After many component factories stopped production! European photovoltaic manufacturing on the verge of collapse

This comes after Meyer Burger announced plans to abandon its component plant in Germany. The European Solar Manufacturing Council (ESMC) has once again called for urgent measures to support the continent's photovoltaic manufacturing industry. There are fears the industry will collapse.

According to the ESMC, European manufacturers are competing with "heavily subsidized foreign PV module manufacturers" whose low prices "create an unfair playing field." Four months before this, REC Group had announced the withdrawal of its polysilicon production in Norway.

ESMC warned that this price dumping and the consequent closures and shutdowns of recent months could be the beginning of a complete collapse of the industry unless emergency measures are taken immediately.

It noted that the EU's benchmark is to produce 40% of the necessary net-zero technologies by 2030 and said, "If nothing is done now, there will be no industry to count on by 2030."

Chinese solar manufacturers occupy an absolutely dominant position in the international market, and the popularity and low cost of solar photovoltaics are largely attributed to these companies.

"For the entire EU photovoltaic manufacturing industry, losing almost all European photovoltaic module producers now will have irreversible negative consequences," ESMC policy director Žygimantas Vaičiūnas said in a statement.

"The European Commission has adopted a temporary crisis and transition framework in 2023, some member states plan to provide REPowerEU financing for EU photovoltaic manufacturing, a net-zero industry bill and forced labor regulations are being legislated. If emergency measures cannot be taken by mid-February at the latest , then all these incentives will be of no avail."

Meyer Burger also hinted at a mid-February date in its German production suspension announcement. The company said a "final decision must be made by late February."

Meyer Burger is equipping its new components plant in Arizona, which will receive more than $36 million in tax breaks under the Inflation Reduction Act.

But it will take months or years for these legislations to come into effect, and the ESMC believes that European solar manufacturers are running out of time.