According to CleanTechnica, solar power manufacturer First Solar announced a $1.2 billion expansion plan, including up to $1 billion to add a fourth factory to the company’s roster in a state to be named later. About $185 million will also go to upgrade the capacity of First Solar’s operations in Ohio. Altogether, the company expects to have more than 10 gigawatts in capacity online by 2025.

The story of how we got here is not straightforward.

The US once had a lock on the global solar manufacturing scene. Bell Labs introduced the first practical solar panels in the 1950s, and US manufacturers began churning them out for the space program and other niche applications domestically and elsewhere around the globe.

By the 1980s, though, US manufacturers began losing out to Japan, and it was all over when China entered the picture. By the 1990s, the US Department of Energy was casting about for a way to revive the domestic solar industry. Labor costs were one of the leading obstacles, partly due to the use of silicon as the material of choice for solar panels. The hunt was on for new materials that would be a better fit for high volume, high throughput, automated manufacturing systems.

Additionally, few can satisfy the made-in-America purity test. Some operate under the umbrella of corporations headquartered overseas, and some assemble solar panels from parts made overseas. This purity test may seem somewhat out of step in a globalized economy, but if domestic energy security is the goal, then a soup-to-nuts domestic manufacturing base is a priority.

Thanks to some hard work by government partners and First Solar, this announcement finally came to fruition.

Democratic US Representative Marcy Kaptur of Ohio’s 9th Congressional District said this in a statement: “Northern Ohio has already revolutionized the field of solar technology. Now, through this remarkable partnership between the U.S. Department of Energy, the University of Toledo, and First Solar – our region will become a hub of next-generation energy innovation that is built right here at home by Ohio’s workers.”

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