{"id":7744,"date":"2012-05-31T07:30:41","date_gmt":"2012-05-31T13:30:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/?p=7744"},"modified":"2012-05-31T09:26:28","modified_gmt":"2012-05-31T15:26:28","slug":"volatile-solar-industry-leads-to-layoffs-in-idaho","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/05\/31\/volatile-solar-industry-leads-to-layoffs-in-idaho\/","title":{"rendered":"Volatile Solar Industry Leads To Layoffs In Idaho"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Transform Solar<\/p>

Nampa-based Transform Solar announced this week that it will close, cutting 250 jobs.<\/p><\/div>\n

In the last two weeks, Idaho workers have gotten dismal news from two solar companies.<\/p>\n

First, Hoku Corporation said<\/a> it would lay off 100 workers at its polysilicon plant in Pocatello.\u00a0 Polysilicon is used in solar panels. Then, on Tuesday, Transform Solar announced<\/a> it will close, cutting 250 jobs. Transform is a joint venture of Micron Technology<\/a> and Australia-based Origin Energy.\u00a0 A spokesman for Micron Technology cited challenging market conditions.<\/p>\n

Bloomberg New Energy Finance analyst Nat Bullard says it\u2019s easy to take a dim view of the solar industry in light of competition from low natural gas prices, and the high-profile bankruptcy<\/a> of solar company Solyndra. \u00a0But there\u2019s more than that to the story.<\/p>\n

“If you take one view, yes the outlook is a little bit gloomy,” Bullard says.\u00a0 “At the same time, the market grew 50 percent last year.\u00a0 That doesn\u2019t mean, however, that it\u2019s going to be good for every company involved, and I think that\u2019s what you\u2019re seeing in the case of Hoku and in the case of Transform.”<\/p>\n

<\/em>Factory expansions and new entrants into the market have led to a glut of solar panels.\u00a0 According to Bullard, as the market grew by 50 percent last year, manufacturing capacity grew by 70 percent.<\/p>\n

“There\u2019s very simple economic math there, which says that if there\u2019s more supply than there is demand, then you will be pricing very close to your cost of production,” he says.
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/em>In the other words, the market has gotten much more competitive.\u00a0 Recently founded and smaller companies are at a disadvantage.\u00a0 The announcements here in Idaho echo others across the U.S., as well as in Europe and Asia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the last two weeks, Idaho workers have gotten dismal news from two solar companies. First, Hoku Corporation said it would lay off 100 workers at its polysilicon plant in Pocatello.\u00a0 Polysilicon is used in solar panels. Then, on Tuesday, Transform Solar announced it will close, cutting 250 jobs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":46,"featured_media":7752,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[14],"tags":[68,37,74],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7744"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/46"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7744"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7744\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7763,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7744\/revisions\/7763"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}