Over the previous decade, one of many defining shifts within the photo voltaic trade has been the transfer towards a extra geographically various provide chain. And whereas this transition has taken time, it has unlocked vital sustainability advantages – good points that are actually shaping the trade’s long-term trajectory.
Necessity, because the saying goes, is the mom of invention. Within the photo voltaic provide chain, the shift towards extra localized manufacturing has confirmed transformative – driving worth creation, strengthening power safety, rising public acceptance of the power transition, and bettering sustainability outcomes.
Whereas the preliminary push towards native manufacturing was largely pushed by an pressing want, the advantages have since grow to be more and more compelling, notably in decreasing carbon emissions and fostering a extra environmentally-responsible photo voltaic provide chain.
In right now’s fast-moving photo voltaic trade, the availability disruptions attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic could really feel like a distant reminiscence. But the repercussions of that interval proceed to reverberate. In early 2021, hovering transport demand collided with constrained logistics capability, inflicting transport container prices to surge, notably on long-distance routes.
On the time, UN Improvement and Commerce reported that transport prices between Asia and North America’s East Coast had elevated by greater than 60%, whereas prices between China and South America rose by a unprecedented 440%. One lasting consequence of this disruption has been a renewed concentrate on supply-chain safety and the near- or on-shoring of element manufacturing. These efforts have been bolstered by broader discussions across the financial and strategic worth of home solar-component manufacturing, in addition to by coverage initiatives designed to incentivize in-country manufacturing – most notably the Biden Administration’s Inflation Discount Act.
Native Manufacturing 2.0
Photo voltaic provide routes stay uncovered to a spread of dangers. In its Power Expertise Views 2024 report, the Worldwide Power Company (IEA) highlighted the photo voltaic and clear power sector’s reliance on “maritime chokepoints,” such because the piracy-prone Strait of Malacca. In keeping with the IEA, roughly 50% of unpolluted expertise shipments cross by these doubtlessly troubled waters.
Constructing on its heritage in tracker provide and lengthy accustomed to the logistical challenges of transporting heavy metal elements, Nextpower has been on the forefront of supply-chain localization. In lower than three years, Nextpower remodeled its U.S. provide chain and now works with greater than 40 suppliers throughout North America – executing tasks cost-effectively, with decreased supply-chain threat and 100% home content material (see Desk 1).
As 2026 dawns, Nextpower is sourcing elements from greater than 100 manufacturing websites in additional than 45 international locations.
Standing up new manufacturing amenities or including manufacturing strains is a gigantic company effort – notably when sustaining rigorous high quality requirements and holding prices below management. Much more difficult is doing so on an accelerated timeline, as is usually required to satisfy domestic-content necessities.
However this geographically diversified manufacturing footprint continues to ship clear provide chain benefits. Manufacturing amenities established earlier this decade have demonstrated their capability to ship significant worth for photo voltaic mission builders, native communities, and the atmosphere alike.
Job Creation
The creation of latest employment alternatives in a future-focused trade is a serious profit of building native manufacturing. The thought of a “simply power transition,” wherein local weather motion goes hand in hand with efforts to handle financial inequality, originated throughout the North American labor motion and is now extensively embraced. It has even been embedded within the language of the landmark 2015 Paris Settlement. By creating jobs throughout the worth chain, the advantages of the power transition are shared extra broadly throughout society.
In 2024, Nextpower commissioned an unbiased examine to quantify the impression of its native job creation efforts throughout North America. The examine discovered that greater than 7,780 jobs had been created, together with 2,470 direct jobs, 2,350 oblique jobs, and a couple of,960 induced jobs – spanning manufacturing, fabrication, engineering, building, analysis and growth, and trucking and transportation.
These figures assist quantify the substantial optimistic impression that photo voltaic mission growth and native manufacturing can ship – but essentially the most enduring advantages can’t be captured by statistics alone.
In contrast to the fossil gas–dominated energy system, which was constructed round a centralized “hub-and-spoke” mannequin, the power transition is giving rise to a extra distributed, network-based electrical energy system. Clear power era is more and more unfold all through the grid and sometimes situated nearer to peri-urban and rural communities.
As communities come into nearer contact with photo voltaic, wind, power storage, and transmission tasks, tensions can come up, typically slowing allowing processes or halting growth altogether. When mission growth is accompanied by native job creation and financial participation, nonetheless, group acceptance is extra readily achieved, serving to to align native pursuits with the broader targets of the power transition.
