Obama Has Another ‘Green’ Investment Go Bad

I really wish President Obama would stop investing our money for us. He’s got a really bad track record. The Hill reported that another “green” company that received millions in federal loan guarantees has gone bankrupt.

A Massachusetts company that received a $43 million Energy Department loan guarantee last year filed for bankruptcy Sunday, a step certain to fuel criticism of federal green energy financing in the wake of the solar company Solyndra’s collapse.

Beacon Power Corp., which develops energy storage systems, filed for bankruptcy protection in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware.

Beacon Power had received federal loan guarantee to help build an energy storage plant in Stephentown, New York that began operating in January. The Treasury Department’s Federal Financing Bank provided the loan.

Beacon sought bankruptcy protection two days after the White House ordered an independent 60-day evaluation of the Energy Department’s loan programs aimed at ensuring effective management and monitoring. (Read More)

Funny the way that independent review was quietly ordered on Friday. Heritage reminds us that it’s not the only investigation into these loans.

The White House’s independent investigation, though, isn’t the only one in town. The FBI raided Solyndra after it declared bankruptcy, and Congress is diving in with an investigation of its own. Energy Secretary Steven Chu, who has been a strong advocate of this federal loan program, is set to testify before a congressional committee in mid-November on his involvement in the scandal. And Heritage’s Lachlan Markay reports that the House Energy and Commerce Committee announced Friday that it will vote to subpoena a host of White House documents related to Solyndra, including messages from the President’s Blackberry. The White House, though, would not comment on whether it will comply with the subpoena.

Even the mainstream media is picking up on the story. On yesterday’s Meet the Press, host David Gregory asked White House senior adviser David Plouffe whether, in times of dire economic straits, the government should be playing venture capitalist and trying to prop up green energy industries. Plouffe’s answer? In a nutshell, other governments are doing it, so we should, too: “Listen, you see what’s happening in other countries, you know, huge investments in this clean energy sector. We have to do everything we can.” (Read More)

Other countries do plenty of things – some put their citizens in gulags and work camps, should we do that, too?

Tags: Beacon, green, investments, loan program, obama, Solyndra