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Solar Industry
US solar industry tariffs prevent widespread adoption of solar
energy in the US
He 15 (Amy ; 7/10/15; More tariffs on Chinese solar panels;
http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/business/2015-07/10/content_21250916.htm)
The US Commerce Department is imposing higher tariffs on Chinese solar products
imported to the US marketplace. Commerce had indicated that Chinese companies may be entitled to lower
rates, but the decision announced on Wednesday to impose tariffs of 238.95 percent
reverses that. The department had conducted a review of whether solar manufacturing companies in China had received
subsidies from the government between March 2012 and November 2013. Manufacturers now face antidumping and anti-subsidy rates of about 31 percent on products made in China . The
review and tariff rates are part of an ongoing trade dispute between the US and
China that was initiated by SolarWorld, a German-owned US-based company that filed a petition accusing
Chinese manufacturers of receiving subsidies from the government and dumping them in the US market. SolarWorld had said that
essentially sidestep U.S. sanctions on solar cells. The U.S. initiated tariffs on solar cells from China
because it believed the Chinese government was giving subsidies to Chinese solar cell manufacturers which then enabled them to
dump solar cells in the American market, putting American companies at a huge disadvantage.
China responded by
placing tariffs as high as 57 percent on American polysilicon, a feedstock for solar panels. Chinas
domestic polysilicon production lags far behind American because of its inferior quality. The country has in recent times taken steps
to close down polysilicon enterprises that cannot compete internationally in terms of price and quality, bringing down the number of
domestic producers from 40 to 10. As of today, China imports roughly two thirds of its polysilicon. Meanwhile,
American
tariffs on China have been practically toothless[sic} as China has been able to
easily circumvent the sanctions by exporting raw materials to Taiwan, assembling
solar cells there, and then reimporting the cells to China , thus artificially making the cells of nonChinese origin. In the U.S., solar power accounts for a mere 0.28 percent of Americas energy needs and some 140,000 jobs.
However, the market for solar energy presents a huge opportunity for future growth; the industry has been expanding at around 40
percent annually since 2007 and according to research by Green America as much as 10 percent of U.S. energy needs could be met
by solar power by 2025. China and the U.S. are not the only countries involved in prolonged trade disputes over solar panels. Last
year, the European Union imposed sanctions on some Chinese companies that were found guilty of dumping solar cells on the
European market. More recently, Chinese companies have been accused of cyber theft. SolarWorld, a German based company with
manufacturing facilities in Oregon has asked Commerce to investigate claims that proprietary production and financial information
was stolen and handed to Chinese state-owned enterprises, which are competitors of the U.S. companies that were hacked. The
issue of solar panel tariffs has been met with mixed reactions from U.S. businesses and politicians. On the one hand, American
companies that are involved in the installation of solar cells, as well as polysilicon manufacturers, benefit from cheap Chinese cells
and would not like to see an increase in tariffs. On the other hand, domestic producers of solar cells welcome higher tariffs. This
pitting of interests among American companies has made Congress more reluctant to push for further tariffs. With regards to the
Energies Industry Association, which represents American as well as foreign manufacturers and installers of solar panels, said in a
this trade dispute threatens to derail the rapid growth of the U.S. solar
industry. If the dispute threatens the solar industry it could also slow down the
transition to renewable energy in the U.S. , leading to more environmental degradation in the future, as
statement that
GW at the end of 2013: a compound annual growth rate of 43 percent. In the United States, new solar capacity has grown from 435 megawatts (MW) in 2009 to 4,751 MW in just four
years: an even higher rate of 82 percent. Meanwhile, solar panel costs are now 154 times cheaper than they were in 1970, dropping from $100 per watt to 65 cents per watt.
What
we are seeing are exponential improvements in the efficiency of solar, the cost of solar, and the
installation of solar. Put these numbers together and you find that solar has improved its cost
basis by 5,355 times relative to oil since 1970, Seba said. Traditional sources of energy cant compete with this. Solar plant.
Image: BLM A great delusion? Other experts disagree. Renowned scientist Vaclav Smil of the University of Manitoba has studied the history of energy transitions, and argues that
forecasts of an imminent renewable energy revolution are deluded. It took between 50 and 75 years for fossil fuels to contribute significantly to national energy requirements, in
circumstances where technology was cheap and supplying baseload power (operating 24 hours continuously) was not a problem. So the idea that renewables could be scaled up in
decades is fantasy, he argues. Similarly, Australian sustainability expert Prof Ted Trainer of the University of New South Wales and the Simplicity Institute argues that renewables cannot
cope with demand in industrial consumer societies. The raw cost of PV is not crucial, Prof Trainer told me. Even if it was free it cannot provide any energy at all for about 17 hours on
an average day, and in Europe there can be three weeks in a row with virtually no PV input. Trainer also flagged-up energy return on investment (EROI)the quantity of energy one
can get out compared to how much one puts in: EROI for PV is around 3:1. It hardly matters what it costs if its down there. There are 300,000 solar installations in the US right now. By
2022, there will be 20 million Fossil fuel ostriches
happens, it happens swiftly, within two decades or even two years, Seba told me. Just ask anyone at
your favorite camera film, telegraph, or typewriter company. Kodak, a photography giant in 2003, filed for bankruptcy in 2012, as the digital photography revolutions swept away
dependence on film. Weve seen parallel disruptions with smartphones and tablets. Sebas main answer to Smil is to highlight the folly of extrapolating the potential for future energy
New clean energy industries are utterly different from old fossil fuel
ones. Its as if saying the industrial revolution could never have happened based on
studying the feudal dynamics of pre-industrial societies. Costs of solar are not just
decreasing exponentially, they will continue to do so due to increasing innovation,
scale, and competition. There are 300,000 solar installations in the US right now. By 2022, there will be 20 million solar installations in the US, Seba
predicts. As a rule, Seba said, when a technology product achieves critical mass (historically defined as about 15-20 percent
of the market), its market growth accelerates further, and sometimes exponentially, due to
the positive feedback effects. In hundreds of markets around the world, unsubsidized solar is already cheaper than subsidized fossil fuels and nuclear
transitions from the past.
