Now let's turn to the trade frictions between China and the United States. As Washington threatened to impose more tariffs on Chinese goods, Beijing vowed to retaliate and all these tariffs are taking a toll on the American solar industry. As Roee Ruttenberg explains, consumers and power producers are seeing cloudy skies.

In January, in his first significant trade move, U.S. President Donald Trump authorized a tariff on the import of solar panels.

One month later, his administration slapped a 30 percent tax on all foreign-produced solar modules.

Beijing wasn't singled out. But as the world's biggest maker of solar equipment, it was a clear target. Indeed, the majority of panels coming into the U.S. were coming from China. And they still are.

"The immediate impact was we saw prices increase."

John Smirnow is with the Solar Energy Industries Association, in Washington. The group represents the interests of more than one-thousand U.S. solar firms.

JOHN SMIRNOW SOLAR ENERGY INDUSTRIES ASSOCIATION "The negative impact has been a loss of nine-thousand US solar industry jobs, and a loss of about 2.5 billion dollars in investment in US solar projects."

That's large scale utilities projects scrapped. But the impact may trickle down.

JOHN SMIRNOW SOLAR ENERGY INDUSTRIES ASSOCIATION "Anyone who's a solar consumer, or uses electricity that's produced by solar, is going to be adversely impacted. They may not be directly. But their energy costs, maybe they're not getting the savings that they could have otherwise."

Whereas other tariffs this year claimed to address "national security" or excessive dumping, the solar tariffs were solely centered on competitiveness.

But some say: Tariffs are the wrong approach.

JOHN SMIRNOW SOLAR ENERGY INDUSTRIES ASSOCIATION "There are a whole multitude of other solutions, other tools, the U.S. government can draw upon other than tariffs, that wouldn't have the adverse jobs impact that we've seen in the industry, (like) an import licensing fee. The money would be used to support the industry. Now it's just a tax. The money goes into the general treasury, and there's nothing that goes back to help the U.S. manufacturers grow."

ROEE RUTTENBERG WASHINGTON "Many in the industry saw the tariffs coming in one form or another. So, they prepared. Some stocked up on cheap panels before the tax. Others have had to pass on the additional costs to their customers."

But that may get tougher over time.

The tariffs still have more than three years left.

JOHN SMIRNOW SOLAR ENERGY INDUSTRIES ASSOCIATION "The industry is entrepreneurial, it's resilient, supplies chains redevelop. The industry gets back on its feet, and moves forward like we're doing now."

Roee Ruttenberg, CGTN, in Washington.