Fisherguy66
I never thought I'd curse at clouds so much!
Send some to Canada, I'm in if it makes em cheaper.
What is the Tariff on Solar Now
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timselectric
If I can do it, you can do it.
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My guess is that they will just route shipping through a country without a tariff.
And absorb the extra shipping costs.
And absorb the extra shipping costs.
Weekend van
New Member
Customs is smarter than that. If it was that easy, it would have been done a long time ago. I am sure there is some of it happening, but not a solid business plan.
timselectric
If I can do it, you can do it.
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Time will tell.
Tulex
Solar Wizard
It's already been going on for a long time. China for example opens "businesses" in other countries and just ships from those.
another thing to realize is these China companies are in it to make money. send any company on alibaba an inquiry and there are ready to sell you as many units as you can buy. and will wheel and deal for $$$
govt is a whole different beast.
govt is a whole different beast.
BaylentheSky
New Member
You're joking, right? Go to any South East Asian countries and see how many Chinese companies have set up shop there to export to the US. Out of nowhere, these countries' total export quadrupled in under 10 years. Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam,... I can tell you from first hand experience of having been in Vietnam once a year for the past 15 years or so, the number of Chinese companies that operate in Vietnam to manufacture and export strictly to the US has increased several tens fold since 2010.
robby
Electronic Engineer
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Yes that is true but the original comment made it sound like you just ship them to Brazil etc and then ship them from Brazil back into America. That would never work!
Customs is looking for country of origin. If you are a big industrial country like Malaysia or Vietnam then it's pretty easy to setup a factory and assemble the parts and then send them out rebadged.
BaylentheSky
New Member
Sorry, I meant to address that too, but in my zeal, I forgot :D
Look up Sunsong trade fraud if anyone is interested in how a Chinese company falsifies the origin of their shipments to avoid tariffs on a huge scale.
timselectric
If I can do it, you can do it.
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It's two separate shipments, with two separate origins.
They store the products in a warehouse in the tariff free country.
When an order is placed It's shipped to the US, from the tariff free location.
They store the products in a warehouse in the tariff free country.
When an order is placed It's shipped to the US, from the tariff free location.
Good morning all,
Richard here from the UK. I occasionally have PCB's made in China and provided I make a change to the PCB each time I want it manufacturing I can order 100 items as samples and these seem to avoid being taxed on import to the UK.
Additionally I was reading somewhere the other day that there is still some kind of agreement in place whereby goods can be shipped to the UK and some part of the cost of the items arriving here is subsidised.
Nearly as barmy as the fact we still provide aid to India as a developing nation (although how much that will amount to as we're cutting such as our foreign aid budget to spend on defence is anybodies guess)........
I don't know how the likes of DigiKey/ Mouser get around import duties on good supplied to the UK (this has nothing to do with the current shenanigans). You are directed to a 'UK' web site and the items seem to be shipped from within the UK and there is no sign of import taxes. Yet if I place an order for less than about £120 with an American company they are obliged to charge me as if the order was £120 (this applies across the EC as far as I'm aware). This obviously means American businesses must be losing lots of small orders to the EC now.
Regards
Richard
svetz
Works in theory! Practice? That's something else
Pretty sure the non-tariffed countries raised their prices to make more profit since there is no lower priced competition. Probably better to buy from a tariffed country as the excess money goes to the U.S. government, that is your over-spent tariff dollars are at least doing something useful.
Those 100 power plants they're bringing back (mostly coal) from retirement due to the energy crisis will have an impact too. As there is no crisis, that means there will be a glut of energy. Normally a glut of a product would mean lower prices (those plants were shut down because they were too expensive to run compared to renewables). But, you can't lower the price of electricity because the utilities would go out of business...that can't be allowed because people need power. So, who's power are we going to throw away? What will the FERC do? The obvious choice is to turn down residential roof top solar because they don't have a lobby and then renewables because the national policy is anti-renewable. So, consumer prices will rise, and so will pollution and health problems.
Early numbers show illegal crossing are way down (50-60%), but fentanyl hasn't really decreased (and therefore probably not getting rid of illegal murders) and I didn't see anything about panels... but it might just be hush hush. ; -)
Finally watched it, he said he'd escalate tariffs as needed to fight retaliation. So, based on the first paragraph of this post, a good time for all solar panel producers, except those in the U.S. (since the tarrifs will go away with the next administration and investments in those companies will inevitably go belly up as they have in the best).
Prices in the U.S. will rise, there's no incentive for them to lower panel costs to the U.S. as no one is buying them in mass due to "drill baby drill" policies.
Those 100 power plants they're bringing back (mostly coal) from retirement due to the energy crisis will have an impact too. As there is no crisis, that means there will be a glut of energy. Normally a glut of a product would mean lower prices (those plants were shut down because they were too expensive to run compared to renewables). But, you can't lower the price of electricity because the utilities would go out of business...that can't be allowed because people need power. So, who's power are we going to throw away? What will the FERC do? The obvious choice is to turn down residential roof top solar because they don't have a lobby and then renewables because the national policy is anti-renewable. So, consumer prices will rise, and so will pollution and health problems.
I think so, there's no incentive for China to reduce prices when they're deploying the equivalent of 5 nuclear power plants worth of solar per week last year and are looking to do it again. Solar and wind with Battery now have LCOEs on par with Natural Gas (cheapest previously) so all developing countries (e.g., India, Africa) can easily devour the rest of China's output. Which means all those investing in pipelines and fuel development now will probably never recoup their investments.
Pfft.... Canada competes with China making panels.Send some to Canada, I'm in if it makes em cheaper.
