Qcells announced in a press release today, the company resumed solar panel assembly at its Cartersville, Georgia, facility after customs clearance delays. The factory plans to continue solar panel assembly and integrate block, wafer and cell production this year with an annual capacity of 3.3 GW, a company spokesperson said.
Qcells Dalton, Georgia manufacturing facility.
“We’re proud to get back to work producing the American energy the country needs now,” said Marta Stoepker, chief communications officer at Qcells. “Like any business, there have been and will continue to be obstacles that require us to adapt and be agile, but our overall goal remains the same: to build a complete American solar supply chain. To achieve this, we are excited to welcome hundreds of new, talented people to our workforce as we complete our unique factory in Cartersville, Georgia. By the end of 2026, nearly 4,000 people will have panels and components that America hasn’t made in a very long time. time.”
In November, Qcells laid off 1,000 employees from its two Georgia factories — about a third of the company’s workforce — and laid off 300 people as U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) increasingly stopped imported solar cells and other module components. Stoepker said Qcells could bring back every laid-off employee.
Products were stopped at the border under the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which prevented Chinese goods made with forced labor from entering the United States. Qcells is headquartered in South Korea and claims it does not use Chinese components in its solar panels, but CBP began clamping down on Qcell products last summer.
The Cartersville plant started operations in April 2025, joining Qcells’ 5.1 GW plant in Dalton, which opened in 2019. State Rep. Kasey Carpenter (R-Dalton) is hosting one press conference highlighting Qcells’ investments in Georgia on Tuesday at 2:30 PM (EDT) at the State Capitol.
