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Policy Watch

Tariffs Hit Solar Cells

And more of the week’s biggest news in clean energy policy.

Solar Panels
Unsplash/Heatmap

1. Seasons change, tariffs stay the same – The Biden administration is putting a duty on solar cells from four South Asian countries believed to be pass-throughs for Chinese imports: Cambodia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam.

  • The tariffs range wildly from less than 1% to almost 300%. Impacted companies include Jintek, Hanwha Q Cells (a.k.a. Qcells), JinkoSolar, and Trina Solar.
  • What this’ll mean: developers wrestling with pricier imported cells from some of the most popular sources.
  • These tariffs resulted from an anti-dumping case filed by an alliance of U.S. solar manufacturers including First Solar, Convalt Energy, REC Silicon, and, ironically, also Qcells.

2. New money for new nuclear – The Energy Department yesterday finalized over $2.8 billion in loans and grants to restart the Palisades nuclear plant in Michigan.

  • The plant – to be operated by Holtec – shut down in 2022 which means, as reports indicate, it shouldn’t take long to recommission and could be re-operational by next year.
  • Nuclear Energy Institute CEO Maria Korsnick told me earlier this year over pasta that she was vying for more direct investments to individual projects, partially to make it harder to repeal Inflation Reduction Act programs.

3. California is so silly sometimes – A judge has temporarily halted a California rule that would’ve stopped some solar developers in the state from building battery storage.

  • California’s contractor licensing board had set forth regulation effective Oct. 1 stopping solar equipment workers from installing or maintaining batteries beyond 80 kWH (which… is obviously not a lot of power).
  • The regulation will now be suspended until a legal challenge from solar and battery storage companies can be resolved.

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Spotlight

Birds Could Be the Anti-Wind Trump Card

How the Migratory Bird Treaty Act could become the administration’s ultimate weapon against wind farms.

A golden eagle and wind turbines.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

The Trump administration has quietly opened the door to strictly enforcing a migratory bird protection law in a way that could cast a legal cloud over wind farms across the country.

As I’ve chronicled for Heatmap, the Interior Department over the past month expanded its ongoing investigation of the wind industry’s wildlife impacts to go after turbines for killing imperiled bald and golden eagles, sending voluminous records requests to developers. We’ve discussed here how avian conservation activists and even some former government wildlife staff are reporting spikes in golden eagle mortality in areas with operating wind projects. Whether these eagle deaths were allowable under the law – the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act – is going to wind up being a question for regulators and courts if Interior progresses further against specific facilities. Irrespective of what one thinks about the merits of wind energy, it’s extremely likely that a federal government already hostile to wind power will use the law to apply even more pressure on developers.

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Hotspots

New Mexico’s NIMBYs Vow to Fight Again in Santa Fe

And more on the week’s most important conflicts around renewable energy projects.

The United States.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

1. Santa Fe County, New Mexico – County commissioners approved the controversial AES Rancho Viejo solar project after months of local debate, which was rendered more intense by battery fire concerns.

  • Opposition to the nearly 100-megawatt solar project in the Santa Fe area was entirely predictable, per Heatmap Pro data, which shows overwhelming support for renewable energy in theory, yet an above average chance of NIMBYism arising. That genuine NIMBY quotient appears resilient, prompting even climate activist Bill McKibben to weigh in on the loud volume of the opposition.
  • The commission approved the project’s necessary permit on Tuesday after local fire officials cleared it on safety grounds. Opponents, however, led by an organization named Clean Energy Coalition for Santa Fe County, reportedly plan to sue over the approval, anyway.

2. Nantucket, Massachusetts – The latest episode of the Vineyard Wind debacle has dropped, and it appears the offshore wind project’s team is now playing ball with the vacation town.

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Q&A

Trump’s Take on Environmental Review Has Some Silver Linings

Talking NEPA implementation and permitting reform with Pamela Goodwin, an environmental lawyer at Saul Ewing LLP.

Pamela Goodwin.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

This week’s conversation is with Pamela Goodwin, an environmental lawyer with Saul Ewing LLP. I reached out to her to chat about permitting because, well, when is that not on all of our minds these days. I was curious, though, whether Trump’s reforms to National Environmental Policy Act regulations and recent court rulings on the law’s implementation would help renewables in any way, given how much attention has been paid to “permitting reform” over the years. To my surprise, there are some silver linings here – though you’ll have to squint to see them.

The following chat was lightly edited for clarity.

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