Enhanced Sustainability
Whereas job creation and financial worth are essential outcomes of native manufacturing, its biggest impression is systemic – reshaping the sustainability profile of the photo voltaic provide chain itself. By the use of context, international photo voltaic installations simply surpassed 600 GW in 2025, up from lower than 60 GW only a decade in the past. With photo voltaic now deploying at this huge scale, the sustainability of its provide chain has grow to be as important because the clear power it delivers.
One clear instance is metal manufacturing. In the US, metal manufacturing is by way of Electrical Arc Furnace (EAF) expertise, which delivers vital emissions reductions in contrast with conventional Blast Furnace–Fundamental Oxygen Furnace (BF-BOF) strategies. Whereas BF-BOF metal manufacturing sometimes emits round 2.5 tons of CO₂ per ton of metal, EAF manufacturing generates solely a fraction of that, roughly 0.8 tons. EAF processes additionally makes use of recycled metal as a feedstock – one other environmental win.
Validation and Credentials
Translating these sustainability good points into merchandise was an apparent subsequent step. In April 2024, Nextpower launched its NX Horizon Low Carbon Tracker (LCT) product to the market – a world first for the trade. Based mostly on third-party verification, the answer delivers as much as a 42% discount in embedded carbon, in contrast with typical options.
For its flagship NX Horizon trackers, Nextpower can be elevating the bar on sustainability. In 2025, the corporate turned the primary tracker producer to develop an Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) – primarily a verified sustainability datasheet. Whereas EPDs are commonplace in mature industries comparable to automotive, their adoption in photo voltaic represents an essential step ahead. An EPD enhances transparency and establishes a transparent sustainability baseline from which steady enhancements will be measured.
UMX line employee at Unimacts, Las Vegas, NV. © Nextpower
Precisely measuring and transparently reporting greenhouse fuel emissions throughout photo voltaic tracker manufacturing and provide chains is critically essential. In keeping with Nextpower’s inner evaluation, whereas PV modules – together with cells, glass, and different supplies – stay the biggest supply of embedded carbon in a utility-scale photo voltaic mission at 43%, trackers usually are not far behind, accounting for 21%. By deploying NX Horizon LCT, that share will be slashed by virtually half, to simply 11%.
One other long-overlooked contributor to mission emissions additionally warrants nearer consideration: aluminum module frames. Though slender, aluminum frames are answerable for an outsized 25% of a mission’s embedded carbon. Right here, too, significant progress will be made.
By changing energy-intensive aluminum with metal frames, frame-related emissions will be decreased by 80% to 90% relying on the uncooked materials supply. Recognizing each this emissions benefit and the added structural robustness metal presents for right now’s large-format modules, Nextpower acquired steel-frame developer Origami Photo voltaic in September 2025. The corporate is now working with mission builders to deliver this revolutionary strategy into the trade mainstream.
Taken collectively, the mix of metal module frames and NX Horizon LCR permits utility-scale photo voltaic builders to cut back total mission greenhouse fuel emissions by as much as 32%, presenting a compelling and sensible pathway to deeper decarbonization. Trying additional forward, the rising adoption of EAF metal manufacturing opens the door to inexperienced metal in photo voltaic tasks. Strategic partnerships between photo voltaic producers and rising inexperienced metal producers might due to this fact unlock a completely sustainable, domestically anchored provide chain.
Value and the Future
Elevating the bar on sustainable supplies and processes inevitably brings added complexity and value. Equally, native manufacturing is never, no less than initially, the lowest-cost possibility. Over time, nonetheless, expertise, scale, and the training curve that has lengthy benefited the photo voltaic trade can drive prices down. Encouragingly, a future wherein native, sustainable manufacturing can be cost-competitive is nicely inside attain.
There’s little doubt that the photo voltaic trade is coming into a brand new period – one outlined by each large alternative and shared duty to each communities and the atmosphere. A localized provide chain with sustainability at its core presents a transparent path ahead: enabling decarbonization that’s cost-effective, equitable, and as environmentally accountable as potential.
In regards to the Writer
Yves Figuerola is SVP of Provide Chain and Sustainability at Nextpower. With over 15 years of expertise in strategic sourcing, logistics, and operations management throughout a number of continents,
he focuses on constructing resilient, cost-efficient provide chains for large-scale photo voltaic manufacturing. Yves holds a Grasp of Science in Industrial & Mechanical Engineering from Arts et Métiers ParisTech and a Grasp of Science in Industrial Organisation & Provide Administration from Universidad Carlos III de Madrid.
