Credit: John Moore / Getty Images

The Department of Energy’s Loan Guarantee Program was started in 2005 under the Bush Administration, but ramped up thanks to the 2009 stimulus passed by President Obama and the Democrats. It has gotten a bad rap ever since the high-profile failure of Solyndra, one of the solar tech companies the program invested in.

But, of course, a certain amount of failures and losses just come with the territory of investments in new technology. And The Atlantic Wire reports that the latest numbers reveal the program’s successfully shepherded 28 companies with various renewable energy projects, while creating over 20,000 jobs. Throw in the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing loan program, and the total created jobs come to around 60,000.

The purpose of the program, which is no longer handing out new loans, was to help companies cross the “valley of death” — the point when a company’s debt is at a maximum, because it’s already spent money investing in capacity and research and development, but hasn’t yet seen enough success in the market to have the revenue to begin paying those loans back. The government guarantee then encourages private investors, who must ultimately make up at least 20 percent of the investment pool under the programs rules, to take the risk of backing the company. The government’s own contributions are also structured as a loan, meant to be paid back over time.

As The Atlantic Wire notes, that last point is especially important to remember. The loan program has paid out $26 billion in total, resulting in a less-than-impressive ratio of $1.2 million per job created. But that’s with the government’s expenditures all out the door, and the returns from the companies yet to come in:

The loan guarantee is often considered a cost, which it isn’t. Some programs — like that wind farm out in Hawaii, are already repaying the loan, though it’s not clear how much. Others, like NextEra Energy, never received the full loan amount. We are currently at the high point of the dollars-for-jobs-created ratio. Given the nature of the program, the amount the government is out is reduced gradually over time.

The calculation is only temporarily that 0.8 jobs were created for every $1 million spent. It is nearly as fair to say that the ratio is 20,000-to-zero.

Obviously, the 20,000 jobs for $0 is an almost-certainly unattainable ideal, but that’s the direction in which the ratio is headed. And for the curious, here’s a map The Atlantic Wire compiled of the various projects and their numbers:

According to the Solar Energy Industries Association, the loan program has already brought one utility-scale solar project to operation, with ten more in the process of construction, in states such as Michigan, Kentucky, and Alabama. When they’re all completed, the eleven projects will supply over 2,700 megawatts — enough power to run roughly half a million homes. Another one of the loan program’s projects is expected to install 750 megawatts of solar arrays on commercial rooftops, across 28 different states.

In a contentious hearing yesterday, the House GOP members of the House Oversight Committee aggressively questioned Fisker Automotive executives and an Energy Department staffer about a loan Fisker received from the Energy Department.

The attacks were reminiscent of those made in hearings on Solyndra and were more of a reflection of the committee’s hyperpartisan agenda than any real oversight duty. It also suggested some hypocrisy as GOP lawmakers attacked the Energy Department for “picking winners and losers” in a loan program that they themselves had sought to exploit for their own “winners.”

Fisker received the $529 million loan through the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program (ATVM), which began under President Bush. In fact in 2008, the Bush Administration urged Fisker to apply for a loan. The company raised more than $1 billion in outside financing. Fisker had received $192 million of the federal loan when the Department of Energy suspended the loan in June 2011. Since then, the government seized $21 million back from Fisker as a partial loan repayment. For context, the larger Energy Department clean energy loan program has leveraged more than $55 billion in total economic investment in 33 projects.

Who is to blame for this loss? Fisker met the conditions of the contract when it was made, and so the Energy Department had to follow the contract’s terms. If bankers could foreclose on a mortgage just because they heard the homeowner got a bad employment review, most would be outraged. As long as the homeowner met the terms of the loan, the bank is not allowed to foreclose. Risk exists in the market.

DoE invested in fast-growing electric car company Tesla Motors (as well as Ford and Nissan North America). Tesla is paying back its loan early, employs nearly 3000 workers, recently turned a profit, and its stock price recently hit an all-time high. Though it is possible that they lost money on Fisker, they helped to create a successful new company, and strengthen two others.

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When the solar manufacturing company Solyndra went bankrupt last September after receiving a $527 million loan guarantee, it sparked a politically-motivated Congressional investigation into the White House’s handling of the program — an “investigation” that critics admitted would “stop on election day.”

After acquiring 300,000 documents, holding a dozen hearings and official meetings, issuing two subpenas, and spending more than a million dollars on the investigation, members of Congress failed to present any evidence of political wrongdoing.

