Hello again. Welcome back to another MLEX podcast. I'm James Panicki, the Brussels managing editor here at MLEX, and today we're talking solar panels.

They're very much part of what many expect to be the planet's renewable energy future, but the policy framework surrounding both the production of and trade in solar panels is indeed tricky.

And nowhere is this more apparent than the EU's trade policy settings,

which deal with the importation of solar panels from China.

The EU has been imposing hefty and controversial anti-dumping tariffs on Chinese solar panel imports

since 2013.

Dumping, of course, is when a foreign good is sold at below the cost of production or below the price at which that product is

sold on its domestic market. And when dealing with China, things are complicated further by

considerations of what should be considered state aid or state backing. It's a regulatory labyrinth, which only the very best trade reporters in the business can understand.

And we have one such reporter here in Brussels.

Her name is Poppy Carnell, and she's Emlex's chief trade correspondent.

Hello, Poppy.

Hello.

Now, why is this case so important?

Well, when the European Commission opened this investigation, they said that the value of the case was 20 billion euros.

Since then, some industry experts have said that that was an overestimation, but still, that meant that it was the most valuable trade defence case in history for the EU. So that in itself brought a lot of

controversy. But also the EU is a global leader in terms of fighting climate change and one of its

goals is to have a strong renewable energy consumption.

And, of course, putting tariffs on solar panels was a conflict of interest for the EU.

So it really was very important for so many different sectors, for so many different companies.

And in 2013, you may remember seeing headlines of a threat of a Chinese trade war because it was such a valuable case also to the Chinese.

And it really rose to the highest political ranks and negotiations were had

...