power. A new Deutsche Bank report just made headlines at the end of October for predicting that solar electricity in the US is on track to be as cheap or cheaper than fossil fuels as early
as 2016. Seba also dismisses concerns about baseload, pointing me to the new Solar Reserve 110 MW baseload solar plant in the Nevada desert, running on molten salt storage, that will
according to Seba: A user could, for about $15.30 per month, have eight hours of storage to shift solar generation from day to evening, not pay for peak prices, and participate in
demand-response programs. Power plant. Image: Pixabay, CC Judgement Day At the current rate of growth, Sebas projections show, globally installed solar capacity will reach 56.7
terrawatts (TW) in the next 15 years: equivalent to 18.9 TW of conventional baseload power. That would be enough to power the world, and then someprojected world energy demand
at that time would be 16.9 TW. Paul Gilding, who has spent the last 20 years advising global corporations like Ford, DuPont, BHP Billiton, among many others on sustainable business
strategy, agrees that the trends Seba highlights imply a disruptive transformational system change that outpaces the assumptions built on the old world view of centralised
generation. Author of The Great Disruption, Gilding said that its the systemic interactions of software, new players, disruptive business models and technology that accelerates the
shift, and which will be self reinforcingnot just cheap prices. EROI concerns are therefore a red-herring. Seba argues that the minimal costs of maintaining solar panels which last
many decades, coupled with the free energy generation once initial costs are repaid, mean that real EROI for solar is dramatically higher than fossil fuels in the long-run.
generated at zero costs (an impossibility), they could never compete with onsite solar. So after 2020, the conventional energy industry will start going bankrupt. The costs of wind, which
complements solar at night and in winter, is also plummeting and will beat every other energy source, except solar, in the same time-frame, according to his analysis. We are on the
cusp of the largest disruption of industry and society since the first industrial revolution. Large, centralized, top-down, supplier-centric energy is on its way out. It is being replaced by
Risks to the energy grid threaten both the military and civilians . Our
nationwide energy system relies on aging transmission infrastructure and
increasingly vulnerable computerized systems. Over the last decade, utility companies have begun
Cyber Pearl Harbor
automating tasks in order to cut costs. While automated systems increase efficiency, they also pose risks for cyber attacks, as it is
could easily dwarf the outage in 2003, where sagging power lines in Ohio left 50 million people without power, cost $6 billion, and
wouldnt take that much to take the bulk of the power system down. If you took down the transformers and the substations so
theyre out permanently, we could be out for a long, long time.
covered political leadership, new incentives and renewable energy sources that could advance the cause of distributed energy and
lead to a safer (and cleaner) future for us all. What is the state of grid security today? How safe are we from either a cyber or
physical attack? I think we are in a very tenuous security situation, mainly because of the way the grid is configured. It is currently
set up in such a way that requires central station generation, which is then distributed through nodes of high voltage substations
it be attacked? A node is one of a number of high-voltage substations, which are contained within the three main interconnects
making up the North American power grid; the Texas, Eastern and Western interconnects. The nodes are sort of a gathering point
inside the interconnects where more than one power generation source feeds into, which is then distributed out to load centers.
These particular nodes, if they are knocked out by either a physical or a cyber attack, could have a major destabilizing effect on the
if there are
multiple node outages it could be many weeks or months till the system is back to
normal. By then, the country could be in chaos. So how do we protect these nodes? Well, there is only so
entire grid system. Repairing these nodes has a long lead time due to their highly customized designs. So
much you can do. We could physically protect these nodes by beefing up security around them, but theyll never be totally safe from
a physical or cyber attack. It is sort of like building a firewall to keep out hackers. Eventually, the hackers will figure out how to get
through, forcing you to build a higher firewall. It never ends. What we need to do is to move toward from this kind of thinking. So
whats the solution here? We need change the way the grid works, not just build higher and higher walls around these nodes. This
can be done by shifting from a centralized to a distributed grid architecture in which power generation is dispersed along the grid.
By that you mean distributed generation? Thats right. Distributed generation. Can you explain what distributed generation is and
So if there is an attack on a node it wont take down that whole area of the grid because there would be those sub-regional and
micro-grids that could island themselves within those areas. So we need to look at a different grid architecture and recognize and
value the sort of support and security that can be provided by distributed generation. Can you give me an example of what a
distributed grid might look like and how it would be powered? A distributed grid can be powered by a variety of methods from cogenerators of natural gas to wind turbines to solar installations on your home. The key is that they are located within that particular
threat of a cyber attack is something very real. Top national security officialsincluding the Chairman of the Joint
Chiefs, the Director of the National Security Agency, the Secretary of Defense, and the CIA Director have said,
preventing a cyber attack and improving the nations electric grids is among the most urgent priorities of our
country (source: Congressional Record). So how serious is the Pentagon taking all this? Enough to start, or end a
The problem is
entirely fixable and NERC and the US government are leaving the American people
and its infrastructure totally unprotected from a total meltdown of nuclear power
plants as a result of a prolonged power failure. Critical Analyses According to Judy Haar,
a recognized expert in nuclear plant failure analyses, when a nuclear power plant
loses access to off-grid electricity, the event is referred to as a station blackout.
However, the good Congressman failed to mention the most important aspect of this problem.
