Governors' Wind Energy Coalition

The Solar Energy Manufacturing for America Coalition, representing 16 panel and equipment companies, is out with a letter to Biden on Mondaywarning the U.S. risks “losing the domestic solar manufacturing industry forever” if Democrats fail to pass massive tax breaks that were included in the imperiled Build Back Better Act.

“Moving from foreign dependence on fossil fuels to foreign dependence on clean energy is not how we can truly build back better and meet our climate targets,” write the companies, including First Solar, Mission Solar, Sunnova and Heliene.

Democrats’ stalled social spending bill includes tax credits for each part of solar panel production and assembly, from mining silicon and other rare earth minerals, to manufacturing the solar cells, and constructing the panels. There would also be tax credits for companies that build solar projects in the field.

The coalition estimates these provisions could produce enough domestic solar module manufacturing capacity to deploy 30 GW of solar power annually by 2025, resulting in nearly 18,000 direct manufacturing jobs and over 60,000 indirect jobs.