"Anybody who's talking about putting up a new project now is thinking, 'Wow, there's no support anymore,' " said State Rep. Chris Ross (R., Chester County).
On Tuesday, Ross plans to introduce a legislative rescue for the industry that would increase the amount of solar energy that utilities must buy through 2015, propping up the price of solar credits.
The bill also would close Pennsylvania's solar markets to out-of-state producers. Developers here say cross-border imports of solar power are driving down prices in Pennsylvania.
"Everybody who knew anything about the market knew this was going to happen," said John F. Curtis III, chief executive of Green Energy Capital Partners L.L.C., a Whitemarsh developer. "Now, there's a big panic to do something about it."
The legislative rescue is likely to encounter resistance from traditional utilities and competing fossil-fuel power suppliers, which argue that renewable-energy mandates drive up consumer costs.
"The reality is, this is kind of what happens when you flood the market with solar," said Eugene Barr, spokesman for the Pennsylvania Chamber of Business and Industry.
Although they can legally recover the cost of renewable power by passing it on to customers, the utilities say they are worried that higher costs will tap out consumers and deprive the utilities of funding for improvements to the distribution system.
"Didn't the developers of these solar projects make a business decision and take a risk when they decided to build these projects?" asked Terrence J. Fitzpatrick, head of the Energy Association of Pennsylvania. "At what point do you just let market forces deal with it?"
