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By Canary Media
Canary Media
See more from Canary Media’s “Chart of the Week” column.
Now that solar has become America’s go-to choice for new power plants, the pressure is on to assemble a fully domestic supply chain for the technology. Data from the latest Clean Investment Monitor shows that this onshoring process is well underway.
Factories in the U.S. can produce more than enough finished solar panels — also known as modules — to supply the nation’s annual installations, which last year hit 47.9 gigawatts (measured in direct current capacity). Module production could grow by about 83% if all the projects that have been announced or are going through construction and commissioning come to fruition. The expansion represents a major change of fortune for domestic solar manufacturing, which had nearly disappeared, but has blossomed in recent years thanks to federal incentives and stiffer tariffs against foreign products.
Still, the panel is just the final step in the solar supply chain. To truly onshore this critical industry, the U.S. also needs to make the components that go into the module: photovoltaic cells, which are etched onto silicon wafers, which are made from processed polysilicon.
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So far, cells have shown the most success among those precursors. Domestic factories can make up to 19.5 GW annually, after several factory openings this year. If projects currently wrapping up construction all come online, the country will be able to make enough solar cells to match 2025 deployments.
The more capital-intensive polysilicon and wafer production, however, is not on track to match the levels for cells or modules.
Crucially, it’s not guaranteed that solar developers will maintain 2025 levels of installations in the years to come, once lucrative federal tax credits run out. The Rhodium Group modeled a range of scenarios for the post-2030 era, and found that the U.S. could install an annual average of anywhere between 8 and 52 GW of direct current solar capacity. That’s an enormous range: If the solar market tanks, the manufacturing sector could be self-sufficient, but if installations rebound, the country will need more polysilicon and wafer production to keep pace.
Ultimately, building out these factories is just the first step toward full self-sufficiency. Next, solar manufacturers need to prove that they can operate sustainably in the U.S. over the long haul.
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Julian Spector is a senior reporter at Canary Media. He reports on batteries, long-duration energy storage, low-carbon hydrogen, and clean energy breakthroughs around the world.
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