By Frank Andorka, Senior Correspondent

What Happened: Earlier this morning, SunPower filed its formal request to be excluded from the Trump Administration’s 30% tariff on imported solar modules, specifically

• Exclude solar cells based on copper-plated, IBC technology.
• Exclude solar modules based on copper-plated, IBC technology.
• Make the product exclusions described above retroactive to Feb. 7, 2018 (when the tariffs went into effect) and direct U.S. Customs and Border Protection to refund any tariffs paid on the above-described products.

SolarWakeup’s View:  All we can say is that it’s about time.

SunPower, a module manufacturer and one of the staunchest opponents of tariffs in last year’s seemingly endless battle, formally filed papers this morning to have their products excluded from the tariffs. Their argument is simple: Their products were significantly different enough from the silicon-based modules targeted by the tariffs to justify being exempt from them.

To which we say: Bravo.

Look, I have long been a critic of the tariffs imposed by President Donald J. Trump in January because I feared the law of unintended consequences would come back to bite the more innovative module manufacturers that have significant presences in this country.

SunPower is one of the companies I worried about, and SunPower President and CEO Tom Werner warned the International Trade Commission that the tariffs would do irrevocable harm to the industry in general and SunPower in particular.

The company has routinely been on the forefront of innovative and forward-thinking module manufacturers, and its dominance as the preferred supplier to the U.S. residential market speaks volumes about the quality of their products.

Why the United States would want to punish a company that has done more than most to expand the industry that now employs more than 250,000 workers is beyond me.

The next step is a 30-day public comment period (we are awaiting a link to where you can comment and will update it when we have it). Go comment and tell the government to support innovation in the solar industry. Exempt SunPower’s modules from these destructive tariffs.

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Submit your comments to the request here

By Frank Andorka, Senior Correspondent

What Happened: Controversial Kentucky House Bill (HB) 227 passed the House by four votes yesterday. Now the bill moves on to the Senate. It would

• Reduce the amount future Kentucky solar customers are paid under its net metering plan, based on
• A mythical cost shift from solar users to non-solar users (or, as I refer to it, the “lie that won’t die.”

SolarWakeup’s View:  This damn thing again?

If you’ve been paying any attention to the broader solar news cycle, you’ve heard of Kentucky HB 227. It’s the latest attempt by utilities to kill an emerging solar industry before it can compete with their “God-given” (and state endorsed) monopoly.

What are utilities telling the legislators to get them to support this bill? It’s the old “cost-shift” nonsense—a zombie lie that utilities across the country are telling state legislators to scare them into voting for bills like this.

The argument goes like this: Retail-rate net metering, a program under which solar customers are reimbursed for the excess electricity they produce, pushes extra costs on to non-solar customers because solar customers aren’t paying for grid upkeep.

What the utilities don’t want you to notice, of course, is that solar customers also relieve congestion on the grid during peak production times, which saves strain on the transmission and distribution lines. So while they may not be paying for upkeep directly, solar production saves wear and tear, which ultimately saves the utility money in the form of repair costs.

You’re welcome.

I should note here that while there is a minor cost-shift, a study by the Lawrence Berkely National Laboratory indicates the shift only happens when a state passes the 10% mark for solar-electricity generation. You know how much solar Kentucky produces from solar?

0.05%, according to the latest numbers from the Solar Energy Industries Association.

Now I’m lousy at math, but that looks nothing like 10% to me. This bill is just a cash grab by utilities, whose only interest is keeping their profits high.

Here, have a Kentucky legislator demonstrating a complete lack of understanding of how solar works. Courtesy of the Associated Press:

“I don’t think anyone out there is forced to buy your excess inventory or excess product and pay you a price that will generate a profit for you. Yet that is what we are really doing,” said [Republican Representative] Jim Gooch, the nincompoop who sponsored the bill.

OK, I’ll admit it: The AP reporter did not call Gooch a nincompoop. But I know that’s what he meant.

