Solar module prices reached a new low this week, says Leen van Bellen, business development manager Europe for Search4Solar, a European purchasing and selling platform for solar products. He tells pv magazine that prices will remain low in the short term.
When panels were 30c/watt, projects at $1/watt in EU and US happened. 70c/watt was spent on labour, copper, support structures, and grid connection equipment. All of those can be locally produced, with possible exception of last item.
At 6c/watt, that is over 90% of power projects are local economy boosting instead of 70%. It provides cheaper energy that is useful for industrialization and cost of living benefits too. US tariffs on solar are entirely about protecting oil/gas extortion power instead of a $10B solar production industry that needs fairly expensive support.
Solar imports does not cause energy dependence. You have power for 30+ years with no reliance on continuous fuel supplies. Shoes and apparel is a $450B industry in US. You need new supplies every year, and it makes much more sense to secure supply in that industry for war on the world purposes.