Congressional critics have “not shown the loan was granted as a result of political favoritism, despite repeated campaign-trail claims,” reported The Hill.

That didn’t stop special interest groups from spending millions of dollars on television ads this campaign season to trump up the Solyndra bankruptcy and spread “over-the-top, ultimately ridiculous” claims about clean energy programs.

According to a ThinkProgress analysis of independent advertisements from Kantar Media’s CMAG system, outside conservative groups spent $10.78 million on presidential campaign ads between April 1 and October 1 of this year specifically attacking the Solyndra loan or mentioning Solyndra as part of a broader attack on clean energy stimulus spending.

The ads were purchased by the American Energy Alliance, the American Future Fund, the Koch-backed Americans for Prosperity, Karl Rove’s Crossroads Grassroots Policy Strategies, and Let Freedom Ring.

However, the impact of those Solyndra ads on American voters mirrored the outcome of the year-long Congressional investigation into the company: minimal to nothing.

Despite the millions of dollars spent on Solyndra-related television spots over the last five months, polls show that a majority of American voters still don’t know about the company or are indifferent.

An NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll from early October showed that 58 percent of registered voters are unaware of Solyndra. The poll also found that one quarter of registered voters had a negative view of the company and 15 percent had a neutral view.
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By now, almost every claim and counter-claim from last night’s presidential debate has been picked apart. But there’s one assertion that has received minimal attention in the after-action coverage of the debate — and it was one of the most blatant lies of the night.

The comment came about two thirds of the way through the conversation. As Romney was riffing on funding education, he pivoted to his talking points on Obama’s support of renewable energy and let this whopper loose:

“And these [clean energy] businesses, many of them have gone out of business, I think about half of them, of the ones have been invested in, have gone out of business.”

The New York Times, one of the few mainstream organizations to follow up on this claim, called Romney’s comment a “gross overstatement.”

Actually, it’s much more offensive than that.

At a time when the U.S. clean energy industry is supporting thousands of innovative businesses in every state (many of them small businesses), hundreds of thousands of jobs (including tens of thousands in Romney’s home state of Massachusetts), and leveraging tens of billions in private capital, Romney casually tried to claim that “half” of businesses that received federal incentives have gone out of business. That’s not even remotely close to the truth.

Okay, let’s throw the Romney camp a bone. To the small number of people who actually monitor this topic, it was clear that he probably meant the loan guarantee program — a tool that provides government backing of private loans in order to leverage capital for “first of a kind” renewable energy projects

After numerous tweets last night calling Romney out, Time Magazine’s Michael Grunwald confirmed today via twitter that the campaign was backtracking: “Now Romney camp tells me he misspoke, only meant to single out loan program.”

So let’s narrow Romney’s statement down to the loan guarantee program. Are we getting closer to the truth? No.

The loan guarantee program Romney referenced supported dozens of companies. Of those companies, three recently went bankrupt due to difficult market conditions. But that’s out of 33 companies that received loan guarantees or commitments for loan guarantees. That translates to a 10 percent failure rate representing roughly 2 percent of budgeted funds for the program — a big difference from the 50 percent failure rate that Romney claimed.

At the same time, the program has supported some of the largest wind and solar projects in the world, helping double generation of U.S. renewable electricity in four years.

In fact, an independent review of the loan guarantee program found that it will cost $2 billion less than actually budgeted for. (Yes, the program is designed to accept a certain level of failure, which is an important part of supporting innovative projects that need help accessing private capital).

Along with his false comments about bankruptcies, Romney claimed that Obama had “provided $90 billion in tax breaks to green energy” in one year. While $90 billion is an accurate number, it was certainly not all for tax breaks and it was not all deployed at once. (In fact, some of it still hasn’t been spent). The money was set aside through the stimulus package for grants, competitive prices, demonstration projects, and loan guarantees — with $3.4 billion going toward “clean coal,” a technology that Romney said “I like” during the debate.

The real problem with these claims isn’t how detached they are from reality. It’s that Romney likely wants them to be true.

Over the last year, Romney has made a conscious decision to run against clean energy — releasing false and misleading ads that disparage government support for the industry.

If the clean energy industry really were suffering — not booming like it is — then he’d be able score politically. But polls show Americans still really, really like federal support of the sector and that messaging around the bankrupt solar company Solyndra isn’t sticking. So, why not claim that half of companies went bankrupt? That will get people’s attention, right?

When you’ve convinced yourself of something that’s not true, it’s very easy to make your false claims as grandiose as you like.