Now, the legislation isn’t as bad as it was last week, when the geniuses in the Kentucky legislature were going to apply the new rules to current solar customers. They have now decided to grandfather them under the old rules for 25 years. Small victories, I guess.

The bill also ends the traditional practice of monthly netting and moves to instantaneous netting. Here, have the reaction to that little gem by Kentucky solar installers Matt Partymiller and Steve Ricketts of Solar Energy Solutions, courtesy of their Facebook page (edited only for grammar and clarity):

INSTANTANEOUS NET METERING, a poisoned pill buried in the revised legislation [that] was strongly objected to by many on both sides of the House means what you currently produce from your array while you are at work for use even a hour later or in the evening at 1:1 rates is not yours any more. What you produce is instantaneously netted against what you consume by the minute. The difference belongs to the utilities and is suddenly worth 70% less. Banking solar inside a day, for a cloudy day tomorrow, from month to month or from summer for winter use is dead. HB 227 has been a Trojan horse for this simple ‘end game’ legislative paragraph.

Raise your hand if you think the utilities will pass the savings they will receive under the new netting rules on to their non-solar customers (oh, put your hands down….you and I both know better)?

Fortunately, there’s one more chance to kill the the bill in the Kentucky Senate. So for all our Kentucky readers, get on the phones and tell your Senators and tell them this bill is bad for Kentucky.

There’s still time to show the rest of the country that Kentucky is ready to move beyond its coal-bound past and into a solar future. Let’s make sure that happens.

More

Kentucky House OKs Likely Less Credits for Solar Customers (AP)

Solar customers still get the shaft in latest version of bill pushed by utilities (Lexington Herald-Leader)

Rural Kentuckians support solar (The Sentinel Echo)

A hotly contested bill to curb solar power rises from the dead and passes Kentucky House (Louisville Courier-Journal)

By Frank Andorka, Senior Correspondent

What Happened: The Motley Fool, a stock analysis website, wrote an article with the headline – Solar-Manufacturing Renaissance Already Falling Apart, which then went on to

• Express surprise that the Trump 30% tariffs on solar modules hasn’t had module companies flocking to the United States in droves.
• Come to the shocking (not shocking) conclusion that maybe the tariffs won’t drive an American module renaissance, let alone a manufacturing renaissance.

SolarWakeup’s View:  There’s a larger question here, sparked by the odd headline: Can something fall apart if it was almost entirely mythical to begin with?

When Trump imposed these nonsensical tariffs at the behest of two foreign-owned companies (I have my blood pressure meds at hand this time), there were some in the solar industry who, all evidence to the contrary, insisted this would do just what the Motley Fool is surprised isn’t happening: Bring back solar module manufacturing jobs.

Clearly, that has not happened.

Having had it up to here with an argument that was just increasingly ringing false, I did back-of-an-envelope calculations about five weeks ago comparing concrete job losses and announced job gains, and posted the results on Twitter. Here’s what I concluded;

-9,800 + 829 jobs = -8,971. That’s still a

 huge net loss, and this isn’t the end of the job losses by any stretch (I shudder at what next year’s numbers will look like). Now if we don’t lose another job in the downstream industry and thousands of manufacturing jobs come, I’ll eat crow.

I’m not exactly getting prepping my grill or getting my seasonings ready.

It should also be noted that my figuring assumed JinkoSolar would actually fully staff its new headquarters in Jacksonville, which it has since announced will be barely half of the jobs in initially promised.

So what lesson have we learned here? We’ve learned that tariffs don’t work, so you shouldn’t do them for any companies, let alone two that don’t have the best interests of the United States at heart.

Someone should forward this to Trump before he severely damages the aluminum and steel industries, too (and thereby further damage solar, by the way).

Oh, and tell The Motley Fool guys to stop fooling around.

More 

Solar-Manufacturing Renaissance Already Falling Apart

My Job Math (Via Twitter)