Solyndra and What's Next For U.S. Energy Policy
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2011-11-17/solyndra-and-whats-next-us-energy-policy
Energy Secretary Steven Chu is facing tough questions on capital hill over the Obama administrations support for Solyndra. The now bankrupt solar panel company received a five hundred and thirty five million dollar loan from the federal government. Republicans charge got the loan because of political favoritism for a big Obama donor. The administration maintains the overall performance loan program will turn out to be sound. Chu, a Nobel laureate, points to the economic stakes for the U.S. in a growing global renewable energy market. A look at the controversy over Solyndra and what's next for U.S. energy policy.
Guests
Kevin Book
managing director of research, ClearView Energy Partners.
Coral Davenport
energy and environment correspondent, National Journal.
Robert Bryce
senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and author of "Power Hungry:The Myths of 'Green' Energy and the Real Fuels of the Future"
Nathanael Greene
Director of Renewable Energy Policy at the Natural Resources Defense Council
Comments
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As to the question of alternative energy subsidization. I was listening to NPR earlier this morning and heard how little the solar energy industry is actually subsidized by the United States Government. It is a fraction of the amount of money that is contributed to Coal, Natural Gas, Oil and Nuclear. All of which are unsustainable forms of energy.
This is not some defense for Solyndra, which probably had all kinds of problems that have yet to be revealed, but I do believe that it is a huge mistake for this country, not to invest in alternative forms of energy. Otherwise we leave that opportunity up to other countries, and along with that all the jobs and money that will go with it. As a country we can simply not afford to do that.
Of course I realize that others may and probably will differ with me on this. So be it....
First President Obama gave the Republicans a pass on war crimes, correct me if I am wrong but didn't Bush have to cancle leaving the country for fear of being arrested? Second how much did Solyndra get in comparisson to what the oil companies have been getting for the last 100 years, which the Republicans defend to the end? Third, the market for solar panals went down so quickly largely due to the Chineese Governmants heavy involvement in Chineese companies. This is a thinly disguised ploy by the Republicans to defeat Obama. When will they get back to governing and solving the problems of the American People? And if this is the best complaint they can come up with legally, Id say Obama is doing quite well.
Solyndra was an attempt to make a tubular photovoltaic product. Had it succeeded an alternative to the boring flat solar panels would have come on the market and provided design and efficiency (sunlight orientation) alternatives that would have expanded the architectural catalog. Components (mostly roof), membranes and coatings have been in development for some time but they too have not attained conversion ratios making them widely marketable. Our ever larger electric generation utility corporations obviously prefer a centralized strategy to home and business place generation and continue to build coal and gas plants. They actually prefer nuclear but cannot mobilize the threshold investment. (best graft opportunity.)
If Solyndra was fraudulent in presenting its prospects this is understandable in the current climate of pervasive corruption. The stubbornness and manipulation of domestic utilities such as Duke Energy (vertically integrated in coal fields, energy transportation and in natural gas importation) is symptomatic of the same lax regulation and failed planning. Solar energy is lagging in the same way that railroad technology languished after it became feasible about 1830.
Only a policy of giveaways to the already wealthy by the government made it happen, and farmers and other shippers were exploited right along with taxpayers as our commonly held resources were squandered. That outmoded capitalist dynamic would be disastrous today. We have scarce resources now and foreign manufacturing competition using enslaved labor.
Still our leadership pairs two anachronisms: Crony capitalism and fossil fuel energy production. After Japan, nuclear may also be in the rear view mirror
So when Solyndra's demise is made a political issue to the exclusion of discussing our energy and climate dilemma, and China is presented as both a new market and a Boogeyman, any calm bystander can see we are headed for Hyperfinance Feudalism (for we 99%), and a dead end for even our glorious 1%. Something is really wrong when Presidential Frontrunners are making trade pacts to export more productive work to cauldrons of injustice, or claim we are going to Hell, but don't know why. (Our Oligarchs are living in an unsustainable past.)
From personal experience and some investigation Wall Street has bounced back but solar and wind have stayed down, way down. My wind and solar holdings are down 85%. Lack of interest in sustainability along with government support to fossil fuel entities would likely account for a company like Solyndra going belly up. I didn't expect this to happen. I thought people AND government AND businesses were smarter than this. I think President Obama did too.
Has anyone addressed the recent TED video by Justin Hall-Tipping?
