Key Points
- Solar company Qcells is temporarily cutting pay and hours for 1,000 employees in Georgia and laying off 300 temp workers.
- The company blames U.S. Customs for detaining imported components needed for solar panel production.
- The detentions are part of increased enforcement of a U.S. law banning goods made with forced labor in China.
- Qcells denies using any forced labor or materials from China and says its supply chain is sourced elsewhere.
A South Korean solar company is temporarily cutting pay and work hours for about 1,000 of its 3,000 employees in Georgia. The company, Qcells, says U.S. customs officials are detaining imported components needed to make solar panels, forcing them to scale back operations.
Qcells, a unit of Hanwha Solutions, also announced on Friday that it will lay off 300 workers from staffing agencies at its plants in Dalton and Cartersville, Georgia.
The company claims that U.S. Customs and Border Protection is holding its imported components at ports because of suspicions that they contain materials made with forced labor in China. Without these parts, Qcells can’t run its solar panel assembly lines at full capacity.
This move by customs officials follows an August announcement by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem that her department would increase enforcement of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act. This 2021 law blocks Chinese goods made with forced labor from entering the U.S. Published reports suggest that U.S. officials started detaining solar cells made by Qcells back in June.
Qcells insists that none of its materials or components are made with forced labor or even come from China. Spokesperson Marta Stoepker said the company has “robust supply chain due diligence measures” and “very detailed documentation,” which have helped some of its shipments be released. She stated that Qcells’ latest supply chain is sourced completely outside of China.
Stoepker said Qcells is cooperating with officials and expects to get back to full production in the coming weeks and months. The company is completing a $2.3 billion plant in Cartersville that will allow it to produce all the building blocks for solar modules in the U.S., reducing its reliance on imports.
“Our commitment to building the entire solar supply chain in the United States remains,” Stoepker said. “We will soon be back on track with the full force of our Georgia team.”
