UNITED STATES

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

Washington, D.C. 20549

 

Form SD

Specialized Disclosure Report

 

Yingli Green Energy Holding Company Limited
(Exact name of registrant as specified in its charter)
Cayman Islands	001-33469
(State or other jurisdiction of incorporation or organization)	(Commission File Number)	(IRS Employer Identification No.)
No. 3399 Chaoyang North Street, Baoding, Hebei Province, People’s Republic of China			071051
(Address of principal executive offices)			(Zip Code)
Yiyu Wang, Chief Financial Officer Telephone: (86 312) 8929-787 Facsimile: (86 312) 8929-800 No. 3399 Chaoyang North Street Baoding 071051, Hebei Province, People’s Republic of China
(Name and telephone number, indicating area code, of the person to contact in connection with this report.)

 

Check the appropriate box to indicate the rule pursuant to which this form is being filed,

and provide the period to which the information in this form applies:

 

x Rule 13p-1 under the Securities Exchange Act (17 CFR 240.13p-1) for the reporting period from January 1 to December 31, 2017.

 

 

This Form SD has been prepared by Yingli Green Energy Holding Company Limited (herein referred to as “Yingli Green Energy,” the “Company,” “we,” “us,” or “our”). The information of this Form SD, together with any Exhibits hereto, includes the activities of all majority-owned subsidiaries that are required to be consolidated in the financial statements of the Company.

 

Section 1 - Conflict Minerals Disclosure

 

Item 1.01 Conflict Minerals Disclosure and Report

 

A. Company Overview

 

We are one of the world’s leading solar panel, or photovoltaic (PV) module, manufacturers and our manufacturing covers the photovoltaic value chain from ingot casting and wafering through solar cell production and solar panel assembly. Our products and services substantially cover the entire PV industry value chain, ranging from crystalline polysilicon ingots and wafers, PV cells and PV modules to the manufacture of PV systems and the installation of PV systems, and starting from 2012, to the development and operation of solar projects. We believe that we are one of the leading PV companies in the world to have adopted a vertically integrated business model. Our end-products include PV cells, PV modules and PV systems in different sizes and power outputs. We sell PV cells, PV modules and PV systems under our own brand names, Yingli and Yingli Solar, to PV system integrators and distributors located in various markets around the world, including China, Japan, India, the United States, Europe, Turkey, Australia, Latin Americas and Middle East, etc. Our principal executive offices are located at No. 3399 Chaoyang North Street, Baoding, Hebei Province, People’s Republic of China.

 

B. Products Overview

 

Our product lines are classified in the following categories: PV cells, PV modules and PV systems (including certain components or auxiliaries thereof).

 

A PV cell is a device made from a polysilicon wafer that converts sunlight into electricity by a process known as the photovoltaic effect. We generally use all of our PV cells (except certain low efficiency PV cells) in the production of our PV modules. However, we occasionally also sell PV cells to other entities.

 

A PV module is an assembly of PV cells that are electrically interconnected generally by ribbons and bus bars, laminated and framed in a durable and weatherproof package by using glasses, back sheets, aluminum frames and EVAs, together with junction boxes and cables. However, in 2016, we commercialized the frameless PANDA Bifacial module, which integrates the technology of PANDA n-type monocrystalline PV cells and is made of two layers of 2.5mm thick low-iron tempered glass, replacing the conventional back sheet and glass structure. Currently, most of our PV modules are made with PV cells produced by us and a small portion of our PV modules were made with PV cells we purchased from third-party suppliers. PV modules are our major products.

 

A PV system consists of one or more PV modules that are physically mounted and electrically interconnected with system components or auxiliaries such as batteries, lamps, capacitor, cables and printed circuit board, to produce and store electricity. Generally almost all PV modules used in our PV systems are produced by us. In order to focus on our core PV products and their components, we no longer produce controllers, inverters and other components used in our PV systems but instead source them from third-party manufacturers and sell them to our customers as part of our PV systems.

 

Based upon our internal assessment, the PV cells we produce do not contain conflict minerals but the PV modules and PV systems we manufacture or contract to manufacture contained conflict minerals. Accordingly, for the purposes of this Form SD, only our PV modules and PV systems were considered.

 

C. Supply Chain Overview

 

Tin, tantalum, tungsten and gold (Conflict Minerals or 3TG) contained in the PV modules and PV systems we manufacture or contract to manufacture were contained in components or auxiliaries supplied by third-party manufacturers. We did not process Conflict Minerals in our products. In order to manage the scope of our supply chain review, we rely upon our direct suppliers to provide information on the origin of the Conflict Minerals contained in components and materials supplied to us, including sources of 3TG that are supplied to them from sub-tier suppliers. We integrated responsible sourcing of minerals requirement with our Conflict Minerals Policy, which could be found at www.yinglisolar.com/en/about/sustainability/. Our suppliers are expected to provide the 3TG sourcing information to us per our Conflict Minerals Policy.

 

 

We have performed comprehensive analysis of our product components, and the role that suppliers play throughout our manufacturing and product delivery processes. Almost all suppliers were required to provide the specifications, data sheets, material safety data sheets or other applicable documents in order to identify the composition of the materials supplied to us.

 

According to the information we gathered, we defined the scope of our conflict minerals due diligence by identifying and reaching out to certain suppliers that provide materials that are likely to contain 3TG. We used the standard Conflict Minerals reporting templates established by the Conflict-Free Sourcing Initiative (CFSI) for reference and adopted a questionnaire (“Questionnaire”) that is substantially the same as the reporting templates, and launched our conflict minerals due diligence communication survey to these suppliers, who are suppliers to our PV modules and PV system manufacturing in 2017.

 

D. Reasonable Country of Origin Inquiry (RCOI) and RCOI Conclusion

 

We have taken the following steps as part of our reasonable country of origin inquiry to determine whether the conflict minerals may have originated in the Democratic Republic of the Congo or an adjoining country (“Covered Countries”): (a) listed out the subsidiaries that manufacture products; (b) list out the materials used during the production of the products of such subsidiaries; (c) determined which conflict minerals were necessary to the functionality or production of products manufactured or contracted to be manufactured by us (“Necessary Conflict Minerals”); (d) identified the suppliers whose products contained Necessary Conflict Minerals; (e) sent the Questionnaires to these suppliers and requested them provide information on the origin of the Necessary Conflict Minerals included in their products; and (f) analyzed whether the Necessary Conflict Minerals used by us during the reporting period may have originated from the Covered Countries.

 

We conducted an analysis of our products and found that our PV modules and PV systems contain tin. Neither our PV modules nor PV systems contain tantalum, tungsten or gold. Therefore, the products that we manufacture are subject to the reporting obligations of Rule 13p-1.

 

After having conducted a good faith reasonable country of origin inquiry, we have noticed that all suppliers claimed that the Conflict Minerals did not originate from the Covered Countries.

 

Therefore, based on our reasonable country of origin inquiry, we have no reason to believe that our Necessary Conflict Minerals may have originated in the Covered Countries.

 

E. Publicity

 

This specialized disclosure report on Form SD is publicly available at www.yinglisolar.com/en/about/sustainability/.

 

Item 1.02 Exhibit

 

Section 2 – Exhibits

 

Item 2.01 Exhibits

 

 

 

SIGNATURES

 

Pursuant to the requirements of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, the registrant has duly caused this report to be signed on its behalf by the duly authorized undersigned.

 

Yingli Green Energy Holding Company Limited
(Registrant)
By:	/s/ Yiyu Wang	Date:       May 29, 2018
Name: Yiyu Wang
Title: Chief Financial Officer