New Tariffs in the States

Steve_S said:

Well it at least appears that Battery Cells for the DIY Crowd are SAFE FOR NOW - there is that November thing in the US -
SCC's Inverters, AIO's seems like are going to get a smaller hit for now.

I personally would not "sit back" too long though, things have an un-funny way of changing.


I wonder "what" they will consider "Battery Parts". I suspect BMS' will be such.

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I ordered twenty two BMS with an extra six for the shelf plus some extra breakers.

Supervstech said:

The INSTANT a tarrif is set, ALL battery/solar will reflect the price change.

If EVERYBODY stopped buying anything after the tarrif takes effect, a message would be sent...
But if government requires solar on new construction, demand will compensate for the increase...
China will likely cease exporting to usa in that case...
Till next election vetos it.

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There have been tarrifs in place prior to last election. China has been getting around them.

The only winner in this is Mexico, they are the honeypot for "nearshoring"
Customers and workers get the shaft as per usual.

Caution: Tariffs are paid by the buyer.
If you order something direct from China, your order may be held by customs . You’ll have pay the tariff to get it released.

I actually live in Mexico....Cabo San Lucas and not the mainland. The crazy thing is that here everything is overpriced Chinese JUNK. We're talking 200-250 watt panels being sold, no name low amperage charge controllers and inverters, etc. Heading to California next week to bring down some Victron 150/100's, Canadian Solar (yes Chinese) panels and 64 more EVE cells. So Overkill solar BMS (and all brands) are going to be hit as well? I can sell everything at a profit no joke. Need to figure out Alibaba or how everyone is getting solar/cells. I started an MX corporation and finally have tax ID.

Starex said:

Caution: Tariffs are paid by the buyer.
If you order something direct from China, your order may be held by customs . You’ll have pay the tariff to get it released.

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Yep if the tariff hits before your stuff gets through customs you will have to pay it to get your stuff.

If there is some mistake i have made a lot, it has been not taking action even if i knew it was the right thing to do.
Get your stuff when is still easy and cheap, tariffs are not coming down, and inflation is never stopping.
Putting together a solar system has done great things for my quality of living, get this tariffs spike as a sign that taking action is necessary.

Is the tariff going to hit Chinese panels (80% of market) or LiFePO4 cells first? I've contacted James at 18650 and he has 64 cells reserved at $6400. Also contacted a source for Canadian Solar CS6W-540MB (eBay) at $150/each. Not sure I want to spend $20k in one fell swoop.

Stiffmeister said:

Is the tariff going to hit Chinese panels (80% of market) or LiFePO4 cells first? I've contacted James at 18650 and he has 64 cells reserved at $6400. Also contacted a source for Canadian Solar CS6W-540MB (eBay) at $150/each. Not sure I want to spend $20k in one fell swoop.

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The Chinese panels are already shipped thru/via other south east Asian countries and then onwards to the US to get around existing tariffs. I don't think anyone is doing the same for LFP cells so they may go up, but keep in mind cell prices continue to drop.

Brucey said:

The Chinese panels are already shipped thru/via other south east Asian countries and then onwards to the US to get around existing tariffs. I don't think anyone is doing the same for LFP cells so they may go up, but keep in mind cell prices continue to drop.

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Thanks for the information. Yes the EVE cells have dropped 1/3 since I purchased 64 last year. I'm going to purchase the Canadian Solar panels and haul them to Mexico and wait on batteries.

Brucey said:

The Chinese panels are already shipped thru/via other south east Asian countries and then onwards to the US to get around existing tariffs. I don't think anyone is doing the same for LFP cells so they may go up, but keep in mind cell prices continue to drop.

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In the news this morning from Reuters: https://www.reuters.com/markets/com...manufacturers-chinese-competition-2024-05-16/

The White House said it would soon remove a two-year-old trade exemption that has allowed imports of so-called bifacial panels to avoid duties. Those panels were a small part of the market at the time of the exemption but are now the main technology used in utility-scale solar projects.
Reuters first reported the administration's plans to do so last month.
Biden will also end a waiver on tariffs imposed on solar panels made by Chinese companies in Malaysia, Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam. He imposed the temporary waiver two years ago at the request of U.S. project developers who rely on cheap imports to make their facilities cost-competitive.

