{"id":886,"date":"2011-10-20T11:15:18","date_gmt":"2011-10-20T18:15:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/savingtherepublic.com\/blog\/?p=886"},"modified":"2011-10-20T11:15:18","modified_gmt":"2011-10-20T18:15:18","slug":"energy-department-caught-trying-to-revise-history","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/savingtherepublic.com\/blog\/2011\/10\/energy-department-caught-trying-to-revise-history\/","title":{"rendered":"Energy Department Caught Trying to Revise History"},"content":{"rendered":"

From The Blaze<\/a>
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Thanks to CNBC<\/a>, the Department of Energy has been caught removing references to \u00e2\u20ac\u0153SunPower,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d a solar energy company that was given $1.2 billion in loan guarantees, from old press releases (H\/T Hotair<\/a>).<\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u0153The changes occurred in two press releases from the Department of Energy\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s loan guarantee program \u00e2\u20ac\u201d the same program that has been the center of controversy surrounding the failed solar company Solyndra,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d reports Eamon Javers of CNBC<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Both were changed to remove the name of a company that has received negative press attention in recent days, SunPower, and replace it with the name of another company, NRG Energy,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he added.<\/p>\n

Watch the CNBC video:<\/strong>
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What does this mean?<\/p>\n

Hotair<\/a> puts it bluntly:<\/p>\n

Clean energy, cronyism, and another gigantic taxpayer loan headed down the toilet. As Andrew Stiles says, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153SunPower is currently on track to become the second embarrassing failure in the DOE\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s loan portfolio.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

Presumably DOE wants to do what little it can to scrub the company from its database before it melts down and another hugely embarrassing \u00e2\u20ac\u0153federal-backed green project goes bust\u00e2\u20ac\u009d media cycle begins.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Sadly, this story should not come as a surprise to many Blaze readers (or anyone who has been following the Fed\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s energy loan program for that matter).<\/p>\n

The Blaze has been closely following several of the failed energy investments of the Obama administration. We have meticulously cataloged the details of the Solyndra scandal, including the Feds loan restructuring <\/a>and the fact that the administration was preparing to give it a second multimillion-dollar loan guarantee.<\/a><\/p>\n

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The Blaze also reported on a little known story that involved $420,000<\/a> in taxpayer-backed guarantees that was wasted on a doomed-from-the-start energy saving project for a truck stop in Tennessee.<\/p>\n

Then there were other energy investments that The Blaze put on the radar because, like Solyndra, they did not sound like \u00e2\u20ac\u0153good\u00e2\u20ac\u009d bets<\/a> and they reeked of cronyism.<\/p>\n

There was a article titled Report:<\/em> $737 Million \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcGreen Jobs\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 Loan Given to Company Affiliated with Pelosi\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Bro-in-Law<\/em>, in which it was revealed that there was a suspected level of cronyism involved in the awarding of $737 million<\/a> to a solar energy company associated with Nancy Pelosi\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s brother-in-law.<\/p>\n

There was another Blaze article titled Next Round: Obama Admin Authorizes Billions More In Loan Guarantees to Solar Companies <\/em>that reported two more solar power companies were being awarded billions in loan guarantees.<\/p>\n

There was First Solar, which received $3.0 billion<\/a> ($967 million guarantee for a project in Arizona, $646 million for one in Antelope Valley and $1.46 billion for its 550-megawatt Desert Sunlight plant), and there was SunPower, which received $1.2 billion<\/a> in loan guarantees.<\/p>\n

Apparently, things started to unravel for the latter of those two companies. In an article titled The Next Round of Companies That Could Go Bankrupt<\/em>, The Blaze documented the fact that SunPower (the solar energy company that received $1.2 billion in loan guarantees) was:<\/p>\n

. . . getting destroyed with the rest of the U.S. industry. SunPower sold its 250MW California Valley Solar Ranch to NRG Energy this year. It also just signed a new $275 million revolving credit facility as well as a new $200 million letter of credit facility, according to Reuters.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Business Insider also noted that SunPower had a financial distress probability of 3.20 percent (as calculated by GovernanceMetrics International<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Next, Human Events<\/a> brought us this:<\/p>\n

How did a failing California solar company, buffeted by short sellers and shareholder lawsuits, receive a $1.2 billion federal loan guarantee for a photovoltaic electricity ranch project\u00e2\u20ac\u201dthree weeks after it announced it was building new manufacturing plant in Mexicali, Mexico, to build the panels for the project?<\/p>\n

The company, SunPower (SPWR-NASDAQ), now carries $820 million in debt, an amount $20 million greater than its market capitalization.<\/p>\n

If SunPower were a bank, the feds would shut it down. Instead, it received a lifeline twice the size of the money sent down the Solyndra drain.<\/p>\n

Two men with insight into the process are SunPower rooter Rep. George R. Miller III, (D.-Calif.), the senior Democrat on the House Education and Workforce Committee and the co-chairman of the Democratic Steering and Policy Committee, and his SunPower lobbyist son, George Miller IV.<\/p>\n

Miller the Elder is a strong advocate for SunPower, which converted an old Richmond, Calif., Ford plant in his district to a panel-manufacturing facility.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So where do we stand?<\/p>\n

The sad fact of the matter is that SunPower may very well be the next solar energy company to go belly up. And where does that put the taxpayers?<\/p>\n

Let\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s see:<\/p>\n