A moment of reckoning for a soaring solar industry
IT WAS A FEAT OF AMERICAN ingenuity that created the world’s first operational solar panel in the mid– 20th century at Bell Laboratories in New Jersey. The U.S. maintained its pace-setting role in the development of solar technology in the half-century that followed, driving down its cost and helping turn it into a growing source of power for utilities and consumers around the world.
As the market has matured, however, global competition has nudged the pioneer from its perch. Today solar panel manufacturing has expanded to a more than $40 billion industry worldwide, more than half of which is controlled by China. With massive government investment, China has developed an unparalleled ability to build solar panels cheaply, allowing its companies to pass on the relative savings to the consumers and energy companies that buy them. As a result, China’s solar-panel industry has grown an average of 18% annually in the past five years, compared with just 0.4% growth in the U.S., according to data from market-research firm IBISWorld.
This story is from the September 25,2017 edition of Time.
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This story is from the September 25,2017 edition of Time.
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