Solar panels used by Man City and David Lloyd linked to Chinese slave labour claims

Solar panels with suspected links to Chinese slave labour have been installed by dozens of organisations including Manchester City, Cheltenham Racecourse and David Lloyd gyms, The i Paper can reveal.

The scale of Britain’s use of solar panels made by firms alleged to have used components made from the forced labour of minorities in China can be disclosed for the first time.

As well as commercial premises, the locations include schools, hospitals and universities across the country. There is no suggestion that any of the organisations installed solar panels with knowledge of links to Chinese slave labour.

A critical component of Chinese solar panels is polysilicon that has regularly been been produced by its persecuted Uyghur minority, trapped in forced labour schemes and subject to human rights abuses.

The i Paper has mapped 84 non-residential locations where solar panels have been installed with links to alleged slave labour. The data is based on evidence provided by Sheffield Hallam University’s Helena Kennedy Centre for International Justice, the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC) and open source analysis.

The map shows Chinese solar panels installed since 2021 when firm evidence of links between their production and forced labour became widely available, although there is no suggestion companies mentioned in this article were aware of the evidence.

There are dozens of other sites across Britain that have installed solar panels made by Chinese companies before this date. In 2021 academic research and investigative reports exposed how polysilicon was predominantly produced in facilities in the Xinjiang region, where the Chinese government is accused of running slave-labour camps.

Later that year, US President Biden brought in the Uyghur Forced Labour Prevention Act banning most solar panels made in Xinjiang on the presumption that they were tainted by “systematic abuses”, including “genocide” and “crimes against humanity”.

China strongly denies all claims its solar panels are produced using forced labour and in February its foreign ministry spokesperson said these allegations were among the “lies of the century”.

Campaigners have criticised the widespread installation of solar panels linked to human rights abuses, but many accept the difficulties organisations wishing to install green energy products have in tracing opaque Chinese supply chains.

Manchester City teams up with ‘high-risk’ solar firm

Last year, Manchester City announced a partnership with Chinese manufacturer Jinko to install 2,800 solar panels on the club’s Women’s Stadium and training facilities. A second stage of the project will see thousands more solar panels installed at the City Football Academy by the summer.

In 2023 a report by Sheffield Hallam University claimed Jinko was one of six companies whose products had a “high risk” of being sourced through forced labour camps.

A Manchester City spokesperson referred The i Paper to Jinko. The Chinese firm claimed to have a “zero-tolerance” approach to forced labour and insisted that its operations were compliant with international and local laws.

They say they conduct their business and operations transparently and in accordance with the principles in its Code of Business Conduct and Ethics which, among others, focuses on the commitment to “No Forced Labour and No Child Labour”.

A spokesperson for the firm said: “Consistent with our mission of promoting a sustainable, and clean source of energy for future generations we, at Jinko Solar are fully committed to conducting our business in a lawful, sustainable, and ethical manner, engaging with suppliers that abide by our principles of business ethics, and by providing safe and inclusive workplaces.”

A green transition on the ‘broken backs of Uyghur slaves’

Last week, growing concerns over Britain’s use of Chinese panels with links to Uyghur oppression forced Energy Secretary Ed Miliband into banning them from being used by the state-funded Great British Energy company unless it can “ensure that slavery and human trafficking is not taking place” in its business or supply chains.

Crossbench peer Lord David Alton, a leading campaigner who helped put pressure on Miliband, told The i Paper: “The Government has rightly accepted that you cannot base a green transition on the broken backs of Uyghur slaves subjected to genocide.”

IPAC’s senior analyst Chung Ching Kwong believes The i Paper’s disclosures are a conservative estimate of the UK’s use of such tainted technology, because of the lack of transparency about the original source of materials used in many panels.

“UK consumers are unknowingly complicit in Uyghur forced labour,” said Ms Kwong. “Our work shows how big a mountain the government has to climb to root out slave made renewables.”

According to the International Energy Agency, the country manufactures more than 80 per cent of global solar panels and it is estimated that half of these are still being made with material sourced from the Xinjiang region.

Professor Laura Murphy at the Helena Kennedy Centre for International Justice at Sheffield Hallam University has led the way in tracing the original source of polysilicon in these panels. Her latest report in 2023 detailed how a number of Chinese firms had “high” exposure to production in Xinjiang. As well as Jinko, these included: JA Solar, Qcells, Canadian Solar, Trina Solar, and LONGi Solar.

