Lee, T., Tom LeeData and Policy AnalystTom Lee is a Data and Policy Analyst at the American Action Forum., Immigration Reform in The America COMPETES Act of 2022Whitney Appel, Appel, W., Tracker: The Federal Reserve’s Balance Sheet AssetsThomas Wade, Wade, T., FTC’s Shifting View on Competition Policy and the Outlook for 2022Jeffrey Westling, Westling, J., Assessing the Impact of the Widespread Adoption of Algorithm-backed Content Moderation in Social MediaJuan Londoño, & Londoño, J. (2022, January 24). Solar tariffs and president Biden’s climate agenda. AAF. Retrieved January 31, 2022, from https://www.americanactionforum.org/insight/solar-tariffs-and-president-bidens-climate-agenda/
This article talks about the solar tariffs imposed by the Trump administration in 2018. The original purpose for them was to address damage done to american solar panel manufacturers that were apparently caused by imports of cheap solar panels. While these tariffs were supposed to boost the domestic production of solar panels, it has caused a lower installation rate as the prices of solar panels have significantly increased in the United States. These tariffs run out in february and force the question of if they should be extended or not.
I think this is a very tough decision to make. We want to have a lot more solar power in the United States that can help mitigate climate change. The main benefit I see from producing solar panels in the United States is that they will help our economy grow. I don’t think it really matters where the solar panels come from. Our main purpose should be to focus on mitigating climate change. If this means buying solar panels from China because they are cheaper, I don’t think it is bad. We need to encourage more people to buy solar panels and the best way to do that is by making them cheap. This is not possible with the tariffs. As we see in the data, the production has barely increased and there are just less people using solar panels.
While I agree that it’s important for solar panels to be as cheap as they can possibly get to make them more accessible to all consumers, I think it’s important to note that they aren’t the most reliable or relatively clean clean energy source; the solar panels degrade over time and end up releasing toxins into the atmosphere. I also think it’s counterintuitive that these solar panels be shipped from China likely on ships that run on fossil fuels. Maybe it would make more sense to renew the tariffs to reduce the popularity of solar panels and instead shift focus towards other cheaper renewable alternatives that could be produced on a larger scale?
As pointed out by the comment above, solar panels have many downsides. Is there an other possible clean energy source that could be apart of households like solar.