Despite bonhomie, India to battle US over green energy at WTO

While Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Barack Obama signed an agreement on Sunday to promote clean energy and expand solar energy initiatives, the two countries are likely to be at loggerheads over the issue in the World Trade Organisation.

Next week, a dispute settlement panel of the WTO will commence hearings on a trade dispute between Washington and New Delhi over the Indian government's insistence on local content requirements for solar cells and solar modules under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission (JNNSM), according to a report in the Mint.

The panel, which will be chaired by former New Zealand trade envoy David Walker, will begin its proceedings on 3 February when the US will make its first submission as to how India violated WTO commitments by implementing JNNSM.

In its dispute notification, the US has charged India with imposing national content requirements and denial of national treatment for solar cells and solar modules. The US has also complained that India provides subsidies to its domestic producers involved in the manufacture of solar cells and solar modules.

WTO members are not supposed to insist on national content requirements that discriminate against foreign products. Governments are also required to provide national treatment, under which imports must be treated on par with domestically manufactured products.

The US claims that the Indian government's measures to impose national content provisions and deny national treatment have impaired benefits accruing to American companies.

The WTO dispute settlement proceedings will go on for several months and a preliminary ruling will be issued in six months.

In New Delhi, an unnamed senior Indian government official told Mint that India wouldn't budge from its stand at the WTO.

''Without support from the government, our domestic industry can't survive,'' said the official.

Chinese and Taiwanese firms may be slapped with an anti-dumping duty by America after the US International Trade Commission on Wednesday ruled that their photovoltaic product shipments had hurt US domestic manufacturers.

India has rolled out an ambitious campaign to promote solar energy by enlisting the Indian Army, Indian Railways and central public sector units and providing them with grants on the condition that they source solar equipment from domestic manufacturers.