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I asked Gobel directly about how they handle any tariff. They said....

"Our forwarder including all costs including the tariff for DDP shipping, they cover the tariff by containers not per order, we don't have problem on the customs."

DDP takes care of everything, including tariffs. That said, some sellers might not want to go with DDP in times of uncertainty if they (or their forwarders) are not sure about upcoming regulations and the impact on price yet.

wpns said:

Tariffs are paid on entry, so anything sitting in a US warehouse won’t cost any more.

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Tariffs are always paid by the consumers. Does not matter what the political speak is, consumers always end up paying for tariffs.

Steve_S said:

It certainly seems to be the end of Cheap Cells & Tech from China for the US. What & How others will react & the fallout effect we DIY types will likely be unpleasant. The other shoe to drop, is what will China do to counter it... and what will that cost us poor shmucks too ?

When & How bad it will be, will likely be announced soon enough. My thought, is GET WHAT YOU CAN NOW !

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This is an interesting topic. There so much stuff that depends on the Tech and even the big names have a lot of no-name tech baked in that I think this will have interesting consequences. It will undoubtedly lift the inflation (we have had about 25% of that in the last 4-5 years). Inflation always hits poor and middle class the worst.

Tariffs are popular with people because they think, "We're fighting back against [insert name of country]!" The reality is that it's the consumer, not the target country, that pays those tariffs.

Users of this forum will simply be forced to pay more, for exactly the same products. Will those dollars go toward enabling a stronger solar industry for our country? Of course not! They just go right into the giant vacuum that already sucks up far too much of our hard-earned money, and redirects it to anything that will get the masses to vote for the people imposing the tariffs. If the additional money being collected went directly into, say, renewable research and building a better industrial base, I might not feel so bad about paying it. But as I see it, this is just a tax on people trying to move away from dependence on utilities and fossil fuels. Not happy about that.

It is supposedly supposed to make the costs for the cheap imports higher to prevent undercutting domestic production. Country A has solid labor conditions, Country B has slave labor and sells to Country A super cheap, drives out production in Country A, which long term has negative economic impact to Country A. That's the basic idea anyway.

....except we don't really have domestic production of this stuff yet.
And there are all kinds of other holes that can be poked in it too.

The good answer to it is not really simple.

Global trade has its pros and cons for sure.

China remains a command economy with capitalistic characteristics...
That's my turn of phrase on a popular saying

A long time ago the CPC recognized they needed to build the capacity to have supply chains of their own and dominate markets at home and by default compete over seas..
Long term plans and state money went into building a system that has dominated the solar battery and now EV markets.
But when the state plans and picks winners and losers often there are a lot of losers and the public pays the cost of that.
That's part of the reason a Chinese worker still has little brass in pocket in spite of decades of massive economic growth

In Canada we take a different approach.
We sell out, then export raw materials.
We avoid capital investments and putting money in R&D, training or education.

SO we make nothing and own nothing.

A tariff will not solve this.
We need actual gov intervention in the economy.
Not to the Chinese level of doing things but I think it would be safe to say the very visible hand of government should pulling anywhere up to 20% of the economic leavers actively owning stakes and and steering development in the growth sides of technology.
That sounds like communism... Colour me red and Black list me....
The free market doesn't plan very far ahead in a word that needs real planning if we are to have a sustainable affordable future.

My two cents....

And I would like to add.
People forget the post WW2 growth was not because of the superiority of on regulated capitalism.
It was because our enemies were defeated and bombed into poverty we had not competition and they need us.
Massive investments in science technology and military spending created the economic miracles of the 1950s and 1960s.
It was the deregulation of the 1980s that set us down a path of "do-nothingism", the out source all the dirty jobs we did not want to put the money and resources into making here.

Madcodger said:

They just go right into the giant vacuum that already sucks up far too much of our hard-earned money, and redirects it to anything that will get the masses to vote for the people imposing the tariffs.

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Most people don't readily realize that all the free-bees are inefficiently distributed back after a substantial portion of that is sucked out of collections to run the machine to collect, account, enforce, and then distribute!!! And, we thank other to give us the free bee that are funded either out of our money or the debt taken in the name of next generation (our children).

SparkyJJO said:

Country B has slave labor and sells to Country A super cheap

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I doubt seriously if it helps the slave labor.