Haar states that all 104 US nuclear power plants are built to withstand electrical outages without experiencing any
core damage, through the activation of an automatic start up of emergency generators powered by diesel. Further,
when emergency power kicks in, an automatic shutdown of the nuclear power plant
commences. The dangerous control rods are dropped into the core, while water is
pumped by the diesel power generators into the reactor to reduce the heat and
thus, prevent a meltdown. Here is the catch in this process, the spent fuel rods are
encased in both a primary and secondary containment structure which is designed
to withstand a core meltdown. However, should the pumps stop because either the
generators fail or diesel fuel is not available, the fuel rods are subsequently
uncovered and a Fukushima type of core meltdown commences immediately. At this
point, I took Judy Haars comments to a source of mine at the Palo Verde Nuclear power plant. My source informed
me that as per NERC policy, nuclear power plants are required to have enough diesel fuel to run for a period of
seven days. Some plants have thirty days of diesel. This is the good news, but it is all downhill from here. The
Unresolved Power Blackout Problem
most certainly interrupt the circulation of cooling water to the pools . Another
one of my Palo Verde nuclear power plant sources informed me that there is no long term solution to a power
the
spent fuel pools carry depleted fuel for the reactor. Normally, this spent fuel has had
time to considerably decay and therefore, reducing radioactivity and heat. However,
the newer discharged fuel still produces heat and needs cooling. Housed in high
density storage racks, contained in buildings that vent directly into the atmosphere,
radiation containment is not accounted for with regard to the spent fuel racks. In
other words, there is no capture mechanism. In this scenario, accompanied by a
lengthy electrical outage, and with the emergency power waning due to either
generator failure or a lack of diesel needed to power the generators, the plant could
lose the ability to provide cooling. The water will subsequently heat up, boil away
and uncover the spent fuel rods which required being covered in at least 25 feet of
water to remain benign from any deleterious effects. Ultimately, this would lead to
fires as well and the release of radioactivity into the atmosphere. This would be the
beginning of another Fukushima event right here on American soil. Both my source
and Haar shared exactly the same scenario about how a meltdown would occur.
blackout and that all bets are off if the blackout is due to an EMP attack. A more detailed analysis reveals that
Subsequently, I spoke with Roger Landry who worked for Raytheon in various Department of Defense projects for 28
years, many of them in this arena and Roger also confirmed this information and that the above information is well
known in the industry. When I examine Congressman Franks letter to NERC and I read between the lines, it is clear
that Franks knows of this risk as well, he just stops short of specifically mentioning it in his letter. Placing Odds On a
Failure Is a Fools Errand An analysis of individual plant risks released in 2003 by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission
for 39 of the 104 nuclear reactors, the risk of core damage from a blackout
was greater than 1 in 100,000. At 45 other plants the risk is greater than 1 in 1 million, the threshold
shows that
NRC is using to determine which severe accidents should be evaluated in its latest analysis. According to the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the Beaver Valley Power Station, Unit 1, in Pennsylvania has the greatest risk of
event of an EMP attack, can tanker trucks with diesel fuel get to all of the nuclear power plants in the US in time to
re-fuel them before they stop running? Will tanker trucks even be running themselves in the aftermath of an EMP
attack? And in the event of an EMP attack, it is not likely that any plant which runs low on fuel, or has a generator
malfunctions, will ever get any help to mitigate the crisis prior to a plethora of meltdowns occurring. Thus, every
nuclear power plant in the country has the potential to cause a Chernobyl or Fukushima type accident if our country
been ordered by China. This makes one wonder what the Chinese are preparing for with these multiple orders for
both transformers and generators. In short, our unpreparedness is a prescription for disaster . As a
byproduct of my investigation, I have discovered that most, if not all, of the nuclear power plants are on known
earthquake fault lines. All of Californias nuclear power plants are located on an earthquake fault line. Can anyone
tell me why would anyone in their right mind build a nuclear power plant on a fault line? To see the depth of this
negligent as to not provide its nuclear plants a fool proof method to cool the secondary processes of its nuclear
materials at all of its plants? Why would ANY nuclear power plant be built on an earthquake fault line? Why are we
even using nuclear energy under these circumstances? And why are we allowing the Chinese to park right next door
to so many nuclear power plants?
starts to show the sign of decreased price as well. We have simultaneously witnessed tremendous advancement on the whole value
more energy efficient equipment, better engineering work and park design, and
most notably the technology leap enabled by innovation. In addition, the maturity of the
market can drive down the price of renewables rapidly trained and skilled workers
are available locally; a matured banking system helps secure funding with advanced risk management; permission and
chain:
connection are streamlined where policy makers want to contribute; and the increased proximity of projects could save travel cost
refurbished and expects that the newly upgraded solar module or wind turbine will be considerably more efficient at a lower cost.
renewables shall continue to generate electricity for a very long time while
their efficiency continues to increase, further boosting competitiveness. Current low
oil prices only marginally affect renewables, or indirectly through gas prices. And like all
things, low oil prices must some day come to an end. Today, oil prices have hit almost $70 per barrel and
some analysts believe that the global benchmark Brent crude will rise by $15 or more a barrel by year-end. If current
trends persist, it remains very likely that renewables that are now in use will serve
us long after the oil price is back onto its usual track. And of course, renewables are an
infinite source of power- the ultimate definition of long-term certainty . Energy security The
majority of oil & gas sources are concentrated in certain regions, many of which are
getting more technically challenging and more expensive to reach, whereas
renewable energy is domestic. It provides security of supply, helping a nation reduce its
dependence on imported sources. It plays a significant role in addressing our energy needs by
replacing foreign energy imports with clean and reliable home-grown electricity with
the added bonus of fantastic local economic opportunities.
