U.S. Energy Department Announces New Initiatives to Boost U.S. Solar Manufacturing

The U.S. Energy Department has announced several financing plans and $56 million in funding, including $10 million from the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, to spur innovation in solar production and recycling. Jointly, the initiatives would aid the reliability and affordability of clean energy, create good, well-paying jobs, and enhance U.S. technological and economic competitiveness and growth.

Investments in developing solar power, the most affordable form of clean electricity supply, is essential to meeting President Biden’s goal of having an electric grid with 100 percent clean energy by 2035, according to the agency. Advancing U.S. solar manufacturing capacity would yield many benefits for the environment and climate as well as for national security, employers, and workers, while cutting down energy bills for households, according to the department’s Solar Supply Chain Review Report. The recently announced plans are targeted at spurring radical improvements in solar technology and its production, provide an enabling environment for the U.S. to advance the manufacturing of thin-film modules, which do not depend on foreign-controlled supply chains, and support new technologies such as perovskite solar cells.

For the financial year 2022, the department has earmarked several funding options. These include $29 million for Photovoltaics Research and Development with $10 million from the infrastructure law to support projects that enhance the recycling and reuse of solar technologies. The budgeted funds would also enable projects to develop PV module designs that lower manufacturing costs and advance the production of PV cells made from perovskites, a class of materials with the potential for high performance at lower production costs.

The $27 million Solar Manufacturing Incubator investment would provide for activities directed at marketing new technologies that can increase investment in U.S. solar manufacturing. Further, a $18 million funding via the Technology Commercialization Fund will support seven proposed National Laboratory projects designed to deal with commercialization challenges faced by technologies funded by the agency. Financing is also available for projects that prepare new technologies and production processes to commercialize and showcase solutions that can boost home-grown manufacturing of thin-film PVs made from cadmium telluride, the most common PV technology available, second only to silicon.