Sunrun Inc. Chief Executive Officer Mary Powell Photographer: Cole Burston/Bloomberg Photo by Cole Burston /Bloomberg Article content
(Bloomberg) — The troubled, $20 billion US residential solar market’s future rests on whether Senate Republicans will challenge their brethren in the House of Representatives and change provisions of the massive tax and spending bill that executives and analysts alike say would devastate the industry.
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The bill passed by the House this week would strip away tax credits for companies that lease rooftop solar systems as well as homeowners who buy them outright. The industry is already reeling from tariffs on imported equipment, high interest rates and reduced state incentives in California, the nation’s biggest residential solar market. One major rooftop solar company — Sunnova Energy International Inc. — is laying the groundwork for a bankruptcy filing, and analyst Philip Shen at Roth Capital Partners warned the bill as written would effectively shut down the industry, starting next year.
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Now, solar executives’ hopes rest on moderate Republican senators, some of whom have already said they don’t favor gutting clean-energy incentives. But given the party’s slim majority in the House, it’s unclear how willing they will be to change the bill and risk alienating fiscal hardliners in the lower chamber.
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“I think there are many senators that are also focused on the fact that you don’t want pull out the rug,” said Mary Powell, chief executive officer of Sunrun Inc., the nation’s biggest residential solar company. She called the House bill “not workable for Americans” and warned it would “slash consumers’ access to affordable, reliable solutions.”
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The industry has been struggling despite subsidies from former President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act. High interest rates have made it more expensive for companies to raise capital and for customers to finance solar panels. California cut the amount of money solar homeowners receive for electricity they supply to the power grid, lengthening the amount of time needed to recoup the cost of their systems.
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In addition, the US International Trade Commission voted this week to move toward slapping tariffs on solar equipment from four Southeast Asian countries that provide the bulk of imported cells and panels, with levies ranging from 34% to 3,521% depending on the country and manufacturer involved. The vote was the culmination of a trade probe, and the US has already been collecting preliminary duties for months.
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US residential solar installations fell 20% last year, according to BloombergNEF data. If the federal tax credits go away, the market will see a further 18% drop over the next ten years, said BNEF analyst Pol Lezcano.
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The release of the House bill on Thursday sent solar shares tumbling, with Sunrun losing more than one-third of its market value. Equipment sellers Enphase Energy Inc. and SolarEdge Technologies Inc. also fell. Solar executives blasted the bill for essentially repealing much of the IRA, which President Donald Trump has called the “green new scam.” Former Sunnova CEO John Berger, in an interview on Bloomberg Television, said ending the solar tax credits for homeowners would be “patently unfair and un-American.”
https://financialpost.com/pmn/business-pmn/fate-of-20-billion-us-home-solar-market-lies-in-gop-senate-hands
