China's cheating on renewables, steelworkers claim

It didn't get a huge amount of play last week when the United Steelworkers filed a complaint thousands of pages long that alleges China is cheating to build the industries of the future. But it's a hugely important issue.

The steelworkers claim China, through subsidies and protectionist tariffs, has created its suddenly formidable renewable energy industries and locked out competitors. In the past two years, China has created the largest solar industry in the world, and has torqued up its creation of a wind turbine industry. For the most part, those industries have been aimed at export markets mainly in the United States and Europe. But China's domestic market for energy of all kinds is going to be the largest in the world by far as the country rapidly industrializes.

And the jobs it's creating by building its solar and wind industries are exactly the green jobs President Barack Obama has touted as part of the future for the United States. Of course, international trade is never a zero sum game, and it's entirely possible that both China and the U.S. workers could benefit from the development of renewable energies, some of them still in their infancy. But if China's cheating to undercut the world in these key industries, as the steelworkers claim, the U.S. needs to play tough.

These energy jobs are too important to the future to cede to competitors. The nation must insist on a level playing field.

“Green jobs are key to our future,” said Leo Gerard, International President of the union. “Right now, China is taking every possible step – many of them illegal under international trade laws – to ensure that it will control that sector. America can’t afford to cede more of its manufacturing base to China. It’s a national priority to reduce our dependence on foreign energy supplies. But if all we do is exchange our dependence on foreign oil for a dependence on Chinese alternative and renewable energy production equipment, we will have traded away our nation’s energy, economic and job security.”