Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Applied Energy journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/apenergy Sustainable silicon photovoltaics manufacturing in a global market: A techno-economic, tariff and transportation framework Sergio Castellanos a,b,c,d, ⁎ , José E. Santibañez-Aguilar e, ⁎ , Benjamin B. Shapiro f , Douglas M. Powell g , Ian M. Peters h , Tonio Buonassisi h , Daniel M. Kammen b,c,f , Antonio Flores-Tlacuahuac e a Berkeley Energy & Climate Institute, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA b Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA c Energy and Resources Group, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA d Escuela de Gobierno y Transformación Pública, Tecnológico de Monterrey, Campus Ciudad de México, CDMX, Mexico e Escuela de Ingeniería y Ciencias, Tecnológico de Monterrey, Av. Eugenio Garza Sada 2501, Monterrey 64849, Mexico f Goldman School of Public Policy, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA g Boston Consulting Group, Detroit, MI, USA h Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA HIGHLIGHTS • A framework to optimize photovoltaics manufacturing supply chains is proposed. • Techno-economic, transportation, and tariff variables impact supply chain results. • Multiple objectives can be optimized while achieving low PV manufacturing costs. • Minimum sustainable price is substantially increased upon tariffs introduction. ARTICLE INFO Keywords: Solar photovoltaics Photovoltaics manufacturing Mathematical programming Minimum sustainable price Multi-objective approach ABSTRACT Solar photovoltaics (PV) manufacturing has experienced dramatic worldwide growth in recent years, enabling a reduction in module costs, and a higher adoption of these technologies. Continued sustainable price reductions, however, require strategies focused in further technological innovation, minimization of capital expenditures, and optimization of supply chain flows. We present a framework: Techno-economic Integrated Tool For Tariff And Transportation (TIT-4-TAT), that enables the study of these different strategies by coupling a techno-eco- nomic model with a tariff and transportation algorithm to optimize supply chain layouts for PV manufacturing under equally-weighted objectives. We demonstrate the use of this framework in a set of interacting countries (Mexico, China, USA, and Brazil) and two extreme tariff scenarios: no tariffs, and high tariff levels imposed. Results indicate that introducing tariffs between countries significantly increase the minimum sustainable price for solar PV manufacturing, alter the optimal manufacturing locations, and render a more expensive final solar PV module price which can hinder the adoption rates required to mitigate climate change. Recommendations for stakeholders on the optimization process, and techno-economic drivers are presented based on our results. This framework may be utilized by policymakers for the spatially-resolved planning of incentives, labor and manufacturing programs, and proper import tariff designs in the solar PV market. 1. Introduction In an effort to mitigate climate change, an increased number of countries are aligning their investment strategies and incentives towards decarbonizing different sectors of their economies [1–6]. This ongoing transition has led to a global surge in the commissioning of renewable energy projects with solar photovoltaic (PV) technologies representing a significant percentage of the total [7]. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2017.12.047 Received 10 October 2017; Received in revised form 27 November 2017; Accepted 8 December 2017 ⁎ Corresponding authors. E-mail addresses: sergioc@berkeley.edu (S. Castellanos), santibanez.ezequiel@itesm.mx (J.E. Santibañez-Aguilar). Applied Energy 212 (2018) 704–719 0306-2619/ © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. T