Joe Stanley
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Federal Government poised to dump $197 million into another solar company
The Obama administration doesn’t have a very good track record with its energy investments, particularly solar companies. The big one we all know about is Solyndra, which went belly-up and cost the American taxpayers $529 million. But there were others too:
- Ener1: cost taxpayers $118.5 million then filed for bankruptcy
- Beacon Power: cost taxpayers $43 million then filed for bankruptcy
- Amonix: cost taxpayers $5.9 million, then laid off 200 of its employees
- Abound Solar: cost taxpayers $70 million then filed for bankruptcy
I could easily go on, but I think you get the picture. It’s worth noting that 80% of the Obama administrations “green energy loans” went to donors to his campaign.
Now, it appears the Obama administration is at it again and is prepared to lend almost $200 million to yet another solar company. The outlook for this one is shaky at best.
from Reuters:
A tiny solar company named SoloPower will flip the switch on production at a U.S. factory Thursday, a major step toward allowing it to tap a $197 million government loan guarantee awarded under the same controversial program that supported failed panel maker Solyndra.
SoloPower has initiated a strategy to differentiate it from struggling commodity players in the solar panel industry. Still, there are several similarities between SoloPower and Solyndra - which became a lightning rod in the U.S. Presidential campaign this year after taking in more than $500 million in government loans and then filing for bankruptcy.
Like Solyndra, SoloPower is a Silicon Valley start-up and uses the same non-traditional raw material in its solar panels. And, like its now-defunct peer, SoloPower is one of just four U.S. panel manufacturers to clinch loan guarantees under the Department of Energy’s $35 billion program to support emerging clean energy technologies. The DOE payments to SoloPower will come on top of the $56.5 million SoloPower has collected in loans, tax credits and incentives from the state of Oregon and the city of Portland, where its first factory will be located.
And, perhaps most importantly, SoloPower is entering the market at a time of cutthroat competition from cheaper solar products made in China.
Here we go again. What was that saying about the definition of insanity?
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Exploding hay, watering bans are latest signs of worsening drought More than 1,000 counties in 26 states were named natural-disaster areas on Thursday by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The move gives that designation to any county in severe drought for eight consecutive weeks, speeding up low-cost loan assistance to farmers.
Representing a third of all U.S. counties, it’s the largest ever USDA disaster declaration, the Bloomberg news service reported.
Fun fact: When moisture gets into hay bales, microbial activity increases, generating heat. Add enough external heat, and it will combust.
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Bill Nye to CNN: “The two sides aren’t equal’ on climate change
Science educator Bill Nye on Monday told CNN that they weren’t doing the public any favors by giving climate change deniers equal airtime because ‘the two sides aren’t equal.”
“There are a couple of things that you can’t really dispute,” Nye explained to CNN’s Carol Costello. “Sixteen of the last 17 years have been the hottest years on record. That’s just how it is.”
“I appreciate that we want to show two sides of the stories — there’s a tradition in journalism that goes back quite a ways, I guess — but the two sides aren’t equal here. You have tens of thousands of scientists who are very concerned and you have a few people who are in business of equating or drawing attention to the idea that uncertainty is the same as doubt. When you have a plus or minus percentage, that’s not the same thing as not believing the whole thing at all.”
The Washington Post noted on Sunday that scientists had been warning for years that because of warming weather and severe droughts, Colorado’s “table was set” for monster wildfires like the ones currently sweeping through the state.
“It is because of the heat ultimately,” Nye told Costello. “Just two years ago, it was was wet in Colorado and there was a lot of growth in forests. And then you can say they should have responsibly cleared that growth — it’s a difficult thing. So then two years later when it’s especially dry and the forest flora gets especially dry and then there’s a lightening strike, the fire is that much more intense than it would have been.”
“But the people who are politicizing this issue, they seem to be winning because not much is being done on the issue of climate change,” Costello pointed out.
“If you’re a voter consider taking the environment into account as well as the economy,” Nye advised. “I think the two candidates running for president right now have different views about the validity, for example, of science and the importance of it and what you would do about climate change in the coming years.”
“We in the science education community chip away at this problem all the time. We have an enormous population of people in the United States that don’t believe in evolution, the fundamental idea in all of life science. It would be like saying, I don’t believe in earthquakes or something. The analogies are disturbing.”
Earlier this year, a Media Matters analysis determined that coverage of climate change had dropped by 80 percent on U.S. broadcast networks between 2008 and 2011.
Watch this video from CNN’s Newsroom, broadcast July 2, 2012.
Because Bill. Because science. Because of a false balance in journalism.
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U.S. Declares the Largest Natural Disaster Area Ever Due to Drought
The blistering summer and ongoing drought conditions have the prompted the U.S. Agriculture Department to declare a federal disaster area in more than 1,000 counties covering 26 states. That’s almost one-third of all the counties in the United States, making it the largest distaster declaration ever made by the USDA.
The declaration covers almost every state in the southern halfof the continental U.S., from South Carolina in the East to California in the West. It’s also includes Colorado and Wyoming (which have been hit by devatasting wildfires) and Illinois, Indiana, Kansas and Nebraska in the Midwest. However, it does not include Iowa, which is the largest grain and corn producer in the U.S.The USDA’s latest crop report is projecting a 12 percent decrease in the corn harvest this year, which would still be the third-largest haul on record. Despite the negative outlook, grain prices remains quite low, according to CNBC.
The ruling allows farmers in those affected counties to apply for low-interest loans and face reduced penalties for grazing on protected lands. The USDA says the loans will only amount to around $4 million, but is one of the few “limited tools” the department has available to help farmers. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has asked for a complete re-authorization of all existing agriculture programs, including crop insurance, that can be used to support struggling farms.
About 53 percent of the country is facing “moderate to extreme drought” so far this summer.
I don’t see a pattern on that map indicative of an expanding thermal equator, because I have a terrible head injury.
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This National Climatic Data Center may shows just how hot it’s been. Every red dot is on a place where a record high daily temperature was broken during June.
If only mankind could have some type of impact on our climate, we could do something to stop this clearly natural rate of change.
(via anetapoland)
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March was the warmest March ever. The NOAA reports that the temperatures wasn’t just record-breaking in March, but beat the prior record by a stunning 8.6°F above the average for the 20th century. In the history of U.S. weather record keeping, only one month has ever seen a larger departure from the historical average: January 2006.