It's remarkable. The Obama administration is not really addressing the energy problem. See Jeremy Rifkin's approach. His book on the third Industrial Revolution talks and book are on the web. Seattle just had podcasts by Rifkin on http://www.kuow.org search for Rifkin there. Failure to look at these ideas is really a plan to fail.
Regards.
Today we see that DRShow listening women are greatly concerned with the energy future of our planet and with maintaining civilization. (where's kathleen?)
nosolau: I don't trust Jeremy Rifkin. He talks with a forked tongue. His dispensing of vocabulary and thought modes is subsidized by invisible Oligarchs just as Cain's presidential run is. And this Startrekky TED stuff is also entrepreneurial elitist bloviation designed to apologize for the wealth gap. They can't share the cake they have already mostly eaten. Tricks of these kinds always result in less than 5% winners and at least 95% losers.
We have come to a crossroads where mass democracy is possible but old ways are holding it down. We could have a planned energy economy by consensus. The general assemblies of Occupy demonstrate that. Women are beyond hitching their wagon to a winning star, or I thought we were. I want to be a "real voter" and a "full citizen" participating in rational decisions. Women are the actual majority and we can make it happen.
By demanding cooperation and complete democracy we can preserve civilization. But we have to speak up and tell the men to chill. Ruthless competition now means certain extinction.
Crony capitalism and corporatism, one day you hate corporations and the next you love them. Some posting here can't even wait for the next paragraph to contradict yourself. What is with you people. Welcome to the occupy movement.
If you go to the latest TED talk by Justin Hall-Tipping (a nano-entrepreneur) "Freeing Energy From the Grid", please read the comments below the window.
Alex Blanes (A Canadian millenial-boy) set off a brainstorm of collaboration among various posters. His vision of a post-entreprenuerial, post-profit, common intellectual property existence was reinforced by other thinkers of both genders in an inspiring way. This short exchange is a small piece of the massive evidence that humanity has matured beyond short-sighted greed and is preparing for paradigm shattering changes. So the provocative aspect of TED talks are good for something other than attracting investors after all. But the talk needs to mature and get real. Boys playing corporate don won't cut it.
(Somebody mentioned Charter Cities. Who knows about that?)
Are any large contributors to the Republican Party included among the Solyndra principals?
Keep in mind that these assistance programs have also provided funding for large solar project in Congressman Mc.Cains constituency with little news coverage.
The real issue is the politics/method of appropriation, a common argument for most Washington activity.
The concept is positive, the method is not so much.
Yeah, I think the government should not be picking winners and losers. So what we need to do is impose a carbon tax sufficient to bring our emissions down below zero. Then let the free market do its thing.
For the last 20 years Germany has led the world in its government subsidized encouragement of commercial solar energy. They certainly have not proven to be shortsighted or economically irresponsible in doing so. Your one guest mentioned their cutting back on renewable energy investments. This is a misrepresentation of their (Germany's) commitment to clean/renewable energy sources.
The Program was stolen from the American people. It's intent is good and most would agree future energy needs to be supported to some degree. The investigation focus should be financial favoritism and the political donations. "Follow the Money". Does Solara really seem fair to the American People ?.
I am in my 50s and therefore remember when the federal government actively supported science and research. US was at the forefront of science, medicine, new technologies. Now new technologies get loan guarantees and must sink or swim. Doesn't this show how market does not necessarily speed up innovation. What your guests have said is basically that China's ability to put out old technology killed US company trying to do it better. Shouldn't we be talking about THAT!
Not one of the guests has mentioned the elephant in the room: climate change and global warming. When analyzing the costs of various energy sources, we must also calcuate the long-term costs of cataclysmic changes that will result if climate models prove true. Or is that not our problem, because those effects will be felt most strongly by our descendents?
Dirty energy-oil, gas, nuclear and coal--have had huge subsidies going back for as far as the eye can see. It's time to invest in clean energy and move forward. One failed loan should not change the fact that it's time to invest in clean energy. It is the future.
From yesterday's Morning Edition:
"Nancy Pfund is a venture capitalist investor in clean technologies, who co-authored a recent study that tallied the tax benefits, loans and grants over the years.
"For oil and gas, it started way back in 1918, and [it averages] almost $5 billion a year," she says. "Nuclear is $3.5 billion [a year] starting in 1947. This is our energy policy.""
Why not give the oil tax break fundings to the renewable energy efforts.
