Do Indian Solar Manufacturers Fear Foreign Competition?

The Indian Government under the Jawaharlal Nehru Solar Mission has proposed ambitious plans for the development of solar energy with a 20 GW target by 2022. This implies almost 1 GW of solar energy to be installed per year in the country.At the current prices that is an impressive $4 billion in investment per year.Naturally this has got the Indian solar industry all excited,however the government’s decision to allow the import of foreign cells and modules has put a dampener in their multi billion dollar hopes.

I have discussed how China has massively increased its marketshare to almost 50% of the current world market from around 5% in 2006. . Indian manufacturing possesses neither the Technological advantages  of the US and Germans nor the Manufacturing prowess of the Chinese.So if the Indian government allows the import (which they should both for economic reasons and also not to violate the agreement under the WTO),I can see the Indian manufacturers becoming marginal players players in their home market

Perhaps seeing this potential disastrous future I can foresee,the Indian Manufacturers are making arguments that don’t seem to have a lot of logic. Here are the arguments

“The national solar mission, which will be implemented using Indian taxpayers money, is somehow becoming the reason for many countries to dump their untested, sub-standard solar products in the country,” said Ajay Prakash Shrivastava, president, Maharishi Solar Technology.

I don’t know to which products/companies, Maharishi is alluding to but companies with Years of Experience,Gigawatt scale of manufacturing and hundreds of  Installations like Suntech,First Solar ,Trina Solar and Sharp can hardly be accused of making “untested substandard” products

“India has ample capacities to fulfil the objectives of the mission with best quality products and therefore, there is no need to allow the import of solar PV products from outside,” Mr Srivastava saids.olar power projects will have 25-year power purchase agreements requiring quality equipment and legal recourse in case of poor or non performance. “This will be difficult to ensure in case non-Indian products are used,” said Tata BP Solar CEO K Subramanya.

I have no doubt that India has ample capacities ,but I also think a  lot of this capacity would be idle because Indian solar manufacturing is not cost competitive compared to foreign solar producers.There  are a number of reasons,for example one of the bigger Indian companies Tata BP Solar has British Petroleum as the main technology provider , this is the same company that has shut down its solar manufacturing plants in Spain and US as it could not compete.Nowadays it outsources a lot of the cell manufacturing to Chinese companies

The second  part of the argument is also specious.Chinese/Japanese/US modules are installed around the world  with 25 year power purchase agreements and they have no issues.I hardly think the Indian quality requirements would be more stringent than those required in Europe ,USA and other developed markets.Note installations in these countries require  rigorous testing under standard independent bodies like UL before they are allowed .Every big manufacturer always gets their products certified and provide warranties on their own / in partnership with insurance companies

Chinese manufacturing benefits a lot from the massive subsidies and support that they get from their government not to mention the protectionism like local content requirements,local standards etc.This gives the Chinese makers huge advantages in competing both at home and abroad.US,Japanese and European producers also benefit from their strong Technological bases. For the Indian manufacturers to compete, they would need some sort of support/subsidy by the Government to offset these advantages.However making specious arguments like the above may not help their case.A Discussion between the Industry and the Government  on how to support the industry without hurting the Indian consumers  is needed.

Cos jittery as govt plans import of solar power tools – Economic Times

The government’s decision to import solar power equipment for its flagship clean energy programme has run into strong opposition from domestic equipment makers, who have argued that it will open up the floodgates for import of cheaper and sub-standard equipment from China.

The government is contemplating import of cells (photo voltaic) and modules from other countries for the its Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission.“The national solar mission, which will be implemented using Indian taxpayers money, is somehow becoming the reason for many countries to dump their untested, sub-standard solar products in the country,” said Ajay Prakash Shrivastava, president, Maharishi Solar Technology.

“India has ample capacities to fulfil the objectives of the mission with best quality products and therefore, there is no need to allow the import of solar PV products from outside,” Mr Srivastava said. Solar power projects will have 25-year power purchase agreements requiring quality equipment and legal recourse in case of poor or non performance. “This will be difficult to ensure in case non-Indian products are used,” said Tata BP Solar CEO K Subramanya.

Many countries impose domestic content clauses on importers. Canada mandates minimum domestic content level of 50%; China has given a $586-billion stimulus package to those projects that purchase local products.