Flush With Investment, New U.S. Factories Face a Familiar Challenge

The Biden administration has begun pumping more than $2 trillion into U.S. factories and infrastructure, investing huge sums to try to strengthen American industry and fight climate change. But the effort is facing a familiar threat: a surge of low-priced products from China. That is drawing the attention of President Biden and his aides, who are considering new protectionist measures to make sure American industry can compete against Beijing. As U.S. factories spin up to produce electric vehicles, semiconductors and solar panels, China is flooding the market with similar goods,…

U.S. Limits China’s Ability to Benefit From Electric Vehicle Subsidies

The Biden administration proposed new rules on Friday aimed at shifting more production of electric vehicle batteries and the materials that power them to the United States, in an attempt to build up a strategic industry now dominated by China. The rules are meant to limit the role that firms in China can play in supplying materials for electric vehicles that qualify for federal tax credits. They will also discourage companies that seek federal funding to build battery factories in the United States from sourcing materials from China or Russia.…

U.S. Debates How Much to Sever Electric Car Industry’s Ties to China

The Biden administration has been trying to jump-start the domestic supply chain for electric vehicles so cleaner cars can be made in the United States. But the experience of one Texas company, whose plans to help make an all-American electric vehicle were upended by China, highlights the stakes involved as the administration finalizes rules governing the industry. Huntsman Corporation started construction two years ago on a $50 million plant in Texas to make ethylene carbonate, a chemical that is used in electric vehicle batteries. It would have been the only…

Could Biden’s Clean Energy Push Be a Victim of Its Success?

Dalton, Ga., was once known as the carpet capital of the country. Economic diversification meant branching out from wall-to-wall to hardwood flooring. Now, at Qcells, a solar panel company, robots patrol acres of shop floor where delicate solar cells are packaged, laminated and boxed into sophisticated panels — almost 30,000 a day at peak production — in a highly automated production line. The company built a massive factory in Georgia — one of the most crucial states in the 2024 presidential election — and has another in the works. Both…

A New Law Supercharged Electric Car Manufacturing, but Not Sales

President Biden’s signature climate law has stimulated a surge of investment in electric vehicle production across the country, including tens of billions of dollars on battery plants across the South and new assembly lines near the Great Lakes. Based on early evidence, it is succeeding at a goal that economists have long considered difficult and costly: using the power of government to rapidly grow a new industry. That growth could prove crucial for the other side of the electric vehicle equation: enticing more consumers to buy them. That’s because Mr.…

Solar Manufacturing Lured to U.S. by Tax Credits in Climate Bill

Six years ago, an executive from Suniva, a bankrupt solar panel manufacturer, warned a packed hearing room in Washington that competition from companies in China and Southeast Asia was causing a “blood bath” in his industry. More than 30 U.S.-based solar companies had been forced to shut down in the previous five years alone, he said, and others would soon follow unless the government supported them. Suniva’s pleas helped spur the Trump administration to impose tariffs in 2018 on foreign-made solar panels, but that did not reverse the flow of…

A Rural Michigan Town Is the Latest Battleground in the U.S.-China Fight

Yard signs along the quiet country roads of Green Charter Township, Mich., home to horse farms and a 19th-century fish hatchery, blare a message that an angered community hopes is heard by local leaders, the Biden administration and China: “No Gotion.” The opposition is to a plan by Gotion, a subsidiary of a Chinese company, to build a $2.4 billion electric vehicle battery factory on roughly 270 acres of largely uninhabited scrub land. An investment of that magnitude can transform a local economy, but in this case it is unwelcome…

U.S. Issues Final Rules to Keep Chip Funds Out of China

The Biden administration on Friday issued final rules that would prohibit chip companies vying for a new infusion of federal cash from carrying out certain business expansions, partnerships and research in China, in what it described as an effort to protect United States national security. The regulations come as the Biden administration prepares to disburse more than $52 billion in federal grants and tens of billions of dollars of tax credits to build up the U.S. chip industry. The new rules aim to prevent chip makers that benefit from U.S.…

Tesla’s Second Quarter Sales and Deliveries Rise as Tax Credits Fuel Demand

Tesla sales rose a better-than-expected 10 percent in the second quarter as the company led by Elon Musk benefited from government incentives and price cuts that made its electric cars less expensive than comparable gasoline models. Tesla delivered 466,000 vehicles from April through June, up from 423,000 vehicles in the previous quarter, the company said on Sunday. Compared with a year earlier, sales in the second quarter rose 83 percent as the company expanded production at new factories in Austin, Texas, and near Berlin. The sales figures exceeded estimates by…

Tesla Sales Surge as Tax Credits Fuel Demand

Tesla sales rose 10 percent in the second quarter as the company led by Elon Musk benefited from government incentives and price cuts that made its electric cars less expensive than comparable gasoline models. Tesla delivered 466,000 vehicles from April through June, up from 423,000 vehicles in the previous quarter, the company said on Sunday. Compared with a year earlier, sales in the second quarter rose 83 percent as the company expanded production at new factories in Austin, Texas, and near Berlin. Rules that took effect this year allowed buyers…