OK, that's been a lesson on how bankruptcy can be both good news and bad news for the petroleum industry.
Now let's switch gears to solar. In this case should the govt decide if some panel manufacturers should go under or be saved? And if saving those companies financially damages other US solar companies are we back to the old nightmare of the govt picking winners and losers? In this case both the winners and losers would be companies working towards increasing solar power in the US. From
https://insideclimatenews.org/news/1408 ... e-industry"Two bankrupt solar panel manufacturers are asking the U.S. government for tariffs on imports, imports U.S. solar installers rely on.Would an intervention by Washington to save this industry end up destroying it? That's the question confronting the solar industry as the U.S. International Trade Commission meets this week on a petition to protect domestic manufacturers with tariffs on solar panel imports and price supports."
{Some what different then US bankruptcy laws allowing damaged petroleum companies to survive and potentially prosper. In those situations the damage is inflicted on investors and/or owners...not other petroleum companies.}
"The commission will hear competing views at a meeting on August 15 and has said it will make a preliminary ruling in late September on whether the petitioners, a pair of domestic manufacturers that have filed for bankruptcy, have been so badly injured by imports that they need relief. The trade petition was filed after Suniva, which had been taken over by a foreign firm, filed this year for bankruptcy; it was joined by SolarWorld, another foreign-controlled and bankrupt company."
BUT: "Most of the rest of the domestic solar industry—including some other manufacturers but mainly those who install and finance solar gear and can thrive on cheap systems from abroad—is lined up against the petition. Their business has been booming as costs have steadily declined, making it easier for consumers, businesses and power companies to shift from fossil-fuel electricity."
Well, the R's and D's have finally found something they can agree on: "On Friday, a bipartisan group of senators sent an open letter to the ITC urging the commission to reject the petition.
"Increasing costs will stop solar growth dead in its tracks, threatening tens of thousands of American workers in the solar industry and jeopardizing billions of dollars in investment in communities across the country," the senators wrote.
{And back to the govt picking winners and losers: "SolarWorld has gotten a whopping $115 million in federal and state grants and tax subsidies since 2012, according to the Union-backed group Good Jobs First. And that’s on top of the nearly $91 million in federal loan guarantees the company got during that time."
And the other company: "Suniva blamed its bankruptcy on competition from cheap Chinese-made solar panels, but the company received about $20 million in support from federal and state taxpayers, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution."
And from what the Rockman has found the Chinese are not "dumping" solar panels into the US market place. Dumping is selling below production costs. The Chinese are not doing that: they are providing quality products and making a profit doing so. Also one report highlighted a huge blunder on the part of the US panel makers: they focused on small scale residential application and the Chinese on large scale commercial products. And 80% of the market is the commercial projects.