Therefore
Oil price volatility can seriously hurt the economy. The market
value of oil is 5% of world GDP, its price can move by 50% within months. It is hard to reduce
consumption quickly when prices rise, and this has widespread knock-on effects across other
sectors. Oil price volatility can thus delay business investment, require costly
reallocation of resources, reduce consumer spending, and slow job growth. Conversely,
reducing exposure to oil price volatility has economic value. Countries can do so by
discouraging wasteful consumption, increasing energy efficiency, and expanding renewables. "Governments must peg their policies to
should be a priority for policy-makers.
long-term energy trends rather than betting on oil prices staying low," says Stern, co-chair of the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate, which
These prices have never been stable, and price shocks are becoming
more drastic and frequent than ever before." Instead, Stern adds, "governments should boost
investment in renewable energy sources that are increasingly competitive, moving
away once and for all from the current outdated carbon-intensive and unsustainable
economic model. Missing this chance would be devastating for the future health of
our economy and our planet." An opportunity for reform Low oil prices do offer a valuable
opportunity, the paper notes: countries can seize the day to improve energy pricing and
reform. Energy prices are now "distorted", the authors note, failing to reflect their environmental costs and often heavily subsidized. Subsidies for
published the paper. "
fossil fuel consumption alone reached an astonishing 550 billion USD in 2013, encouraging waste, straining public finances, and weakening growth by
depressing investment in the energy sector. Klevns, Stern and co-author Jana Frejova recommend that governments "seize the day" to undertake reforms
with long-term benefits, including establishing carbon pricing and reforming fossil fuel subsidies. Low oil prices will dampen the impact on consumers and
were paying double the price for gasoline as they are now, meaning they are less likely to notice a few extra cents on each gallon of gas due to a carbon
The increased revenues could be used to offset impacts on lowincome households and to finance reductions in other, distortionary taxes ." Why renewables
are still the best bet Another key message of the paper is that even with low oil prices now, expanded
investment in renewable energy -- particularly for electricity -- is still important, not just to reduce greenhouse gas
emissions, but to help lower and stabilize energy prices in the longer term . Cheaper oil does not
price or reduced energy subsidies.
compete directly with renewable energy for electricity production, but it can bring lower natural gas and coal prices, with wider impacts. Lower natural gas
prices may strengthen the near-term case for switching from coal to gas, while making renewable energy less cost-competitive. In the long term, however,
a shift to gas cannot depend on the indirect impact of lower oil prices, and achieving
GHG benefits in such a scenario requires getting several policy measures right , from
steps to reduce methane leakage, to continued support for fully CO2-free energy. At the same time, the costs of renewable
energy are falling and have low volatility, making them an attractive option
regardless of short-term oil price movements. The costs of solar and wind power continue to fall fast, and there are
steps countries can take now to reduce the cost of renewable energy solutions further, notably by enabling lower-cost finance. These
energy sources have very low operating costs, so they can effectively lock in the
cost of energy production for 20 years or more. The best wind and solar projects can
already compete even with cheaper natural gas, and renewables can also mitigate
pressing problems that do not show in the market price for energy: energy security
concerns, air pollution, as well as exposure to future fossil fuel price volatility. Still, using modern
renewables is not without challenges. To benefit, countries need to start the process of "learning by doing", putting in place local supply chains, new
2015: 1, 14, 437; Roach, 2014). The risk may increase if one of the interdependent countries is governed by an
inward-looking socio-economic coalition (Solingen, 2015); second, the risk of war between China and the US should
not just be analysed bilaterally but include their allies and partners. Third party countries could drag China or the
US into confrontation; third, in this context it is of some comfort that the three main economic powers in Northeast
Asia (China, Japan and South Korea) are all deeply integrated economically through production networks within a
the value attributed by national decision-makers to economic development and their assessments of risks and
opportunities.
their own nations decline then they may blame this on external dependence,
appeal to anti-foreign sentiments, contemplate the use of force to gain respect or
credibility, adopt protectionist policies, and ultimately refuse to be deterred by either
nuclear arms or prospects of socioeconomic calamities. Such a dangerous shift
could happen abruptly, i.e. under the instigation of actions by a third party or against a third party. Yet
as long as there is both nuclear deterrence and interdependence, the tensions in East Asia are unlikely to
escalate to war. As Chan (2013) says, all states in the region are aware that they cannot count on support from
China and the US fail to rebalance their financial and trading relations (Roach, 2014) then a trade war could result,
interrupting transnational production networks, provoking social distress, and exacerbating nationalist emotions.
This could have unforeseen consequences in the field of security, with nuclear
deterrence remaining the only factor to protect the world from Armageddon,
and unreliably so. Deterrence could lose its credibility: one of the two great powers
might gamble that the other yield in a cyber-war or conventional limited war, or third
party countries might engage in conflict with each other, with a view to obliging Washington or Beijing to intervene.
Trade disputes
US solar panel tariffs undermines global solar panel use and
enforcement of the Paris Climate agreement
Stemler et al 16 (Abbey, JD, MBA, Assistant Professor of Business Law and
Ethics, Indiana University; Scott Shackelford, JD, PhD, Assistant Professor of
Business Law and Ethics, Indiana University; W.Glenn Campbell and Rita
RicardoCampbell National Fellow, Stanford University; Visiting Scholar, Stanford Law
School; Senior Fellow, Center for Applied Cybersecurity Research; Eric Richards, JD,
Professor of Business Law, Indiana University; PARIS, PANELS, AND PROTECTIONISM:
MATCHING U.S. RHETORIC WITH REALITY TO SAVE THE PLANET; 02/02/16;
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2732026)
**we dont endorse the use of ableist language in this card**
Tension between the competing goals of global
governance regimesencouragement of national environmental policies versus the
removal of protectionist trade barriersis not new, as seen in the Tuna and Shrimp cases discussed in Part III.