For a review of all claims on energy during the debate, check out our fact check from last night.

I previously dubbed the manufactured political outrage about the Department of Energy’s clean energy loan guarantee program the “Solyndra Standard.” While legislators and candidates hammer away at supposed “taxpayer giveaways,” they completely ignore the billions of dollars in defense boondoggles, fossil fuel subsidies, and agricultural subsidies — all of which dwarf investments like those to Solyndra.

The graphic below illustrates this double standard quite well. Personally, I wouldn’t tell the House to “shut its face,” as Dave Llorens of Solar Power Rocks does. After all, I do believe strongly in Congress doing its job and looking into whether programs like this are working for taxpayers. The problem is that the Solyndra “investigation” has turned into a complete political circus with no proof of any wrongdoing. Rather than an actual investigation, it’s become a messaging platform against Obama during an election year — and even Republicans have admitted they’ll stop after the campaign season winds down.

And so, here’s how that $535 million stacks up with some other major expenditures:

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The House of Representatives added to its historic tally of anti-environment votes with a 245 to 161 vote on Friday approving the GOP’s “No More Solyndras Act” — a messaging bill that hampers Department of Energy loan guarantees to clean energy projects.

Under GOP leadership, the House has voted 302 times against the environment since 2011, according to the latest report from House Energy and Commerce Committee Democrats. More than one hundred of these votes have favored profits in the oil and gas industry. Since June, the House has added 55 votes and counting to this list, amounting to more than one vote for every day it has been in session.

Here is a breakdown of some of Republicans’ votes against clean energy and in favor of oil:

– 133 votes targeting the Environmental Protection Agency
– 54 target the Department of Energy
– 128 block measures preventing pollution
– 55 to defund or repeal clean energy initaitives
– 47 votes to promote offshore drilling

The latest vote today had little to do with Solyndra, and even less to do with smart investments in clean energy. After spending $1 million of taxpayer money, holding 12 hearings, and 300,000 pages of documents, House Republicans have found “no evidence” of wrongdoing. Representative Jim Jordan (R-OH) has admitted the ploy is political, and would likely stop on election day.

As the House’s anti-environment record grows, oil, gas and coal’s political spending has reached record levels. In addition to the $153 million in TV ads from fossil fuel groups this election, oil, gas and coal have contributed 88 percent of its $45 million to Republican candidates. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, the coal mining and oil and gas industries have contributed 89-90 percent of their $12.6 million donations to House Republicans.

Check out the full database of anti-environmental votes here.

This week, the House will likely pass the “No More Solyndras” Act, a bill designed dismantle the loan guarantee program. While the bill won’t pass the Senate, it’s an opportunity for House Republicans to continue messaging on Solyndra in the lead-up to the November elections. Below, we feature a re-print of an earlier Climate Progress article outlining why the “No More Solyndras” Act is such a bad idea.

by Richard W. Caperton

Imagine a government program that had produced dozens of success stories, cost less than expected, and helped build an industry of the future. Wouldn’t you want to expand that program?  Yes, you probably would.  Unless, of course, you were Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL).

If you were Rep. Cliff Stearns, you would introduce legislation to end the program.  And, if the program somehow did survive, your legislation would make sure that it operated with more bureaucratic red tape and weaker financial standing.

Welcome to the bizarre politics around the Department of Energy Loan Guarantee Program. Tomorrow, two subcommittees of the House Energy and Commerce Committee will consider a piece of legislation written by Stearns called the “No More Solyndras Act.”  Every aspect of this bill is bad. If Congress really wants to improve the loan guarantee program, they should do so by allowing it to fund many more projects with a full portfolio of financial tools. Let’s look at why.

The Loan Guarantee Program has been a success

First, some background. DOE’s loan guarantee program was created in the Energy Policy Act of 2005, and was strengthened in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (the stimulus bill). The program is built to provide financing to new clean energy technologies that the private sector is unable to finance.  These companies are trying to cross the “Valley of Death,” where they need many millions — even billions — of dollars to build new projects.  Traditional lenders won’t finance these projects because they’re generally the first-of-a-kind, and venture capitalists who would finance innovative projects simply don’t have enough money to meet these companies’ needs.  So, the government stepped in and guaranteed that they’ll pay back a loan if the company is unable to.  This guarantee unlocks capital.

The program has been an overwhelming success.  The loan guarantee program alone financed 32 projects in more than 20 states, ultimately creating 22,000 jobs directly. Best of all, the government only spent $2.5 billion to mobilize more than $20 billion in private capital.

