
• Heat pumps
• Insulation
• Hydrogen fuel-cell components, including electrolyzers, fuel cells, and platinum group metals

As part of the same executive order, Biden also froze tariffs on imported PV components—a move intended to uncork the flow of components from Cambodia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam, where a Department of Commerce investigation was disrupting the supply chain.

For more information:

U.S. Department of Energy
energy.gov