255 However, the green energy race differs slightly because countries are using
traditional industrial policy instruments (sectortargeted subsidies, local-content subsidies, and export restrictions) to
spur the development of renewable energy and environmentally friendly
industries.256 Despite pre-Paris conference comments by the Obama administration
that the U.S. hopes that leading by example will put it in a stronger position to
negotiate international reductions at the Paris climate conference and build on
bilateral talks with China,257 recent trade actions by the country give such
rhetoric a hollow ring. At the same time that the Administration has promised in
its Clean Power Plan to [give] a head start to wind and solar deployment . . . by executive actions to scale up investment in clean energy
innovation,258 it has imposed crippling[sic] tariffs on imports of environmentallyfriendly imports from China and other trade partners. For instance, Chinese production of cheap
solar panels substantially reduced global prices and triggered a boom in the solar
industry, even as it hurt U.S. PV producers. 259 Since 2012, the U.S. Commerce Department, using U.S.
antidumping and anti-subsidy laws , has levied steep tariffs on the imports forcing
several of the exporting companies out of business .260 As we will see, this has caused China
to retaliate, resulting in a trade war in which the competing priorities of free trade
and sustainable development come into stark relief . In late 2011, a group of U.S. solar
companies (led by SolarWorld Industries) filed a petition (Petition) with the United States International Trade Commission
(USITC) and the U.S. Department of Commerce (Commerce), claiming that the Chinese
Governments support for renewables actually consists of unfair subsidies by
providing land, electricity, material inputs, and financing below-market rates, as
well as direct financial support and preferential policies. 261 While government subsidy programs are not
B. Shining a Light on the Solar Panel Trade War
always anticompetitive, Chinas subsidies, the Petition claimed, were not designed to support an up-and-coming industry, but rather to give China an
unfair advantage.262 China, however, maintained that its lower prices on PV panels are due to . . . Chinas comparative advantages in manufacturing,
later, Commerce announced that it would impose an additional tariff, in the form of an antidumping duty of about 31% to 250% against Chinese solar
These duties are among the largest ever levied against a product
through a unilateral tariff and increased the cost of solar panels significantly .268
China denounced the duties as a worrying indication of U.S. trade
protectionism.269 Beijing responded in May 2012 by filing its own WTO dispute against the U.S., which it eventually won.270 In July
2012, it also launched its own antidumping investigation into U.S. and South Korean
exports to China of polysilicon, the main ingredient used in solar cells.271 This investigation has
resulted in preliminary tariffs as high as 57% for U.S. polysilicon and 48.7% for South Korean
polysilicon.272 In December 2013, SolarWorld brought a second set of anti-dumping and antisubsidy complaints against China and Taiwan.273 It claimed that this was to close a loophole in the outcome of the first trade
case. The loophole allowed Chinese producers to import modules assembled in China from cells manufactured in third countries, notably Taiwan.274 In
May and June 2014, Commerce set preliminary tariffs based on affirmative countervailing
subsidy and anti-dumping investigations respectively.275 The U.S. thus expanded
the tariffs resulting from the first set of cases and broadened the scope of the duties
to any modules that undergo final assembly in China , regardless of manufacturing origin. Experts
saw this as an unprecedented move.276 Paula Stern, former chairwoman of the International Trade Commission, sums up
panel manufacturers.267
that sentiment: Trade spats featuring the U.S. and China are nothing new, nor is the battle over government subsidies to Chinese solar manufacturers.
What is new is the Commerce Departments move to change the rules in the middle
of the game, hurting the domestic solar industry, undermining U.S. climate change
goals, and risking a prolonged trade dispute at the WTO.277 U.S. attacks on
Chinese subsidization of its exports are certainly suspect.278 Some might argue that the very laws
being employed against these importsantidumping and antisubsidy are skewed in favor of protecting the domestic economic environment. For
instance, in order to be subject to offsetting tariffs, the ITC must find that the dumped or subsidized imports cause or threaten to cause material harm to a
domestic industry. Yet, under the ITC statute, when the six ITC Commissioners are evenly divided on that issue, a finding of such harm will be declared.279
Thus, in a 2015 case, the U.S. Federal Circuit upheld antidumping duties and countervailing duties against utility scale wind towers from China despite the
rules and
enforcement actions like this are not likely to assure China and other
trade partners of this countrys real commitment to either international trade
law or climate change promises.
fact that three of the six Commissioners found there to be neither material injury nor a threat of such harm.280 In any event,
an even greater effort to address climate change and take on international responsibilities that are commensurate with . . . [its]
will suffer. 295 Ultimately, the U.S. and China must lead the way in imposing a price on
carbon, because only that will take to scale the already significant technology breakthroughs
that have happened with wind, solar, batteries, energy efficiency and nuclear
power.296 While this will not be easy,297 recent events suggest that it is possible. For instance, in December 2015, 53 WTO
members, including the U.S. and China, agreed on a timetable for the elimination of tariffs on an expanded list of information
technology products (valued at more than $1.3 trillion per year) over a three-year period.298 Because of the most-favored-nation
the tariff reductions brought about by this Information Technology Agreement (ITA) will
benefit exporters from all 162 WTO members ,299 thereby stimulating the sale of
information technology products around the world. Following the template of the ITA, the U.S. and
China are key participants in negotiations for an Environmental Goods Agreement (EGA) by 17
WTO members.300 The EGA has been described by the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) as a
measure that will spur innovation in green tech nologies.301 The benefits of cutting tariffs on green
goods have been lauded by WTO Director-General Roberto Azevedo who observed: The challenge is . . . to ensure
that trade is an ally in the fight against climate change . . . We need to create a
virtuous circle of trade and environmental policies which promote sustainable
production and consumption while being pro-growth and development. 302 As with the
ITA, the benefits of a completed EGA theoretically would be shared by all WTO members.303 However, U.S. trade
partners, including China, might well question whether that rhetoric will
match reality. After all, the U.S. has already been accused of using its
antidumping and countervailing duty laws as a ruse to raise tariffs on
imports after its trade partners have opened their markets to U.S.
