Energy policy in Europe: Why Meyer Burger is drawn to the USA

Energy policy in Europe
Why Meyer Burger is drawn to the USA

By Marko Schlichting
6/21/2023 3:21 am

One of the last large solar companies based in Europe would rather open new locations in the USA than in Germany. The boss of the company Meyer Burger is on Lanz explaining what would have to change for the company to invest in this country.

The news hit like a bomb. The Swiss solar company Meyer Burger has written a fire letter to the Federal Finance Minister Christian Lindner. It threatens to build new locations in the USA instead of in Germany. The reason: the subsidy policy in the USA. There is more money there. Meyer Burger is the only major solar cell manufacturer in Europe with locations in Saxony-Anhalt and Saxony, among others. These works are not in danger, it is said. Now the EU fears that other companies could follow. The US government wants to combat high domestic inflation with the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). The act is worth $360 billion. This money should flow primarily into climate protection. Companies that use US products or produce in the US benefit from subsidies or tax credits there.

“We have delivered machines to China”

Gunter Erfurt is CEO of Meyer Burger and will be a guest of Markus Lanz on ZDF on Tuesday evening. He reports on the trade relations of his company. It started with China, he says. China has developed extremely well in the last 15 years because the country has built up industry with state funds. “The Chinese solar economic miracle is having an impact on European technology today,” says Erfurt. His company originally delivered machines to China. Today, China builds these machines itself, based on European technology. China has recognized that solar energy will be by far the most important generation of electricity in the future. “Precisely for this reason, China, with great industrial-political ambitions, has drawn this industry into the country in its entirety, and we in Europe are now dependent on it,” Erfurt criticizes.

Apparently, the manager cannot find this ambitious policy in Europe. “We lost 120,000 jobs in solar energy,” he says. In China, 15 years ago, an issue that Europe is currently arguing about was considered important.

However, there are also problems for the manager. Establishing a company in China is impossible, and he doesn’t know whether his company can still buy machines from the country today. China wants to dominate the production of solar energy and has communicated that the technology, once adopted from Europe, can no longer be exported.

US offers market protection

Now other countries would come into play, for example India – or the USA. “Not only do they provide money, there is also market protection.” This is an advantage for companies like Meyer Burger, because: “Chinese products don’t come into the USA,” says Erfurt. In addition, in contrast to Europe, the USA offers perfect framework conditions for growing as a company.

In order to make Europe an interesting industrial location again, Erfurt sees two possibilities: The World Trade Organization (WTO) would have to stop subsidies worldwide, which he considers impossible. Another possibility would be that there are also subsidies for certain types of industry in Europe.

But the USA has another locational advantage for Erfurt: There is almost no bureaucracy there. An application for setting up a new company will be processed there in a few weeks. Within the EU, this could take two years, says Erfurt.

How does it go from here? In order to continue producing in Germany, Erfurt wants money for his company from Finance Minister Lindner. He has not yet commented on this.