First Solar announced a $330 million commitment to a fifth US manufacturing facility in Gaffney, South Carolina on November 14, to come online in 2026. The announcement followed the mid-2025 inauguration of the company’s $1.1 billion, 3.5 GW AI-enabled facility in Iberia Parish, Louisiana, which opened ahead of schedule. Combined, the two developments push First Solar’s projected US manufacturing capacity to 17.7 GW by 2027, with total domestic capital deployed exceeding $4 billion.
The expansion is structured around the IRA’s Section 45X domestic manufacturing credit, which pays solar module manufacturers a per-watt credit on US-produced components. First Solar’s thin-film CdTe technology, manufactured entirely in the US, qualifies fully. The company does not source cells from China or Southeast Asia, which means it also avoids the AD/CVD tariff exposure that landed on crystalline silicon competitors in June 2025.
The manufacturing scale matters as a supply signal. 17.7 GW of annual US nameplate capacity from one manufacturer, by 2027, is the clearest single data point on whether the IRA’s reshoring logic works for solar. First Solar is the proof-of-concept the domestic manufacturing thesis needs, and the South Carolina announcement extends the capex commitment well beyond the minimum needed to capture current-year credits.