another "green energy" bet goes belly up, $151M of taxpayer dollars wasted

ChesusRice said:

Well that's becuase we didnt invest in something for after the space shuttle

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There is a difference between NASA and donor's private companies. Although admittedly, NASA has been used as a middleman for funneling tax money to private companies for decades, just like our military and mostly by the right. I guess we should thank Obama for cutting out the middleman? The crony-capitalism in DC needs to be illegal and prosecutable if we ever want to reach our economic potential.

The only solution I can think of to deter this is to limit what our elected officials are able to get away with. Unfortunately we've become a country that only calls out the other side. When examples of crony-capitalism is pointed out the worst thing we can do is make excuses and live in denial because they bat for our team.

ginwilly said:

There is a difference between NASA and donor's private companies. Although admittedly, NASA has been used as a middleman for funneling tax money to private companies for decades, just like our military and mostly by the right. I guess we should thank Obama for cutting out the middleman? The crony-capitalism in DC needs to be illegal and prosecutable if we ever want to reach our economic potential.

The only solution I can think of to deter this is to limit what our elected officials are able to get away with. Unfortunately we've become a country that only calls out the other side. When examples of crony-capitalism is pointed out the worst thing we can do is make excuses and live in denial because they bat for our team.

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You do happen to know that the DOE programs that give out money and loan gaurantees did not start with Obama....right?

ChesusRice said:

You do happen to know that the DOE programs that give out money and loan gaurantees did not start with Obama....right?

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of course. It was unfair and most of all harmful to natural economic laws then as it is now. The people who screamed about Halliburton should be screaming about this too, it's the same damn thing. The people screaming about this and Solyndra but didn't scream about Halliburton are just as hypocritical.

ChesusRice said:

You do happen to know that the DOE programs that give out money and loan gaurantees did not start with Obama....right?

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And Ethanol didnt start under Obama yet we continue to turn food into fuel that provably causes more pollution than natural gasoline.

That does not mean that the project should not be shitcanned ASAP...

I love DOE funding. Pays my salary.

Obama says he wants to create 5 million green jobs

[video=youtube;H-qG88wsBCI]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-qG88wsBCI&feature=player_detailpage[/video]

NLXSK1 said:

And Ethanol didnt start under Obama yet we continue to turn food into fuel that provably causes more pollution than natural gasoline.

That does not mean that the project should not be shitcanned ASAP...

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i have not heard the "more pollution than natural gasoline" before have you got a source?

ginjawarrior said:

i have not heard the "more pollution than natural gasoline" before have you got a source?

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These are different days than the Bush years. America now has the ability to tap into massive amounts of resources so that we can be energy independent in 6 years. But we have to vote Mitt Romney for that to be possible

The complete list of faltering or bankrupt green-energy companies:

1. Evergreen Solar ($25 million)*
2. SpectraWatt ($500,000)*
3. Solyndra ($535 million)*
4. Beacon Power ($43 million)*
5. Nevada Geothermal ($98.5 million)
6. SunPower ($1.2 billion)
7. First Solar ($1.46 billion)
8. Babcock and Brown ($178 million)
9. EnerDel’s subsidiary Ener1 ($118.5 million)*
10. Amonix ($5.9 million)
11. Fisker Automotive ($529 million)
12. Abound Solar ($400 million)*
13. A123 Systems ($279 million)*
14. Willard and Kelsey Solar Group ($700,981)*
15. Johnson Controls ($299 million)
16. Schneider Electric ($86 million)
17. Brightsource ($1.6 billion)
18. ECOtality ($126.2 million)
19. Raser Technologies ($33 million)*
20. Energy Conversion Devices ($13.3 million)*
21. Mountain Plaza, Inc. ($2 million)*
22. Olsen’s Crop Service and Olsen’s Mills Acquisition Company ($10 million)*
23. Range Fuels ($80 million)*
24. Thompson River Power ($6.5 million)*
25. Stirling Energy Systems ($7 million)*
26. Azure Dynamics ($5.4 million)*
27. GreenVolts ($500,000)
28. Vestas ($50 million)
29. LG Chem’s subsidiary Compact Power ($151 million)
30. Nordic Windpower ($16 million)*
31. Navistar ($39 million)
32. Satcon ($3 million)*
33. Konarka Technologies Inc. ($20 million)*
34. Mascoma Corp. ($100 million)

Where do you think the money for all those magical overseas donations came from? (jk tinfoilies)
Anywho, as the magical underpants man said, he doesnt pick winners and losers, he picks losers, and is a loser.

Critics have seized on the news of Solyndra’s bankruptcy to condemn the Department of Energy’s Loan Guarantee Program, which provided a $535 million loan guarantee in 2009. The National Review’s Greg Pollowitz writes that Solyndra’s failure shows “why the government should not play venture capitalist.” Yet the fact is that, when judged by its entire diverse portfolio of investments, the LGP has performed remarkably well. Indeed, with a capitalization of just $4 billion, DOE has committed or closed $37.8 billion in loan guarantees for 36 innovative clean energy projects. The Solyndra case represents less than 2% of total loan commitments made by DOE, and will be easily covered by a capitalization of eight to ten times larger than any ultimate losses expected following the bankruptcy proceedings.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/energys...-to-abandon-federal-energy-innovation-policy/

The broad success story of the LGP shows why federal investment in clean energy is necessary to help early-stage clean energy technologies achieve scale and reach commercialization. The inherent uncertainty in investing in novel technologies, coupled with the high capital costs and long time horizons, prohibits most venture capital funds from investing in large-scale clean energy projects. Financing tools and direct investment from the federal government can help bridge this well-known “Commercialization Valley of Death,” and the LGP is an effective way of doing that.
Instead of “picking winners and losers,” as the program’s critics allege, the program actually reduces risk for a suite of innovative clean energy technologies and allows venture capitalists and other private sector investors to invest in the best technology. Rather than picking winners, the LGP enables innovative companies to compete in the marketplace, allowing winners to emerge from competition. And while Solyndra is shutting its doors, companies like SunPower, First Solar, and Brightsource Energy, which also received loan guarantees and other support from the federal government, are industry leading success stories.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/energys...-to-abandon-federal-energy-innovation-policy/

Critics who think the government has no place in supporting technology innovation have a tenuous grasp of U.S. economic history. In fact, the government has a long and successful history in helping America’s intrepid entrepreneurs succeed in new high-risk, high-reward technology sectors. As we wrote in “Where Good Technologies Come From,” the government has played a key role, either as an early investor or a demanding customer, in the development of virtually every advanced technology we take for granted today, from aviation to biotechnology, to computers and the Internet, microchips, and now clean energy. Indeed, without a visionary government investing in key strategic industries, world-leading companies like Google, Genentech and Boeing would not exist.