Delay on First Solar's Ordos Project

Today Bloomberg Businessweek is reporting the First Solar Ordos, Inner Mongolia project is hitting snags:

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-05-19/first-solar-faces-delay-on-china-plans-over-prices-sohn-says.html

First of all, I'm not surprised. The story says the delays in the progress of the Ordos, Inner Mongolia CSP project is from China not having a comprehensive feed-in tariff. I'm amazed that First Solar president Bruce Sohn says that he expects China to have a feed-in tariff by the end of the summer. He says the delay has been due to the bidding process on other solar projects. I hope he knows what he is talking about because this seems unrealistically optimistic to me.

The Bloomberg report quotes Sohn as saying that they are also missing clarity on what the price per kilowatt hour will be. The NDRC has said for months that we are close to getting a comprehensive nation-wide price for electricity generated by these solar plants. As of today, this hasn't happened. The NDRC has said that for the time being it is using the rate agreed for the Enfinity Dunhuang CSP project, 16 cents per kilowatt hour.

There seems to be an unusually high amount of confusion around FiT and pricing for solar electricity from utility-level plants. Considering the chaos and mixed messages between Ministry of Finance and NDRC in announcing the Golden Sun subsidies, it shouldn't be surprising.

NYT's Keith Bradsher on Foreign Companies Chafe at China's Restrictive Policies

Keith Bradsher had an interesting article on foreign companies doing business in China:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/17/business/global/17lobby.html?ref=global

From the China renewable perspective, there are a couple of interesting parts of the article. Bradsher lists Chinese green company advantages: State-controlled banks are providing generous loans at near-zero interest rates to Chinese-owned companies that manufacture solar panels. Foreign-owned companies that set up wind farms in China have been banned from selling carbon-emissions credits to businesses in Europe, denying these companies millions in revenue as Chinese-owned companies with the wind farms are allowed to sell the credits.

Bradsher writes that changes in the way the Communist Party operates have also driven the pro-China measures. Starting with the military in the late 1990's, and gradually expanding to other industries since then, the party has gradually forced the members to choose: they can be military officers or ministry officials, or they can run companies, but they are discouraged from holding government and corporate jobs at the the same time.

The shift has meant that corporate executives, often former government officials or military officers who have turned into capitalists, have more of a stake in maximizing their company's profits.

Bradsher goes on to write about the rise of lobbyists within China. I am particularly interested in the evolution of China's overseas lobbying efforts. I am drawing up a list of which lobbying firms represent Yingli, Canadian Solar, Suntech, A-Power. In many cases the NRDC acts as a lobbyist for China renewable energy companies.