Title of Dissertation: national renewable energy policy

 
Complicated and murky renewable energy policies
 
In recent years, more policies have been included into renewable energy policies. 
Traditional renewable energy policies have been support policies such as FIT and RPS, 
which promote the use of renewable energy. Recent policies on renewables are not 
necessarily implemented to increase the use of renewable energy. The purposes of these 
policies are to fix unfair international trade practices, to promote the exports of domestic 
corporations, or to increase the use of domestically-produced facilities in domestic 

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market. Most of these policies do not contribute to achieving the goal of the traditional 
renewable energy policies.
In this sense, renewable energy policies are not necessarily environmental 
policies. At this point, they are environmental policies, trade policies, and industrial 
policies. Before the globalization of renewable energy industry, traditional renewable 
energy policies have been able to promote both the use of renewable energy and the 
growth of industry. However, the globalized industry has posed challenges to these 
efforts. Traditional renewable energy policies can expand the use of renewable energy, 
but they do not necessarily develop a domestic industry. Under these circumstances, 
different types of policies including industrial policies and trade policies were introduced 
to complement the traditional renewable energy policies.
Some of these non-traditional renewable energy policies conflict with traditional 
renewable energy policies. The policies to promote domestically-produced products may 
negatively affect achieving the goal of the traditional policies by reducing the use of low-
priced foreign products. Some non-traditional renewable energy policies could also 
conflict with global trade rules. The U.S. anti-dumping tariff on Chinese solar panels has 
caused trade dispute with China as China submitted a complaint to the WTO. Moreover, 
there are less transparent policies to protect domestic industry. Certification programs or 
government-driven renewable energy project development programs could be used as a 
policy measure to develop domestic corporations. It is not easy to find out how these 
“murky” industrial policies affect the use of renewable energy locally and globally.

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Limitation
The causal mechanism of renewable energy policy change is limited in being 
generalized due to the specific contexts of two case countries. Since each country has its 
own political, economic, and social contexts, these two country-level case studies are not 
easily generalized. Future research can complement this limitation by expanding case 
countries, and by conducting a quantitative large N-study. Despite this limitation, the two 
cases do allow insight into drivers of firm behavior and policy response that are relevant 
for these major actors, as well as providing the basis for future inquiries
 

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Chapter 8. Conclusion 
This research explores how the globalized renewable energy industry has changed 
national renewable energy policies through three analyses. The findings of the three 
analyses reveal that the globalized renewable energy industry has led the diversification 
of national renewable energy policies by increasing international interactions between 
actors, by posing new challenges to domestic renewable energy industries, which were 
addressed through additional policy measures, and by introducing opportunities to the 
industries to grow, which resulted in more political power of the industries.
Analysis 1 shows that solar multinational corporations have adapted to the 
changes of the global market rather than attempted to change national policies. It does not 
find any evidence of the effect of an individual solar multinational corporation on 
national policies. Rather, national policies, especially the policy measures to protect 
domestic industry, have affected the risks that multinational corporations face. They 
attempted to adapt to these increasing risks by expanding their business to downstream. 
This expansion has led them to face new policy risks. 
Analysis 2 reveals that solar multinationals have affected national policies 
through engaging in framing of a policy issue. In the U.S., the solar multinationals 
headquartered in other countries have dominated the framing of the issue of Chinese solar 
panels. Although Analysis 1 shows that an individual multinational corporation has 
barely influenced national policies, Analysis 2 identifies that it has affected national 
policies indirectly through framing.
Finally, Analysis 3 finds that the globalization of solar industry has affected the 
diversification of national solar policies. It changed the market conditions that solar 

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industry faced, and led the industry to initiate or suggest new policies. Moreover, the 
globalization of solar industry has led the growth of downstream solar industry by 
decreasing the costs of solar products. The growing downstream industry has 
strengthened the political power of the solar industry, which has helped the industry to 
engage in policymaking to maintain existing favorable policies, to make existing policies 
favorable, or to make non-solar policies favorable.
Interpretation of the findings of Analysis 1 and Analysis 2
 
The findings of Analysis 1 have an apparent inconsistency with those of Analysis 
2. Analysis 2 finds the effect of multinational corporations on policies, while Analysis 1 
does not find it. This inconsistency arises from differences in topical focus and method, 
and therefore relates more to the scoping of the analyses than to a theoretically 
fundamental divergence. In this sense, the two outcomes provide partial complementarity 
that gives a more complete picture of firm and policy responses. Three reasons can 
explain this inconsistency.
First, there was difference between the analyses in terms of the focus of an 
activity for policy engagement. Analysis 1 focused on the actual engagement of 
multinational renewable energy corporations in policymaking, while Analysis 2 focused 
on framing a policy issue. Framing a policy issue is a more indirect engagement in 
policymaking compared to other engagements such as lobbying. Therefore, it can be said 
that renewable energy corporations’ engagement in policymaking was indirect rather than 
direct. In the interviews, a few multinational solar PV manufacturers said that they could 
not actively engage in the U.S. policy issues because they are a non-U.S. manufacturer. 

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However, these manufacturers have participated in framing the Chinese solar panel issue 
in the U.S. This suggests that multinational corporations adopted indirect ways to engage 
in policies since their capabilities for policy engagement were limited in non-home 
countries. 
Second, Analysis 1 does not capture the behaviors of all the multinational 
corporations since the data was limited to the annual reports of the global top 15 solar 
module manufacturers. There is a possibility that non-top 15 solar module manufacturers 
actively participated in policies. For instance, SolarWorld, the dominant actor in framing 
the Chinese solar panel issue in the U.S., was not included in the top 15 module 
manufacturers.
Third, the annual reports might not include all the actual activities of the solar 
module manufacturers for policy change. Since lobbying is a sensitive issue, corporations 
might attempt to avoid describing their efforts to change policies in their annual reports.
In this sense, the findings of Analysis 1 and Analysis 2 complement each other 
rather than conflict. In combination, they show that multinational corporations’ policy 
engagement tend to be more indirect rather than direct. They engaged in policies through 
framing a policy issue and collaborating with other actors. Moreover, less globally 
dominant multinational corporations can be more active than dominant corporations for a 
specific policy issue. While Analysis 1 focuses on the direct policy engagements of large 
multinational corporations, Analysis 2 shows broader and indirect policy engagements of 
multinational corporations including less dominant corporations. 

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Evaluating the propositions