DOE Secretary Defends Decision to Support Solyndra
At a Nov. 17 congressional hearing characterized by partisan rancor, Energy Secretary Steven Chu disputed Republican allegations that politics played a role in his decision to approve a loan guarantee to Solyndra, the now bankrupt solar firm.
E-mails obtained and released by Republican committee members suggest that there was some disagreement within the administration about the economic viability of Solyndra, and some have alleged that the White House pressured the Dept. of Energy to take Herculean steps to save the foundering company, which filed for bankruptcy late this summer.
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The decision to offer the $535-million loan guarantee "absolutely … was made only on the merits," Chu told members of the House Energy and Commerce Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee. Furthermore, Chu took full responsibility for the decision to grant the loan guarantee, but noted that the decision spanned two administrations and was made only after two years of "rigorous technical, financial and legal due diligence."
But Republican committee members, particularly subcommittee Chairman Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) and Joe Barton (R-Texas), questioned Chu's management of the program. Stearns also raised the issue of the overall viability of the loan guarantee program, as two of the first three firms to receive loans under Chu's leadership have gone bankrupt. "If Solyndra really is a litmus test, we have a much bigger problem on our hands," Stearns said.
Chu contended that, when the loan program was created, Congress acknowledged some projects would fail by appropriating nearly $10 billion to cover potential losses in the total loan program. He noted that renewable-energy projects are crucial to the nation's economic security and competitiveness with nations such as China, Germany and Canada, which all operate government-backed clean-energy lending programs.
"We are in a fierce global race to capture this market," Chu said.
The most disturbing aspect is how Chu appeared totally ignorant of various facts in the case. I have to serious wonder if he was intentionaly kept in the dark about all the Chicago-styl...
Dr. Chu had to know that the cost of traditional solar panel was dropping drastically and rapidly thus making the more costly and more efficient Solyndra less attractive. How much ,if a...
Incidentally it is not uncommon for people of great distinction and demonstrated intelligence to make elementary blunders. My favorite example is the failure of scientists to fail to recognize for about 5 critical years 1934 - 1939 that they were splitting the atom. When Niels Bohr was told this, he put his hand to his forehead and exclaimed "what fools we have been"
A closer commercial analogy is Thomas Edison who continued to spend huge amounts of money on a complex process of extracting iron ore from low grade deposits even after the discovery of the great mesabi range with its abundant reserves of high grade iron ore. Psychologically Chu and Edison may have been fascinated by what to them and others was beautiful technology and this blinded them to its uneconomically. Just as the Nuclear scientists of the 1930's may have been blinded by their beautiful but false theories of the atom.