They are doing that. It's a little complicated as they need a factory in that country and a few people beat to explaining it... but, what they didn't say was that since tariffs raised prices, the middleman is also raising the prices and pocketing the difference rather than the U.S. collecting the tariff money. It's also why U.S. investment in solar to develop manufacturing are doomed, if they can build them for the tariff price when the tariff price goes away the American company can no longer compete.
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Thank you for posting this. Many Americans who are mad about tariffs have zero idea of how the US gets screwed over and over and over. And it's not just Asian imports etc. It's also the countries we are closest to. The bottom line is it needs to be fair for all.
Q-Dog
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Enlighten us.
Brucey
Velcro Man
I think he's saying that open free market only works if there's reciprocity on the other side. I.e US open to all markets A to Z yet we may not have the same access when exporting to country X.
Seems like common sense that if the US grants access to our domestic market that we have reciprocal export rights back to that country.
Q-Dog
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I would like to hear it from him. He says we are getting screwed over and over and over. How? One person's screwing over is another's good time.
McKravitts
Solar Enthusiast
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China uses Taiwan to avoid US tariffs. US companies use Taiwan to avoid Chinas tariffs, plus getting the added bonus of cheap labor.
In business everybody is trying to screw everybody else.
On March 22, 2018, Trump signed a memorandum under the Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, instructing the United States Trade Representative (USTR) to apply tariffs of $50 billion on Chinese goods including solar panels and batteries, yet the cost of solar panels, batteries, etc. continued to decline. The only thing that changed is the “from” address on shipping labels.
Tariffs are just a game politicians use to play the tough man. It's a great way to get votes, but in the end the only ones who suffer are the small business who don't have the clout to play the game and individuals who buy a few souvenirs in a foreign country and bring them back to their own country.
The playing field is about as level as it's ever been and probably will always be.
In business everybody is trying to screw everybody else.
On March 22, 2018, Trump signed a memorandum under the Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, instructing the United States Trade Representative (USTR) to apply tariffs of $50 billion on Chinese goods including solar panels and batteries, yet the cost of solar panels, batteries, etc. continued to decline. The only thing that changed is the “from” address on shipping labels.
Tariffs are just a game politicians use to play the tough man. It's a great way to get votes, but in the end the only ones who suffer are the small business who don't have the clout to play the game and individuals who buy a few souvenirs in a foreign country and bring them back to their own country.
The playing field is about as level as it's ever been and probably will always be.
Not just taxes, cheaper labour is also important. Chinese labour is not super cheap like it was 10 or 20 years ago.
robby
Electronic Engineer
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The only reason we are in this crap is because we have no cards and are just bluffing our way through this game.
If we had several LFP battery manufacturers and PV Manufactures in the USA that could satisfy domestic demand then this conversation would not even be happening. Even now as the last two decades have passed they have kept yammering on about moving back manufacturing and yet nothing significant has really happened.
When they are serious and it is important to them, like when they saw what happened during Covid and the TSMC Chip shortage. Notice how fast they acted to get sufficient manufacturing moved to the USA.
Hedges
I See Electromagnetic Fields!
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What has happened is advanced semiconductor fabs getting built here, by companies from Taiwan and others.
Intel too.
I'm involved with this, have been in the fabs to perform my EMI black arts.
Battery cells and PV cells are lower cost commodities so as you say not so much.
PV panel assembly makes some sense if avoiding bulk shipment is valuable. But cross-ocean container shipping is cheap. It is domestic shipping that dominates.
Ideally we do some low-touch high-tech manufacturing in the US, and as that product is exported there are credits that can be used to avoid tariffs on imports.
"Cap and Trade Trade", I say. Balanced trade (and balanced budget) is what we need.
Intel too.
I'm involved with this, have been in the fabs to perform my EMI black arts.
Battery cells and PV cells are lower cost commodities so as you say not so much.
PV panel assembly makes some sense if avoiding bulk shipment is valuable. But cross-ocean container shipping is cheap. It is domestic shipping that dominates.
Ideally we do some low-touch high-tech manufacturing in the US, and as that product is exported there are credits that can be used to avoid tariffs on imports.
"Cap and Trade Trade", I say. Balanced trade (and balanced budget) is what we need.
Fisherguy66
I never thought I'd curse at clouds so much!
Yep that's our wonderful liberal trudeau gov't, bang the drum on climate change then make it too expensive for people to help the climate.
All kinds of talk about tariff's for months and now it's happening. Most people had a choice before now to buy what they needed like me, so I did just that. I have stuff sitting around waiting on me to install. I just hope this all works out to be better for us in the long run.
The uk guy literally explained it before
One of us used to work for sundyro corporation and imported scooters directly from China.
Ended up dismantling the factory in China and moving to US.
If you want more info about how easily it is to get around tariffs then do some research. Not tik tok or even here.
Not every country has tariffs. So if country a doesn't. Country b does. Country c doesn't . Shop to a. Then to c.
This stuff isn't difficult. There's also minimum costs whers tariffs don't apply. So if an item is under say $800, no tariff. $801, tax applied. So you declare your items to be of much lower value and using a cooperating shipper and voila.
Or send all components and assemble in USA. Like we did. No tax.
Nice post to.be an a**hole by the way. Life is too short. Find other ways to be happy
Exactly. Once workers realize they have rights, the days of cheap labor end. So we find another cheaper country.
Guy I know in Guatemala. They have a commercial ac company. They went from China to India to here to there
Found out that Africa was the cheapest. So they had a factory. They needed security to protect the employees. And security to protect the security!
So they decided there's a limit to "cheaper"
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