US–Renewable Energy is the last in a series of WTO disputes involving subsidies schemes with local content requirements. Local content requirements (LCRs) are highly discriminatory and trade distortive instruments and therefore all cases concerning green energy have been found to violate WTO law. However, recent jurisprudence has developed a different definition of prohibited LCRs under the GATT and the SCM agreement, the latter allowing for some leeway to define origin of products under a government subsidy scheme. Depending how the subsidy scheme is framed, it will be able to be excused from the GATT's more stringent prohibition of LCRs, this raises question of consistency in the application of the LCRs prohibition. Moreover, we review a simple and robust approach that modern welfare economics suggests for framing discussions of subsidy policy. We apply this approach to the case of renewable energy subsidies and discuss some complexities with respect to local content requirements. In conclusion, this allows us to critically assess and review proposals to increase coherence between WTO subsidy policy and green energy promotion policies and submit proposals to achieve better suited WTO subsidy rules.

中文翻译：

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Nihil novi sub sole：根据美国重新思考 WTO 和绿色补贴的必要性——可再生能源

美国——可再生能源是一系列 WTO 争端中的最后一个，这些争端涉及具有当地含量要求的补贴计划。本地含量要求 (LCR) 是具有高度歧视性和贸易扭曲性的工具，因此所有有关绿色能源的案件都被发现违反了 WTO 法律。然而，最近的判例根据 GATT 和 SCM 协议对禁止的 LCR 制定了不同的定义，后者允许在政府补贴计划下定义产品原产地有一定的余地。根据补贴计划的制定方式，它将能够免除 GATT 更严格的 LCR 禁令，这引发了 LCR 禁令适用的一致性问题。此外，我们回顾了现代福利经济学提出的一种简单而稳健的方法，用于构建补贴政策的讨论。我们将这种方法应用于可再生能源补贴的情况，并讨论与当地含量要求有关的一些复杂性。总之，这使我们能够批判性地评估和审查提案，以提高 WTO 补贴政策和绿色能源促进政策之间的一致性，并提交提案以实现更适合 WTO 补贴规则。