Leading Solar Panel Maker In China Declares Bankruptcy
China has lessons for Marxists the world over regarding government subsidized Solar energy (are you listening Obama?) - even with the largest building boom (1) in world history, there is not enough profit to be made to keep a solar panel company in business, despite China's generous handouts and loans.
In the photo above taken on 26 Sep 2011, a worker forklifts solar panel products at Suntech Power in Wuxi, east China's Jiangsu Province. China's leading solar panel maker, a New York-listed private company based in Wuxi, declared bankruptcy on 20 Mar 2013 (2).
As well, a few days later, German car parts supplier Bosch announced it would discontinue its solar panel manufacturing business (3).
This will not deter our President from making more investments in green energy businesses that will ultimately fail. Despite state and government subsidies, promises of lower utility rates to encourage voters to accept these projects have not panned out; even the U.S. Department of Energy experts in the matter say that solar costs three and a half times that of coal. Indeed, rates for electricity in Boulder City, Colorado did in fact increase (4).
I can't figure out which is the greater hoax: that subsidizing green energy is good for our country or that Obama is not a Marxist.
Notes
(1):
Time Magazine, Ordos, China: A Modern Ghost Town
The Kangbashi district began as a public-works project in Ordos, a wealthy coal-mining town in Inner Mongolia. The area is filled with office towers, administrative centers, government buildings, museums, theaters and sports fields—not to mention acre on acre of subdivisions overflowing with middle-class duplexes and bungalows. The only problem: the district was originally designed to house, support and entertain 1 million people, yet hardly anyone lives there.
(2):
NY Times, 20 Mar 2013, Chinese Solar Panel Giant Is Tainted by Bankruptcy
HONG KONG — It was the Icarus of the solar power industry. And, on Wednesday, it fell to earth.
The main subsidiary of Suntech Power, one of the world’s largest makers of solar panels, collapsed into bankruptcy in a remarkable reversal for what had been part of a huge Chinese government effort to dominate renewable energy industries.
The bankruptcy is a sign of the worldwide consolidation of the solar industry, which has been crippled by a glut of products on world markets and Western tariffs on Chinese products. It also signals China’s unwillingness to continue to subsidize struggling manufacturers in the industry, which is contributing to the steep decline of its green energy pursuits.
More than any other country, China had leaned heavily on renewable energy to solve its problems of severe air pollution and dependence on energy imports from politically unstable countries in the Middle East and Africa.
(3):
The Local - Germany's News in English, 22 Mar 2013, Bosch pulls plug on solar business
German car parts supplier Bosch said Friday it plans to discontinue its solar panel manufacturing business because overcapacity in the industry has caused prices to nosedive. Up to 3,000 workers are affected.
"Bosch is to discontinue its activities in crystalline photovoltaics," the company announced in a statement.
"Bosch's manufacture of ingots, wafers, cells, and modules will be ceased at beginning of 2014," the statement said.
As far as possible, individual units would be sold quickly and all development and marketing activities were likewise to be ended.
(4):
Nevada Journal, 20 mAR 2012, Obama to tout green energy ‘investments’ at solar facility employing 5 workers, relying on $54 million in taxpayer subsidies
President Obama will tout investments in “renewable” energy Wednesday at the local Copper Mountain Solar 1 plant, although the plant has only five full-time employees.
The plant, owned by San Diego-based energy company Sempra, was built in late 2010 at a cost of $141 million. Funding included $42 million in federal-government tax credits and $12 million in tax-rebate commitments from the state of Nevada.
...
Solar 1 is the largest solar photovoltaic (PV) power plant in the country and is regarded as a “revenue generator” by Sempra. According to the Las Vegas Sun, Boulder City expects to receive over $60 million in lease revenue from the plant.
...
In addition to wanting to create many new jobs, President Obama has claimed green-energy investment will decrease America’s energy costs and reduce the country’s dependency on foreign oil.
In Boulder City, however, renewables have produced no lower energy costs. Instead, in late 2009, the city approved a 35 percent rate hike, while power generated by Copper Mountain is to go to Southern California — rather than serve Nevadans whose taxes helped finance the plant.
...
Nationally, solar energy is unlikely to help the president achieve his goal of lower energy costs. Geoffrey Lawrence, deputy policy director at the Nevada Policy Research Institute, the free-market think tank that publishes Nevada Journal, noted in his Solutions 2013 report that, even according to the U.S. Department of Energy, solar-PV energy will cost three and a half times more than energy from traditional sources such as coal.