Her report stated: “None of the companies that were engaged in state-sponsored labour transfers in 2021 has announced any changes to its recruitment methods or shown any resistance to participation in the PRC (Peoples Republic of China) Government’s programmes. Indeed, since that time, the PRC Government’s labour transfer programme has only increased in scale and the pressure on companies to absorb the workers the state deemed to be surplus remains high.”

Gyms and racecourses face questions on the source of their solar

Last year, JA Solar, which accounted for almost half of the sites mapped, had its panels installed on gyms in 10 cities belonging to the popular health club brand David Lloyd including those in Manchester and Birmingham. The firm’s panels were also fitted at Cheltenham and Newmarket racecourses.

Cheltenham and Newmarket racecourses did not respond although there is nothing to suggest they knew about any alleged link to forced labour.

A spokesperson from David Lloyd Clubs said: “We stand firmly against the exploitation of forced labour. We always do our due diligence and have robust procedures in place to ensure we have verified supply chain traceability and comply with the relevant laws and regulations.”

In January, the US banned a subsidiary of JA Solar from shipping goods to the country under its forced labour legislation. The company did not respond to requests for a comment but it’s understood JA Solar has taken concrete steps to avoid any exposure to forced labour in its supply chain, regular audits its suppliers and has heavily invested in its traceability system.

In recent years, all the solar companies mentioned in Murphy’s reports claim to have taken steps to sever ties with Xinjiang. Some have diversified their production to cut out the region, while the solar industry itself has tried to improve its monitoring of supply chains.

The UK formed the Solar Stewardship Initiative (SSI) with trade organisations in a bid to tackle human rights challenges within the global solar supply chain including “rigorously” auditing some Chinese sites. Trini Solar and JA Solar are members.  The latter firm was suspended in January after the US banned panels made by one of its subsidiaries but was reinstated after the SSI concluded its supply practices had changed.

SSI’s chief executive Rachel Owens said: “We are acutely aware of the complexities involved in verifying supply chain links that may be several tiers removed from the end-product. That is precisely why the SSI, together with a large range of stakeholders including civil society, human rights experts, international financial institutions and industry, developed the SSI Supply Chain Traceability Standard. It will be implemented in 2025.”

The i Paper approached all six Chinese solar panel firms for comment. Only Jinko responded.

It is also understood that Trina Solar has taken measures to introduce internal processes to protect customers from forced labour allegations and has publicly committed to having no use of forced labour in its operations.

Some Chinese firms have criticised Sheffield Hallam’s report, claiming it disregards corporate due diligence policies.

But Prof Murphy who strongly defended her research, warned against companies taking the words of Chinese firms as evidence that supply chains are clean.

She said: “A simple attestation that forced labor has been excluded simply isn’t enough to ensure that modules are in fact free and clear of forced labor.”

Chloe Cranston at Anti-Slavery International, claimed a lack of extensive testing of Chinese manufacturers has made the UK a “dumping ground” for panels linked to slave labour.

She said: “What we were seeing is many of the big solar companies… essentially creating one clean supply chain for the US to meet the requirements there but then they were not having to take those same steps in other markets globally meaning that the UK market was opening itself up as a dumping ground.”

What the companies say

The i Paper contacted every company on its map that had installed panels made by firms with alleged links to forced labour. Many said they were assured by those who installed the panels that there was no association to forced labour, while others admitted not being aware of the links. For a full list of company responses please see panel below.

Jon Brooks, the managing director of a plastic moulding business in Bournemouth said the company “invested heavily” in solar panels to shrink its carbon footprint. He said they used a respected UK contractor who claims to have excluded slavery violations from its supply chain to install the panels in 2022 and admitted that they hadn’t considered the possible links to forced labour.

He said: “If we were investing again, we would seek more specific assurances on this issue. But I imagine that all suppliers will be adept at claiming or providing ‘evidence’ that their supply is clean. These are difficult paths to tread.”

The Shadow Security Minister Alicia Kearns said: “It is sadly no surprise so many sites across Britain host solar panels made by companies with alleged links to Uyghur forced labour.

“It is not fair to expect every small organisation or individual installing a solar panel to be able to assess whether their clean energy was built on the back of slaves. The Government needs to step up, get serious and show some moral leadership – regardless of how desperate they are not to upset the Chinese Communist Party.”

A Government spokesperson said:”We are committed to stamping out modern slavery. The Procurement Act 2023, which came into force on 24 February this year, significantly increases our powers to deal with modern slavery in procurement, including banning suppliers from contracts where there is evidence of forced labour in their supply chain.

“We will stand firm on human rights, including in Xinjiang, and we continue to work with international partners to hold China to account for their violations.”

All company responses to questions about their solar panels and alleged links to Chinese slave labour can be viewed here.