Solar Power Cells, Hot Water, Energy, Collectors

BP Solar and India: Unable to Compete in Solar

01.01.70

Piece, "Indian suppliers like Tata BP Solar India Ltd., Indosolar Ltd. and Moser Baer India Ltd. have failed to benefit from a rule intended to spawn a domestic manufacturing hub in one of the world’s fastest-growing markets. Instead, low-cost Chinese rivals like Suntech and Trina Solar Ltd. and U.S. firms backed by preferential trade finance, including First Solar, have reaped most of the equipment orders for 1,100 megawatts of plants to be built by January." The piece adds, "Local manufacturers have received almost no orders from developers building plants in India and are producing far below their factories’ full capacity. [...] Indosolar, the nation’s biggest cell company, stopped production in June and has defaulted on 2.75 billion rupees ($52 million) of long-term bank loans as its business became 'unviable,' Fitch Ratings analysts Vivek Jain and Salil Garg said in a Dec. 5 note."

Jigar Shah has suggested that the right policy is to remove all subsidies from all energy sources. He wrote on his blog, "The federal government should get rid of permanent energy subsidies for all energy sources, including fossil fuels, nuclear, solar, wind, biofuels. This would force everyone to innovate, compete and win -- or lose -- on their own merits.

Source: Greentech Media (blog)