Compliance in Solar Supply Chain

The Uyghur Region produces between one third and one half of the world’s solar-grade polysilicon, as well as much as 32% of global metallurgical grade silicon (MGS), polysilicon’s pre-cursor material.    So if it's a solar panel, the odds are good slavery had a hand making it.

Alan Crawford and Laura Murphy of Sheffield Hallam University published a review of the solar panel supply chain and its potential exposure to modern slavery, and the findings were discouraging.

“Despite significant global pressure for increased transparency, information regarding solar industry sourcing is becoming less transparent over time, thwarting the world’s ability to source ethically,” the Authors write.

“Information about solar sourcing has become increasingly unavailable following the revelations of the solar industry’s reliance on—and resultant complicity in—the oppression in the Uyghur Region…. Public trust in the solar industry is extremely low,”

Crawford and Murphy assessed the top five manufacturers (which together manufacture 70% of the world’s solar modules), and found the vast majority of modules produced globally continues to have exposure to the Uyghur Region

The most significant findings of the report include the following:

• Companies that have created supply chains purportedly free of XUAR inputs continue to source from suppliers or sub-suppliers that have exposure to the Uyghur Region for other product lines.
• It is sometimes impossible to determine if it is indeed the case that these dedicated product lines are XUAR-input-free because companies do not disclose sufficient supply chain information.

"Though there is increasing appetite for ethical sourcing of solar modules on the part of governments, developers, and domestic consumers, there is no way for these stakeholders to easily and accurately determine whether a particular silicon-based solar module contains silicon produced with forced labor in the XUAR. The problem results from the global silicon-based solar industry’s almost universal lack of transparency regarding the full supply chains of silicon-based solar modules.

The lack of transparency is amplified by a blind spot in the industry regarding the most upstream segments of the supply chain, which are mining quartz rock for conversion to MGS and producing polysilicon from the MGS

"For years, the solar industry has described its supply chain as if it begins with polysilicon, without regard to where or how the polysilicon was produced, so long as the purity/ quality was assured. It is not unusual to hear people talk about polysilicon as a “raw material” or even to read of the “mining” of polysilicon, even though that is far from the truth. This is a critical oversight because quartz mining and MGS production segments are the most likely supply chain segments to transfer Uyghur Region exposure to the entire solar supply chain.

Many companies have attempted to “bifurcate” their supply chains to comply with regulations and consumer demand, producing some product lines that include XUAR inputs and others that they claim do not. At the same time, batches of MGS or polysilicon sourced from different locations are often blended, which could introduce XUAR-sourced materials into any batch made by a company sourcing any amount of materials from the region. Bifurcation of solar module supply chains presents a significant challenge to the wide range of governments, developers, and consumers purchasing modules, as they cannot always be certain whether they are buying the tainted or untainted product

• The five named solar panel manufacturers have operations in North America. Qcells and Jinko Solar, have US operations,while  JA Solar will produce modules in Arizona, US beginning in late 2023.   Maxeon and Canadian Solar, manufacture products just north or south of the U.S. border.  
• The report does not speak to the supply chains of three leading US manufacturers First Solar, Silfab and Mission Solar.

[Sheffield Hallam Report]