A Huntsville, Alabama, solar panel factory will close after President Joe Biden exempted foreign-made bifacial solar panels from United States tariffs previously this month.
LG Electronics, a South Korea-based company, revealed that it will be closing its Huntsville photovoltaic panel manufacturing operation, leading to the layoffs of about 160 American workers and another 60 Americans who are used as agreement employees.
Executives said they want to retain as numerous staff members as they can by transitioning them into the business’s other service and manufacturing sectors at its Huntsville school. Laid-off staff members will get severance packages.
The announcement comes simply weeks after Biden decided to exempt foreign-made bifacial photovoltaic panels– the frustrating bulk of which come from China– from Area 201 tariffs on solar imports to the United States that were very first enforced by previous President Trump in January 2018 at a 30 percent rate.
The Coalition for a Prosperous America (CPA) had actually alerted that Biden’s gutting U.S. tariffs on China-made bifacial photovoltaic panels would have a terrible impact on America’s solar manufacturing sector.
“China sympathizers might think that gutting the 201 solar tariffs would not affect the U.S. solar production industry as long as Congress supports domestic manufacturers. This is flat-out incorrect,” certified public accountant Chairman Zach Mottl said in a declaration:
Without trade treatments to level the playing field for U.S. solar producers that are completing versus heavily subsidized Chinese business, it will not matter if Congress passes a domestic tax credit for American producers. [Focus included]
Shortly after Trump imposed the U.S. tariffs on solar imports, LG Electronic devices revealed that they would broaden their Huntsville campus to include making solar panels– an advantage for the city’s regional economy as each factory task supports an extra 7.4 tasks.
In November, as Breitbart News reported, Biden’s Commerce Department agreed Chinese solar makers who produce their products in Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam by rejecting a request from American solar manufacturers to investigate U.S. tariff evasion.
Biden had been lobbiedby 12 Senate Democrats who sent out a letter asking the administration not to enforce any tariffs on the items made in Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam by the Chinese solar manufacturers.
From 2001 to 2018, U.S. open market with China has actually cost Alabama a minimum of 50,700 jobsor about 2.5 percent of the state’s employment. A previous studydiscovered that long-term 25 percent tariffs on China-made products imported to the U.S. market would produce a million American jobs in 5 years.
John Binder is a reporter for BreitbartNews.Email him at jbinder@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter here.