US Sets Initial Duties On Indian Solar Imports At 126%

(MENAFN- Live Mint) (Bloomberg) - The Trump administration set preliminary duties of 126% on solar imports from India after determining the country unfairly subsidized manufacturing.

The US Commerce department also set initial levies from 86% to 143% for Indonesia and 81% for Laos. The rates are based on a determination of foreign subsidies that the US says allowed exporters from the countries to undercut products from domestic solar producers.

While the duties aim to benefit domestic manufacturers, they heighten uncertainty for an industry not favored by US President Donald Trump and threaten to increase costs for producers as well as for consumers.

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These levies would be different from Trump's sweeping global tariffs, which the US Supreme Court struck down last week. In response, Trump issued new 10% duties that he's threatened to raise to 15%. The president had also struck a bilateral trade deal with India earlier this month that had sought to reduce economic tensions between the countries.

India, Indonesia and Laos accounted for 57% of solar-module imports to the US in the first half of 2025, according to BloombergNEF.

Chinese solar manufacturers, facing stiff US tariffs, have increasingly shifted production to Southeast Asia to preserve their access to the US market. Initial efforts focused on Cambodia, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Thailand until those nations were also hit by steep US duties, promoting producers to relocate capacity elsewhere in Asia.

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US solar manufacturers filed trade petitions in July, alleging that Chinese companies were flooding the US market with unfairly cheap goods made in India, Indonesia and Laos. The complaints have since prompted the U.S. International Trade Commission to launch an investigation into the anti-dumping and countervailing duty claims.

Solar imports from India in 2024 were valued at $792.6 million, more than nine times that in 2022, according to the Commerce Department.

The relatively high levies will make the US market largely unavailable for Indian solar panel manufactures, Citigroup Inc. analyst Vikram Bagri said in a note Tuesday.

A US solar group, the Alliance for American Solar Manufacturing and Trade, had petitioned Commerce to investigate the subsidies, saying a probe was needed to protect US manufacturing.

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“Today's finding is an important step toward restoring fair competition in the US solar market,” said Tim Brightbill, co-chair of Wiley Rein's International Trade Practice and lead attorney for the Alliance.“American manufacturers are investing billions of dollars to rebuild domestic capacity and create good-paying jobs. Those investments cannot succeed if unfairly traded imports are allowed to distort the market.”

The final determination on the investigation is scheduled to be issued July 6. The Commerce Department is conducting a concurrent antidumping duty probe of solar cells imported from India, Indonesia and Laos.

- With assistance from Ocean Hou.

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