Solar Summit: Participants discuss tariffs, other issues

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Experts in the solar sector are discussing tariffs and other issues at the ongoing Solar Summit in San Diego, California, as trade tensions between the U.S. and China continue to mount. Mark Niu has the latest.

Solar in the Trump Era - that's the name of a session that helps kick off the summit.

Expert on Stage "A number of top Chinese solar companies are also networking with global influencers.Top Ten Chinese solar panel maker, Talesun, says although their bottom line to a temporary hit, the tariffs have been far from catastrophic."

DEREK MARCHANT, SALES DIRECTOR, TALESUN "The Chinese are looking to their own markets primarily and then to other markets globally. So, the U.S. market - even if it went away tomorrow 100% - would not impact the Chinese manufacturing, because there so many other global markets developing coming up right now who don't have tariffs."

Hong Bin Fan, the director of Product Marketing for Chinese solar maker LONGi says the tariffs means companies are looking even more at innovation to capture a share of the U.S. market. It spent a whopping 170 million in Research and Development last year.

HONGBIN FAN, PRODUCT MARKETING DIRECTOR, LONGI SOLAR "With a high tariff people are looking for better solutions. And so what high-efficiency, high-end yield product can bring better value for the customers, partially offset the impact of the tariff."

Chinese company JinKo Solar - the largest solar panel maker in the world - has already submitted an application to have certain high-performance solar cells be tariff-free.JinKo recently broke ground for a factory in the U-S city of Jacksonville, Florida.

NIGEL COCKROFT, GENERAL MANAGER USA, JINKO SOLAR "The factory will begin with about 200 jobs. And, depending on the outcome of some product exclusions that we've requested from the U.S. government, it's conceivable that we could expand that further if the economics make sense, if some of the tariff exemptions are granted."

MARK NIU, SAN DIEGO "With new markets developing all the time, solar is increasingly becoming a global market with global players. And, for many, that means getting a presence in the world's largest solar markets - India, the U-S and China."

Solar-Log is a solar plant monitoring company for both commercial and residential solar customers. It's a German company with operations in the U-S and China.

ANTHONY CONKLIN, N. AMERICA PRESIDENT, SOLAR-LOG "You can't stop the solar and wind train. That train has already left the station. Right now, we are on parity with natural gas. It's a growing market. I think this will just be another speed bump in the growing trajectory of solar."

And that means increased competition for China too - as a number of industry experts, including Conklin - cite South Korea and other Asian countries as fast moving players in the international solar panel market.

Mark Niu, CGTN, San Diego, California.