Even projects without guarantees have benefited from the process. For example, the due diligence process helped bring in a $1 billion investment from Bank of America for the largest residential solar project in U.S. history. The chief executive officer of the solar company deploying the project said that without the due diligence process to attract private lenders, “We would not have been able to make the economics of this project work.”

Enter the “No More Solyndras Act”: A potential disaster

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Congress is back in session after a long summer break. And the first order of business in the House of Representatives is to pass the “No More Solyndras” Act, a bill designed to squash the Department of Energy’s embattled loan guarantee program for innovative clean energy projects.

But here’s something you won’t likely hear from lawmakers: Experience on the ground shows that the loan guarantee program is working as designed.

Partly boosted by the construction of large-scale solar projects supported by loan guarantees, the U.S. solar photovoltaic market is on track for a third consecutive year of triple-digit growth.

U.S. solar developers installed 742 megawatts of solar PV in the second quarter of 2012. And if growth continues, the industry could install more than 3,000 megawatts of projects this year, according to a new market report from GTM Research and the Solar Energy Industries Association.

While residential installations were flat and commercial installations dipped in Q2 of this year, utility-scale projects grew substantially. Two projects partly responsible for the boost — the 290-MW Agua Caliente project in Arizona and the 170-MW Mesquite project — received loan guarantees through the DOE. Neither project is fully complete yet, but both had phases come online this year. A third project, the 50-MW Silver State solar plant, was fast-tracked by the Interior Department and became the first large-scale solar facility to be developed on public lands.

If it were not for the growth in large-scale projects, the solar market would have declined by 18 percent rather than grow by 45 percent in the second quarter, according to the report.

Much of the political attention to loan guarantees has been focused on a few high-risk technology companies that went bankrupt (Abound Solar, Beacon Power, Solyndra); however, the majority of projects supported by the program were for large-scale power generation and fuel production. The loan guarantees were designed to help leverage private capital to finance these facilities during the economic downturn when private investors were wary of deploying capital. It worked. And today, dozens of “first-of-a-kind” projects are under construction or completed, helping boost America’s share of renewable energy.

In fact, because the loan guarantee program supported mostly generation projects with long-term contracts, analysis has found that it will cost taxpayers $2 billion less than initially expected.

Unfortunately, this story will likely be ignored by opponents still intent on politicizing Solyndra.

Related Posts:

• Five Things You Should Know About Solyndra During The 2012 Campaign
• Breaking News Stunner: DOE Loan Guarantee Program Will Cost $2 Billion Less Than Initially Expected
• Renewable Electricity Nearly Doubles Under Obama: ‘I Think They’re The Future. They’re Worth Fighting For’

One year ago today, the solar manufacturer Solyndra filed for bankruptcy after receiving a $527 million loan guarantee. The bankruptcy set off a political firestorm in Congress, and eventually worked its way into the presidential campaign.

Today, the Republican party is using Solyndra as a key tool in its campaign against Obama — smearing the entire clean energy industry in the process.

If you’ve been paying attention to the issue over the last year, you’ve likely heard the name “Solyndra” so many times it makes you nauseous. But most Americans are only now paying attention to the campaign, so it’s likely that many are hearing the name for the first time. If you’re wondering what the GOP claims on Solyndra are all about, here are some facts to put the issue in context:

1. The loan guarantee program supporting Solyndra has been a success

The loan guarantee program, which provides government backing of private loans for first-of-a-kind projects, was designed to help leverage capital for innovative renewable energy projects during the height of the financial crisis. And it worked. Since the program was enhanced through the stimulus package, it has supported the world’s largest wind farm, the first commercial cellulosic ethanol plant, some of the largest solar PV plants in the world, and the country’s largest concentrating solar power project — nearly 40 projects in all that helped keep 60,000 people employed during the economic downturn.

2. The Solyndra bankruptcy represented a small fraction of the overall program

The loan guarantee program came under fire after the bankruptcies of a few high-risk companies — most famously Solyndra — that received backing. But according to John McCain’s National Finance Chairman, Herb Allison, the overall cost to taxpayers will be $2 billion less than actually budgeted for. Backing up the findings of Herb Allison, the Congressional Research Office also concluded that the majority of loans were extremely low risk. In fact, over the last 20 years of experience, the U.S. government has shown a knack for managing risk — with loans and loan guarantee programs only costing tax payers 94 cents for every $100 dollars invested.

