Europe wants to stop the invasion of Chinese electric cars. He already tried it with solar panels and failed

Electric cars and solar panels are no longer the technologies of the future, but of the present. Little by little, both are becoming more affordable, which allows more and more citizens to opt for them and it is something that governments like because they are two of the keys to decarbonization. Something they have in common is that China is an enormous power, one that enters Western markets by force and which, at times, they seek to put a stop to,

Currently, we are seeing that there are countries trying to stop the Chinese electric car through tariffs. As they say, history is doomed to repeat itself and, in Europe, it is something that has already been tried with electrical panels. In the end, the flag of surrender was raised.

Dumping. At the beginning of the century, many countries began to turn to renewable energy. Seeing the growing emissions of CO2 into the atmosphere, green energies were seen as the great hope and both wind and photovoltaic fields began to be launched. At the user level it was not something that was imported too much, since the price of solar panels for self-consumption was prohibitive, but in the business community an enemy was beginning to appear: China.

The Asian giant began to produce solar panels in industrial quantities, flooding foreign markets with panels at a lower price than local ones and gaining acceptance from buyers. The panel producing companies put pressure on the European Commission, which decided in 2013 to impose a protectionist measure against Chinese panels to avoid dumping (selling products below cost price). What they came up with was an 11.8% tariff on Chinese panels. And, if the Chinese government did not take measures, the surcharge would increase to 47.6%.

End of protectionism. The Commission announced that the measures imposed in June of that year would have a duration of six months and, beyond that period, it would be each of the member states that would decide whether to make them permanent for a period of five years. Curiously, several countries were not in tune with this measure of the Commission.

The measure was a failure. China continued with its Made in China 2025 plans to stop being simply another country’s factory and become a power, and in 2018, Europe once again opened its doors wide to panels from China. At first, the Chinese panels were not very efficient, which gave them a bad reputation, but over the years they greatly improved their processes and, taking this and economic issues into account, the Commission decided that it did not make sense to maintain the measure. antidumping.

2024. Currently, China has not only consolidated itself in the electrical panel market, but has made the world depend on its technology. A panel manufactured in China is 50% cheaper than one produced in Europe and what in the first decade of the 2000s only affected companies is now having an impact on consumers. The fact that the price of panels has dropped allows panels to be purchased for self-consumption and they are even cheaper than garden fences.

Business interests. This flood of Chinese solar panels only leaves Europe and the United States with one option: specialize or throw in the towel. And given what is happening with the panels, let’s go with electric cars. Currently, the situation is similar to that experienced 10 years ago with photovoltaic panels and we are seeing that countries like the United States are imposing strong tariffs on electric cars from China. From 25%, they have gone to 100% overnight.

It doesn’t look like this is going to slow down, since the measure adopted by the Biden government will be replicated if Trump wins the elections. In Europe we cannot afford a 100% tariff on Chinese electric cars for something very simple: there are powerful commercial interests. The first thing is that Europe is the Western market that is putting the most pressure to jump to the electric car. The second thing is that Germany is one of the most important markets and not only do many of its cars arrive with Chinese parts, but companies like Volkswagen are interested in the Chinese market continuing to grow.

China is clear. For its part, China continues to advance to flood Europe with electric cars. One of the best-selling cars in Spain last year was the MG ZS, a car from the SAIC company that has just acquired another huge Ro-Ro ship to continue sending electric cars to the West.

It seems that the history of solar panels, at least in Europe, is doomed to repeat itself with electric cars. We will see what happens in the future, but different companies have a strong dependence on China at the moment and something like the tariffs that the North American market has applied does not seem feasible.

Images | Ricardo Aguilar, AleSpa

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