goods.304 A careful reading of the USTRs comments regarding the EGA does little to quiet this concern as it primarily applauds
the initiative as a means of facilitating the export of American-made, environmental goods.305 CONCLUSION For the U.S., the
economic benefit of free trade pacts is estimated by the White House to be more
than $1 trillion, with the value of the proposed Trans-Pacific-Partnership (TPP) alone projected to be more than $300
billion.306 Appraisals of the economic benefit of a healthy, sustainable global
ecosystem are more complicated to calculate, but those that have tried, such as the World
Bank, have placed the figure in the trillion s.307 Similarly, the cost of forces disrupting
these public goods such as trade disputes and climate change is incredibly higha
U.S.-China trade war could cost tens of billions of dollars cumulatively ,308 while climate
principle,
change has already been estimated to impact the global economy to the tune of some $1.2 trillion annually, which works out to
roughly 1.6 percent of global GDP.309 Furthermore, the price tag of delaying action to stem climate change has been estimated at
more than three percent of global GDPwhich in the U.S. alone would come to more than $150 billion annuallywhile the least
developed nations face losing more than ten percent of their GDP.310 In other words,
Warming is real, anthropogenic, and threatens extinction --prefer new evidence that represents consensus
Griffin 15 (David, Claremont philosophy professor, The climate is ruined. So can
civilization even survive?, 4-14, http://www.cnn.com/2015/01/14/opinion/co2-crisisgriffin/)
climate scientists have become increasingly
worried about the survival of civilization. For example, Lonnie Thompson, who received the U.S.
National Medal of Science in 2010, said that virtually all climatologists "are now convinced
that global warming poses a clear and present danger to civilization."
Informed journalists share this concern. The climate crisis "threatens the survival of our
civilization," said Pulitzer Prize-winner Ross Gelbspan. Mark Hertsgaard agrees ,
Although most of us worry about other things,
of fossil fuels. Before the rise of the industrial age, CO2 constituted only 275 ppm (parts per million) of the
a temperature rise of 2C (3.6F) has been widely accepted. But many informed people have rejected this
assumption. In the opinion of journalist-turned-activist Bill McKibben, "the one degree we've raised the temperature
already has melted the Arctic, so we're fools to find out what two will do." His warning is supported by James
The
burning of coal, oil, and natural gas has made the planet warmer than it had been
since the rise of civilization 10,000 years ago. Civilization was made possible by the
emergence about 12,000 years ago of the "Holocene" epoch, which turned out to be
the Goldilocks zone - not too hot, not too cold. But now, says physicist Stefan Rahmstorf, "We are
catapulting ourselves way out of the Holocene." This catapult is dangerous, because we
have no evidence civilization can long survive with significantly higher
temperatures. And yet, the world is on a trajectory that would lead to an increase of 4C (7F) in this century.
In the opinion of many scientists and the World Bank, this could happen as early as the 2060s. What would "a
4C world" be like? According to Kevin Anderson of the Tyndall Centre for Climate
Change Research (at the University of East Anglia), "during New York's summer heat
waves the warmest days would be around 10-12C (18-21.6F) hotter [than today's]."
Moreover, he has said, above an increase of 4C only about 10% of the human
population will survive. Believe it or not, some scientists consider Anderson overly
optimistic. The main reason for pessimism is the fear that the planet's temperature
may be close to a tipping point that would initiate a "low-end runaway greenhouse,"
involving "out-of-control amplifying feedbacks." This condition would result, says Hansen, if all
fossil fuels are burned (which is the intention of all fossil-fuel corporations and many governments). This
result "would make most of the planet uninhabitable by humans."
Moreover, many scientists believe that runaway global warming could occur much
more quickly, because the rising temperature caused by CO2 could release massive
amounts of methane (CH4), which is, during its first 20 years, 86 times more
powerful than CO2. Warmer weather induces this release from carbon that has been stored in methane
Hansen, who declared that "a target of two degrees (Celsius) is actually a prescription for long-term disaster."
hydrates, in which enormous amounts of carbon -- four times as much as that emitted from fossil fuels since 1850 -has been frozen in the Arctic's permafrost. And yet now the Arctic's temperature is warmer than it had been for
120,000 years -- in other words, more than 10 times longer than civilization has existed. According to Joe Romm, a
physicist who created the Climate Progress website, methane release from thawing permafrost in the Arctic "is the
most dangerous amplifying feedback in the entire carbon cycle." The amplifying feedback works like this: The
warmer temperature releases millions of tons of methane, which then further raise the temperature, which in turn
amounts of permafrost would not melt, releasing its methane, until the planet's temperature has risen several
degrees Celsius, recent studies indicate that a rise of 1.5 degrees would be enough to start the melting.
What
can be done then? Given the failure of political leaders to deal with the CO2
problem, it is now too late to prevent terrible developments. But it may -- just
may -- be possible to keep global warming from bringing about the
destruction of civilization. To have a chance, we must, as Hansen says, do
everything possible to "keep climate close to the Holocene range" -- which
means, mobilize the whole world to replace dirty energy with clean as
soon as possible.
approaching war. It could be argued that the Sino-American economic relationship is so deep that it has tamped
down the great power conflict that would otherwise have been in full bloom over the past two decades. Instead,
both China and the United States have taken pains to talk about the need for a new kind of great power
well? The two other legs of the Kantian triaddemocratization and multilateralismare facing their own problems
in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis.110 Economic openness survived the negative shock of the 2008 financial
crisis, which suggests that the logic of commercial liberalism will continue to hold with equal force going forward.
