Founded in Dresden in the early 1990s, Germany’s Solarwatt quickly became an emblem of Europe’s renewable energy ambitions and bold plan to build a solar power industry. Its opening of a new solar panel plant in Dresden in late 2021 was hailed as a small victory in the battle to wrestle market share from the Chinese groups that have historically supplied the bulk of panels used in Europe. Now, Solarwatt is preparing to halt production at the plant and shift that work to China.
But Gunter Erfurt, chief executive of Switzerland-based Meyer Burger, the country’s largest solar panel maker, is sceptical it will be enough. “You need to create a level playing field,” he said. Meyer Burger would benefit if the EU imposed tariffs because it has operations in Germany. Having begun in watchmaking, Meyer Burger shifted into the solar industry in 1983. Faced with widening losses, the group earlier this year announced it would shut a panel factory in the German city of Freiberg.