{"id":96075,"date":"2021-09-30T08:49:20","date_gmt":"2021-09-30T12:49:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.solarpowerworldonline.com\/?p=96075"},"modified":"2021-10-06T07:44:49","modified_gmt":"2021-10-06T11:44:49","slug":"commerce-says-petitioners-cant-be-anonymous-in-latest-solar-panel-tariff-development","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.solarpowerworldonline.com\/2021\/09\/commerce-says-petitioners-cant-be-anonymous-in-latest-solar-panel-tariff-development\/","title":{"rendered":"Commerce says petitioners can’t be anonymous in latest solar panel tariff development"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Dept. of Commerce has requested additional information from a group of anonymous American solar manufacturers in reference to a petition to review Chinese solar panel companies allegedly circumventing antidumping and countervailing (AD\/CV) duties by manufacturing portions of their product in three Southeast Asian countries.<\/p>\n

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Credit: Oregon Department of Transportation<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n

“We have examined your submissions and have determined that we require additional information to address certain threshold issues before we can consider the merits of your requests for anticircumvention rulings,” stated Abdelali Elouaradia, office director for the Dept. of Commerce, in a Sept. 29 letter to the law firm Wiley Rein LLP, which is representing petitioners American Solar Manufacturers Against Chinese Circumvention (A-SMACC).<\/p>\n

The group has until Oct. 6, 2021 <\/del>Oct. 13, 2021<\/strong>, to provide Commerce with further proof of tariff circumvention by Chinese companies working in Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam, and then the department will initiate a 45-day review.<\/p>\n

Solar advocacy group SEIA, which had requested Commerce to dismiss the petition outright, said it was disappointed with this decision to continue the review.<\/p>\n

“However, the detail and nature of the questions Commerce asked the anonymous petitioners clearly indicates that the petitioners have produced a filing largely devoid of the information the department needs to assess whether to initiate this case,” said Abigail Ross Hopper, president and CEO of SEIA. “We believe that when and if the petitioners amend their original submission, it will become abundantly clear that they have no case for circumvention.\u201d<\/p>\n

In August A-SMACC filed a petition<\/a> with the Dept. of Commerce asking for an investigation into Chinese silicon solar panel manufacturing companies working in Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam as a way to avoid AD\/CV duties. Various forms of these duties have been in place against Chinese solar manufacturers since 2012<\/a>. Any silicon solar imports from China come with an extra tax from the Dept. of Commerce. Some Chinese companies, in a possible attempt to avoid paying the tax, have moved portions of their manufacturing capacity to other Southeast Asian countries, according to the petition.<\/p>\n

A-SMACC asked Commerce for a deeper look into specific Chinese companies working in the three mentioned countries:<\/p>\n