From: http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/05/about_those_oil_subsidies.html
"Congress defining accounting terms such as "capital equipment." And the total amount of earnings not collected in taxes (which liberals define as a "subsidy") is about $4 billion per year."
WATER Remind the gentleman from Austin that shale oil and gas recovery is very water intensive. Water that is poisoned and pumped into the ground at the rate of millions of gallons per well. Texas is facing historic droughts. What about the water?
Mellen West, Dallas TX
Your guests have been talking about providing a cheap, reliable and abundant source of energy. What happened to consideration of mitigation of environmental and climate change impacts as another factor for consideration?
The key word here is diversification. I hear one of the guest main arguement being don't support green energy because oil/gas is cheaper now. I think the plan is to build our capicity, so that we'll be able to control our energy cost for the next 100 year and on. I don't think anybody is saying forget oil/gas.
Wind power is a good alternative. For me the turbines are more attractive than a belching smoke stack, and are pretty quiet, unless the wind is blowing very hard. We get very little sun in winter, just a few short days each month, but the wind never seems to stop. may as well take advantage of it.
The 600 lb gorilla in the room is global warming. Natural gas, oil, coal, shale oil, and tar sands oil are all fossil fuels that will cost us far more in the long run than wind, solar, and geothermal. It is the only future we have.
If we are in need of a new technology with regard to solar to win against China then wouldn't our $ be well-spent in greater funding for research and development in that sector?
Diane - I am really a 'facts' guy and I am continually disappointed at the otherwise smart, informed people that quote inaccurate information as facts.
My point: Using the extraction, production, and distribution costs only of fossil fuels is simply not accurate. There is not cost quoted for the long term after effects.
Thanks. Ron Swanson
Robert Bryce is tied to the oil and gas industry, so we must judge what he has said (and will say) with that financial relationship in mind. He works for the Manhattan Institute, which receives significant funding from the Koch Brothers (oil refining and more) and Exxon Mobil. Therefore it is especially important to verify everything that he says with independent sources.
Due diligence. I am a mechanical engineering involved in product design for 20 years and now part of the renewable energy industry. The Solyndra product was a material inefficient design - over complicated and thus too costly for competitive payback. Had the administration cast about for qualified reviews of the Solyndra project they would have heard ample, and qualified comment to this effect.
I was also troubled by a husksterish tone to their website, and some poor explanations of technical points that would have shown the product in a less useful and durable light. Marketing hype rather than technical merit.
I do not believe this funding of a poor product would have happened had due diligence had been achieved. Perhaps it was done and ignored? I would like to hear more about the questions raised within the administration prior to proceeding with the loan guarantee. Hopefully the hearings will seek to learn from this rather than seek political gain.
I will be at least as unhappy about the hearings, if they are not effective.
New technology called the E-Cat. This is a cold fusion devise by Italian inventor, Andrea Rossi. It uses nickel powder and water to produce heat energy. Mr. Rossi has demonstrated a 1 megawatt plant to the public. Thus far, the media has not paid enough attention even though the E-Cat could be the "Holy Grail" of the Energy Revolution.
I sometimes have insights that I try to e-mail to the show at the last minute. To wit:
"Remember when the (illegitimate, unelected) Bush/Cheney administration christened the invasion of Iraq Operation Iraqi Liberation (OIL) and told Congress that profits from newly-available oil production would more than pay for American costs of the war?
The United States has long expended military resources to ensure access to sources of hydrocarbons. If we paid for this military protection at the pump or when ordering heating oil instead of through income taxes, the comparative prices for various energy sources would appear far differently.
Are we seriously comparing the amount of graft coming from renewable energy companies to the amount of graft that allowed Bush and Cheney to steal elections? My sense is that the oil companies and Enron contributed far more to the corruption of our system."
Michael Ross makes an interesting point. Flawed designs should not be subsidized.
So in discussions of nuclear energy, let's remember that no private insurer will deign to pay damages due to system failures -- that technology requires taxpayer guarantees to exist, not to mention a national security state to keep nuclear materials out of the hands of terrorists.
These are only a few of the hidden costs in our energy consumption. Free-market fundamentalists seldom, if ever, count these.
Not one word about the evil of 'fracking'. The proponents of fossil fuel use focus on TODAY'S benefits and completely ignore the costs: environmental, health, global warming. All those costs will eventually fall on the government (us) while the private companies have bagged all the profits. It's time we looked at the long term goals, only renewable will give us a better life. Only the government has the wherewith all (and hopefully courage) to invest in the long term goal.