But some international relations scholars doubt the power of globalizations pacifying effects, arguing that
interdependence is not a powerful constraint.111 Other analysts go further, arguing that globalization exacerbates
financial volatilitywhich in turn can lead to political instability and violence.112 A different counterargument is
that the continued growth of interdependence will stall out . Since 2008, for example, the
growth in global trade flows has been muted, and global capital flows are still considerably smaller than they were
in the pre-crisis era. In trade, this reflects a pre-crisis trend. Between 1950 and 2000, trade grew, on average, more
than twice as fast as global economic output. In the 2000s, however, trade only grew about 30 percent more than
output.113 In 2012 and 2013, trade grew less than economic output. The McKinsey Global Institute estimates that
possibility is due to innovations reducing the need for traded goods. For example, in the last decade, higher energy
prices in the United States triggered investments into conservation, alternative forms of energy, and
unconventional sources of hydrocarbons. All of these steps reduced the U.S. demand for imported energy. A future
in which compact fusion engines are developed would further reduce the need for imported energy even more.116
A more radical possibility is the development of technologies that reduce the need for physical trade across
borders. Digital manufacturing will cause the relocation of production facilities closer to end-user markets,
shortening the global supply chain.117 An even more radical discontinuity would come from the wholesale diffusion
of 3-D printing. The ability of a single printer to produce multiple component parts of a larger manufactured good
eliminates the need for a global supply chain. As Richard Baldwin notes, Supply chain unbundling is driven by a
fundamental trade-off between the gains from specialization and the costs of dispersal. This would be seriously
undermined by radical advances in the direction of mass customization and 3D printing by sophisticated
machinesTo put it sharply, transmission of data would substitute for transportation of goods.118 As 3-D printing
technology improves, the need for large economies to import anything other than raw materials concomitantly
deterrence has helped curb violent conflict among the great powers. Multilateral peacekeeping missions mitigate
small country conflicts. Even if there is a decline in interdependence, it is possible that the Long Peace will
endure. Furthermore, it is impossible to predict the degree to which either innovations or geopolitics will lessen the
need for international trade. Even technological optimists acknowledge that the future diffusion of 3D printing is
endogenousthat is to say, preexisting levels of globalization might constrain revisionist impulses, rather than such
impulses weakening the globalized economy. If great powers resort to revisionist foreign policies, however, then the
global economy will start to resemble the Cold War era of economic blocs and strategic embargoesone in which
trade and investment follow the flag rather than follow the rate of return. The increased American use of targeted
financial sanctions, for example, has already generated grumblings from peer competitors about finding ways to
diversify away from reliance upon the dollar.123 In 2015, China introduced its own international payment and
The correlation of
economic flows with geopolitical alliances would not just have a profound effect on
cross-border flows; it would likely lead to the fragmentation of global economic
governance. Just as significantly, great power governments would reverse postCold War trends and choose to allocate more scarce resources towards their
militaries.
settlements system, in part, to diversify away from reliance upon the dollar.124
WTO judges who were mulling Chinas complaint against the U.S . over its duties on solar panels
and steel ruled in favor of you guessed it more world trade. Reuters reports: In the $7.2 billion Chinese case,
the panel found that Washington had overstepped the mark in justifying the socalled countervailing duties it imposed as a response to alleged subsidies to
exporting firms by Chinas government. And it told the United States it should adapt its measures to bring
them into line with the WTOs agreement on subsidies and countervailing measures. The Coalition for Affordable Energy, a
trade group, cheered the ruling. It primarily represents solar panel installers, not solar panel manufacturers, so it supports
lower-cost panels regardless of where they are made. Todays WTO announcement and the broader
trade dispute should prompt the Obama Administration to reconsider the wisdom of
additional solar tariffs, CASE President Jigar Shah said in a press statement. Trade Representative
Michael Fromans office said it will evaluate all options to ensure that U.S. remedies against unfair subsidies remain strong and
effective. In other words, it is likely to appeal the ruling something that could help keep the tariffs in place for at least another six
to 12 months.
In order to
promote voluntary compliance, the WTO must maintain a high level of
credibility.106 Nations must perceive the WTO as the most reasonable option for
dispute resolution or fear that the WTO wields enough influence to enforce
sanctions.107 The arbitrators charged with performing the substantive work of the WTO by negotiating, compromising, and issuing
judgments are keenly aware of the responsibility they have to uphold the organizations
credibility.108
decisions, suggesting that governments recognize the value of maintaining the international construct of the WTO.105
Framing
Debating about government policies is a valuable heuristic
we can learn about the state without being it. Instead of
rejecting government policies in general, we should analyze
particular policies.
Zanotti 13 Laura Zanotti, Associate Professor of Political Science at Virginia
Tech, holds a Ph.D. in International Relations from Florida International University,
2013 (Governmentality, Ontology, Methodology: Re-thinking Political Agency in the
Global World, Alternatives: Global, Local, Political, Volume 38, Issue 4, November,
Available Online to Subscribing Institutions via SAGE Publications Online, p. 299300)
notwithstanding their critical stance, scholars who use
governmentality as a descriptive tool remain rooted in substantialist ontologies that
see power and subjects as standing in a relation of externality. They also downplay
processes of coconstitution and the importance of indeterminacy and ambiguity as
the very space where political agency can thrive. In this [end page 299] way, they
drastically limit the possibility for imagining political agency outside the
liberal straightjacket. They represent international liberal biopolitical and
governmental power as a homogenous and totalizing formation whose scripts
effectively oppress subjects, that are in turn imagined as free by nature.
Transformations of power modalities through multifarious tactics of hybridization and redescriptions
are not considered as options. The complexity of politics is reduced to homogenizing
and/or romanticizing narratives and political engagements are reduced to total
heroic rejections or to revolutionary moments . / By questioning substantialist
representations of power and subjects, inquiries on the possibilities of political
agency are reframed in a way that focuses on power and subjects relational
character and the contingent processes of their (trans)formation in the context of
agonic relations. Options for resistance to governmental scripts are not limited to
rejection, revolution, or dispossession to regain a pristine freedom
from all constraints or an immanent ideal social order. It is found instead in
multifarious and contingent struggles that are constituted within the scripts of
governmental rationalities and at the same time exceed and transform them.
