The United States will rise duties on imports of Chinese polysilicon, photovoltaic cells and Chinese polysilicon, announced Wednesday 11 December the Biden administration, making the last efforts in this word to defend home clean technology manufacture from inexpensive deliveries from abroad.
The U.S. Trade typical Office (USR) increased the rates on “photovoltaic wafers” and polysilver from China to 50%, while duties on tungsten products were increased to 25%. Rates will begin to apply from 1 January 2025.
Tungsten is utilized in products in many industries, including aerospace and defence industries, as well as in medicine and automotive. USTR assured that reliance on China for tungsten products threatens US national security.
"China's imports proceed to undercut home production and rising tariffs will make home producers more competitive, expanding force on China to destruct their harmful activities, policies and practices, and reduce vulnerability to these harmful activities, policies and practices"
– declared USR in a communication published on Wednesday 11 December in the national Register.
Polysilicon, “waffles” and photovoltaic cells (basic “cells” from which PV panels are built) are key materials utilized in the production of solar power plants.
"The tariff increases announced present will further reduce the harmful policies and practices applied by the People's Republic of China," said Katherine Tai, United States Trade Representative. "These actions will complement national investments made by the Biden-Harris administration to advance a clean energy economy while expanding the resilience of key supply chains".
In addition to the imposition of charges on Chinese goods, the US President's administration Joe Bidena invested crucial resources in the improvement of home clean energy technology and semiconductor production through subsidies specified as the inflation simplification (IRA) and the CHIPS Act.
The latest decision is based on the September decision to impose 100% duties on Chinese electrical vehicles and 25% duties on lithium-ion batteries for electrical vehicles.
In November this year the Biden administration besides imposed duties on solar panels imported from Malaysia, Cambodia, Vietnam and Thailand. These moves were a consequence of a commercial case in which Chinese producers of solar panels owned by factories in Southeast Asian countries were accused of lowering prices by dumping products on the market.
Anti-dumping duties imposed by the Department of Commerce ranged from 21.31% to 271.2%, depending on the company.
According to government data in 2023, over 90% of American imports of solar power generation equipment came from only 5 countries: Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia and India.
The latest tariff increase is expected to origin further deterioration of trade relations between the 2 world's largest economies, in the face of US concerns overcapacity of China and flooding countries with inexpensive goods.
This decision took place in the fresh months of Biden's administration, which besides issued export restrictions to slow down Chinese semiconductor potential. In this case, the argument was utilized that Chinese microprocessors would let artificial intelligence to be utilized for the needs of the Chinese army.
President-elect Donald Trump, who started a trade war with China in 2018, will take office in January next year. Although he was critical of Biden's administration's actions, during the election run he promised to impose duties of up to 60% on Chinese imports. After the election, he reduced that number to 10%. In the past week, he announced that he had invited president Xi Jinping, president of the PRC, to the inauguration ceremony on 20 January 2025.
The increase in customs duties in the United States will not origin local producers to reduce the cost of production. In their business they must trust on suppliers from Asia especially from China. Last year, China accounted for nearly 98% of the planet production of photovoltaic cells.
The worldwide distribution of photovoltaic cell production in 2023
Source: Nikkei Asia, Statista
Leszek B. Glass
Email: [email protected]
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