3. There is “no evidence” of political manipulation

Since Solyndra went bankrupt, House lawmakers have held 12 hearings and official meetings, acquired more than 300,000 documents, issued two subpenas, and likely spent more than a million dollars on the investigation. What have they found? “No evidence of wrongdoing,” reported Bloomberg Businessweek. And in a more detailed investigation, the Washington Post went further: “The records do not establish that anyone pressured the Energy Department to approve the Solyndra loan to benefit political contributors.”

And just last month, House GOP lawmakers issued a progress report on their investigation. As The Hill reported on the findings: “Republicans have not shown that the loan was granted as a result of political favoritism, despite repeated campaign-trail claims that the administration steered loans to Solyndra and other green-energy projects on the basis of political donations.”

4. Dozens of Republicans supported loan guarantees or similar programs

Since the Solyndra bankruptcy, many Republicans have scrambled to create a political scandal. However, a review of official documents and news reports over the years reveals that more than 60 Congressional Republicans — many of whom are critical of government support of renewables — have lobbied the Department of Energy for loan guarantees, grants, and other support for clean energy projects in their districts. In addition, Congressman Darrell Issa, one of the leaders of the House investigation into the Solyndra bankruptcy, strongly supported billions of dollars in loan guarantees for nuclear energy projects. However, when such tools are used for renewable energy, he labels it “picking winners and losers.”

5. Republicans have bluntly admitted the investigation is political

With multiple Congressional and journalistic investigations revealing no evidence of political manipulation, why does the GOP continue to spend so much time on the issue? One Republican, Representative Jim Jordan from Ohio, recently admitted that the plan was to keep Solyndra in the headlines throughout the election — no matter what the outcome: “Ultimately, we’ll stop it on Election Day, hopefully. And bringing attention to these things helps the voters and citizens of the country make the kind of decision that I hope helps them as they evaluate who they are going to vote for in November.”

A year after the Solyndra bankruptcy, we still haven’t found any evidence of political wrongdoing. But facts be dammed, the GOP is now using Solyndra as a central part of its national messaging strategy against Obama. So the next time you hear “Solyndra” in a debate or on the campaign trail, keep these facts in mind.

The X-51 Scramjet Engine Demonstrator, also known as the WaveRider

Today the Air Force announced that its X-51 Scramjet Engine Demonstrator called the WaveRider — a hypersonic jet designed to travel up to 3,600 miles per hour — crashed into the Pacific Ocean 15 seconds into a test flight.

This is the second failed test in a row for the WaveRider — an aircraft technology that the military has already spent between close to $300 million on developing. And that’s just on one program. We’ve been working on hypersonic flight programs since the 1960′s.

But even with more than a quarter billion dollars worth of hardware now sitting in the Pacific Ocean (chump change for the Pentagon), we haven’t heard a peep from anyone in Washington on the crash. No calls for a Congressional investigation, no outrage about hundreds of millions of dollars sinking in 15 seconds, no public flogging of Defense Department leaders.

But hell, when a few cutting-edge clean energy companies crash after getting support from the federal government, they’re used by the national Republican party as a tool to question the very idea of making strategic investments in cleantech.

It’s been almost a year since Solyndra, the solar manufacturer that received a $527 million loan guarantee, went bankrupt. Since then, House lawmakers have held 12 hearings and official meetings, acquired more than 300,000 documents, issued two subpenas, and likely spent more than a million dollars on the investigation.

What have they found?

“No evidence of wrongdoing,” reported Bloomberg Businessweek.

The Washington Post went further in a recent investigation: “The records do not establish that anyone pressured the Energy Department to approve the Solyndra loan to benefit political contributors.”

This is not to say we should shrug off the bankruptcy of Solyndra and other clean energy companies. It’s Congress’ job to determine whether taxpayer dollars are being spent wisely — and taking a look into the causes and consequences of these types of incidents is important for transparency.

But as we predicted when the Solyndra story first broke, these investigations have turned into a political sideshow. One year later, GOP lawmakers failed to prove their theory that decisions to offer loan guarantees to clean energy companies were based on political insider deals. Yet they continue to call for more documents and potentially more hearings, hoping to extend the Solyndra “crony capitalism” meme until after the election.

Representative Jim Jordan (R-OH) was the most blunt about the GOP’s plan for Solyndra: Push the manufactured scandal until November and then drop it after the election.

E&E News reported on Jordan’s comments in March:

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