This approach questions oversimplifications of the complexities of liberal
political rationalities and of their interactions with non-liberal political players and
nurtures a radical skepticism about identifying universally good or bad
actors or abstract solutions to political problems. International power
interacts in complex ways with diverse political spaces and within these spaces it
is appropriated, hybridized, redescribed, hijacked, and tinkered with. /
Governmentality as a heuristic focuses on performing complex diagnostics of
events. It invites historically situated explorations and careful
differentiations rather than overarching demonizations of power,
romanticizations of the rebel or the the local. More broadly, theoretical
formulations that conceive the subject in non-substantialist terms and focus on
processes of subjectification, on the ambiguity of power discourses, and on
In this article, I have argued that,
hybridization as the terrain for political transformation, open ways for reconsidering
political agency beyond the dichotomy of oppression/rebellion. These
alternative formulations also foster an ethics of political engagement, to be
continuously taken up through plural and uncertain practices, that demand
continuous attention to what happens instead of fixations on what
ought to be.83 Such ethics of engagement would not await the revolution to
come or hope for a pristine freedom to be regained. Instead, it would constantly
attempt to twist the working of power by playing with whatever cards are
available and would require intense processes of reflexivity on the consequences
of political choices. To conclude with a famous phrase by Michel Foucault my point is
not that everything is bad, but that everything is dangerous, which is not exactly
the same as bad. If everything is dangerous, then we always have something to do.
So my position leads not to apathy but to hyper- and pessimistic activism.84
alone, ignoring the complex relations to its soil, the air, sunshine, rainfall, etc., that also allowed it to grow robustly in this way. This is the sort of critique
were always leveling against the neoliberals. They are abstract thinkers. In their doxa that individuals are entirely responsible for themselves and that
they completely make themselves by pulling themselves up by their bootstraps, neoliberals ignore all the mediations belonging to the social and material
context in which human beings develop that play a role in determining the vectors of their life. They ignore, for example, that George W. Bush grew up in a
family that was highly connected to the world of business and government and that this gave him opportunities that someone living in a remote region of
Alaska in a very different material infrastructure and set of family relations does not have. To think concretely is to engage in a cartography of these
mediations, a mapping of these networks, from circumstance to circumstance (what I call an onto-cartography). It is to map assemblages, networks, or
thinks abstractly in its own way, ignoring how networks, assemblages, structures, or regimes of attraction would have to be remade to create a workable
alternative. Here Im reminded by the underpants gnomes depicted in South Park: The underpants gnomes have a plan for achieving profit that goes like
this: Phase 1: Collect Underpants Phase 2: ? Phase 3: Profit! They even have a catchy song to go with their work: Well this is sadly how it often is with the
articulated at phase 1 are right, but there are nonetheless all sorts of problems with those critiques nonetheless. In order to reach phase 3, we have to
and dudettes, what are you doing? But finally, and worst of all, us Marxists and anarchists all too often act like assholes. We denounce others, we condemn
them, we berate them for not engaging with the questions we want to engage with, and we vilify them when they dont embrace every bit of the doxa that
we endorse.
minister or the priest of the inquisition (have people yet understood that Deleuze and Guattaris Anti-Oedipus was a
critique of the French communist party system and the Stalinist party system, and the horrific passions that arise out of parties and identifications in
This type of revolutionary is the greatest friend of the reactionary and capitalist
because they do more to drive people into the embrace of reigning ideology than to
undermine reigning ideology. These are the people that keep Rush Limbaugh in
business. Well done! But this isnt where our most serious shortcomings lie. Our most serious shortcomings are to
be found at phase 2. We almost never make concrete proposals for how things ought to
be restructured, for what new material infrastructures and semiotic fields need to
be produced, and when we do, our critique-intoxicated cynics and skeptics immediately jump in
with an analysis of all the ways in which these things contain dirty secrets, ugly motives, and
are doomed to fail. How, I wonder, are we to do anything at all when we have no concrete
proposals? We live on a planet of 6 billion people. These 6 billion people are dependent on a certain network of
production and distribution to meet the needs of their consumption. That network of production
general?).
and distribution does involve the extraction of resources, the production of food, the maintenance of paths of transit and communication, the disposal of
waste, the building of shelters, the distribution of medicines, etc., etc., etc.
meet these problems? How will you navigate the existing mediations or semiotic and material features of infrastructure? Marx and Lenin
had proposals. Do you? Have you even explored the cartography of the problem? Today we are so intellectually bankrupt on these points that we even
have theorists speaking of events and acts and talking about a return to the old socialist party systems, ignoring the horror they generated, their failures,
notice in our circles? Who is addressing the problems of micro-fascism that arise with party systems (theres a reason that it was the Negri & Hardt
contingent, not the Badiou contingent that has been the heart of the occupy movement). At least the ecologists are thinking about these things in these
terms because, well, they think ecologically. Sadly we need something more, a melding of the ecologists, the Marxists, and the anarchists. Were not
getting it yet though, as far as I can tell. Indeed, folks seem attracted to yet another critical paradigm, Laruelle. I would love, just for a moment, to hear a
radical environmentalist talk about his ideal high school that would be academically sound. How would he provide for the energy needs of that school?
How would he meet building codes in an environmentally sound way? How would she provide food for the students? What would be her plan for waste
disposal? And most importantly, how would she navigate the school board, the state legislature, the federal government, and all the families of these
What is your alternative? I think there are alternatives. I saw one that approached an alternative
in Rotterdam. If you want to make a truly revolutionary contribution, this is where you should start. Why
should anyone even bother listening to you if you arent proposing real plans? But we havent even gotten to that point. Instead were like
underpants gnomes, saying revolution is the answer! without addressing any of the
infrastructural questions of just how revolution is to be produced, what alternatives
it would offer, and how we would concretely go about building those alternatives.
students? What is your plan?
Masturbation. Underpants gnome deserves to be a category in critical theory; a sort of synonym for self-congratulatory masturbation. We need less