China proposes export controls on 12 solar manufacturing technologies

China's Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) and Ministry of Science and Technology proposed on October 16, 2026 to add 12 solar manufacturing technologies, covering polysilicon, wafer and cell production, to the Catalogue of Technologies Prohibited or Restricted from Export. Joint Announcement No. 48 of 2026, which also lists 23 artificial intelligence and 5 biomedicine technologies, takes public comments until November 15. One part applies immediately: from the day of publication until the revised catalogue takes effect, exporters must register any export of the listed technologies with MOFCOM before it happens, including exports that have started but are not complete. The announcement says the scope also includes the key and core equipment that carries the technologies.

Under China's rules, a prohibited technology may not be exported at all and a restricted one needs a license, as MOFCOM's spokesperson explained when the catalogue last changed. The solar section of the draft list is written in factory numbers, and its prohibited tier starts with the newest cells:

• Perovskite and tandem production: perovskite-silicon tandem cells on mass-production wafers of at least 182 mm at 30% efficiency or more; perovskite slot-die coating at least 1.1 meters wide; single-junction perovskite modules of at least 1 square meter at 18% or better, and tandem perovskite modules of the same size at 28% or better.
• Polysilicon: cold-hydrogenation fluidized-bed processes for trichlorosilane with single-line capacity of at least 250,000 tonnes a year, and silane fluidized-bed processes of at least 20,000 tonnes a year.
• Wafers and cells: preparation of wafers 70 micrometers thick or less, and an edge-passivation technology for cells on wafers 182 to 230 mm on a side and no thicker than 140 micrometers.

Each of those also covers the technology for making the equipment. The restricted tier reaches further into the mainstream: polysilicon plant engineering for lines of at least 30,000 tonnes a year, reduction processes for furnaces of at least 800 tonnes a year each, monocrystalline ingot pulling (including puller designs with chambers of at least 1,600 mm or pull rates of at least 1.2 mm a minute), ingot machining, ultra-thin large-wafer preparation, and high-efficiency TOPCon, back-contact and heterojunction cell processes. Most of the cell entries turn on wafer size and thickness, throughput, or indium and silver content: TOPCon's tunnel-oxide and doped-polysilicon deposition is covered for tools rated at 6,000 or more full G12 wafers an hour.

MOFCOM's spokesperson gave national security as the first reason: solar technology keeps finding uses in aerospace, defense, unmanned equipment and high-security infrastructure, and the security risk of exporting it keeps rising. One entry fits that account closely, deposition technology for p-type heterojunction cells that qualifies at 20.5% efficiency under AM0 light, a test condition pv magazine notes is relevant to space applications. Most of the rest is measured in tonnes a year and wafers an hour.

The spokesperson also drew the edges. Products made with the listed technologies are outside the scope, technologies below the thresholds stay free to export, and unlisted solar equipment is in principle unaffected. The bite is in how solar know-how actually leaves the country: its export, the spokesperson said, often comes with the export, installation, commissioning and upgrading of production lines, and exporters doing that work should apply for a technology export license. Registration covers assigning a technology's ownership abroad, licensing it for use abroad, its owner or controller becoming a foreign entity, and other cases MOFCOM names. Every export of the listed key and core solar equipment must be registered.

Beijing has floated solar controls once before. A draft MOFCOM published on December 30, 2022 would have added solar wafer preparation as a restricted technology, with control points including large wafers, black silicon and high-efficiency cast ingots, according to a review by Han Kun Law Offices. The catalogue the two ministries issued on December 21, 2023 has no solar entry. The battery chain fared differently: a revision that opened for comment on January 2, 2025 was issued on July 15, 2025, adding battery cathode material preparation, including lithium iron phosphate and lithium manganese iron phosphate, as a restricted entry, and lithium extraction processes to an existing one.

Perovskite and tandem cells already get favored treatment at home. They are among the products exempt through 2028 from the consumption tax that reaches solar cells on April 1, 2027 (as we reported); the draft would keep the know-how for making them there too. The module threshold also sits close to where the field is heading. After its 676 cm² submodule record with UtmoLight, UNSW's next step is a 2.8 square meter module at a hoped-for 18% to 19% (UNSW and UtmoLight claim 23.5% record for a 676 cm² perovskite submodule), numbers that would meet the draft's single-junction marks of 1 square meter and 18%.

Comments go to MOFCOM's Bureau of Security and Control by email, fax or letter until November 15, 2026, on the scope, thresholds, controls and facilitation measures. The announcement sets no date for the final catalogue; the registration requirement runs until it takes effect.