Two more German solar power companies file for bankruptcy

  "HIGH YIELDS IN EVERY DIRECTION"

(Q-Cells webpage 2 April, 2012)

                                            "Q-Cells SE will file for insolvency proceedings on Tuesday, 3 April 2012, at the competent Insolvency Court in Dessau."

(Q-Cells webpage 2 April, 2012)

Q-Cells, the pride of the German solar power industry, today announced that it will file for bankruptcy. This is the fourth bankruptcy in the German solar power industry since December: 

The slump has been blamed on controversial cuts in state assistance and on imports of cheaper Chinese-made solar panels.

A decade ago, Germany stimulated a brand new solar-power industry with laws that required utilities to accept all electricity they were offered from private owners of solar panels.

Q-Cells, which manufactures black panels that convert sunlight into electricity, began as a story of high hopes, setting up its modern factory in the east German town of Bitterfeld-Wolfen.

But the industry has been squeezed as the state assistance has been cut back.

"Feed-in" tariffs, the artificially high price that utilities must pay for the energy, have been reduced by 50 per cent since their peak, and fell another 20 to 30 per cent at the start of this month.

Today also another German solar power company, Odersun, filed for bankruptcy:

With massive cuts to solar feed-in tariffs in Germany, another solar company has filed for bankruptcy. Frankfurt-based Odersun is expected to be closing its doors and laying off 260 people at the end of May.

The chain of bankruptcies in Germany is a sad consequence of Angela Merkel´s failed energy and environmental policy. And this is only the beginning ....