Guest essay by Eric Worrall
The Obama administration has just announced $12 billion in new Federal loan guarantees for renewables businesses.
According to a Whitehouse press release;
FACT SHEET: President Obama Announces New Actions to Bring Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency to Households across the Country
President Obama is committed to taking responsible steps to address climate change, promote clean energy and energy efficiency, drive innovation, and ensure a cleaner, more stable environment for future generations. That is why at Senator Reid’s National Clean Energy Summit later today, he is announcing a robust set of executive actions and private sector commitments to accelerate America’s transition to cleaner sources of energy and ways to cut energy waste.
…
To continue to reinforce American leadership in deploying clean energy and cutting energy waste while creating jobs and reducing carbon pollution, the Administration is announcing the following actions:
Making $1 Billion in Additional Loan Guarantee Authority Available and Announcing New Guidelines for Distributed Energy Projects Utilizing Innovative Technology: Distributed Energy Projects are currently driving innovation and transforming U.S. energy markets. Technologies such as rooftop solar, energy storage, smart grid technology, and methane capture for oil and gas wells, solve key energy challenges. Catalyzing these technologies and demonstrating the viability of these markets would create economic opportunity, strengthen energy security, transform certain energy markets, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. To accelerate the pace of innovation in distributed energy, the Department of Energy is:
Inviting Innovative Distributed Energy Projects to Apply to More Than $10 Billion in Current Loan Guarantees: The Department of Energy is supplementing its current loan guarantee solicitations to invite applications for Distributed Energy Projects. The current Solicitations, totaling more than $10 billion in loan guarantee authority, are now clearly unlocked to support scale up of Distributed Energy Projects utilizing innovative technology. Today’s announcement includes guidance from the Department on how a Distributed Energy Project transaction could be properly structured.
Making Available $1 Billion in Additional Loan Guarantee Authority for New, Innovative Projects: As part of its new push for Distributed Energy Projects utilizing innovative technology, the Department of Energy is providing up to $1 billion in additional loan guarantee authority through its current Solicitations for new Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Projects and Fossil Energy Projects. This significantly boosts the resources available to new applicants.
Federal renewable loan guarantee schemes have attracted significant criticism in the past, for example when Solyndra went spectacularly bust in 2012, a bankruptcy which cost US taxpayers $535 million in lost federal loan guarantees. Perhaps President Obama believes his administration has learned from that experience.
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“Perhaps President Obama believes his administration has learned from the experience” of throwing money at renewable schemes/scams!!!
A fool never learns – A fool and his money are soon parted.
Some get rich by getting other peoples money.
Obama the socialist never tires of spending other peoples money, until he runs out of other peoples money!
There is nothing so unimportant that you can’t spend someone else’s money on it.
“Perhaps President Obama believes his administration has learned from that experience.”
When has he learned anything from experience? He plows on with the same agenda he has had from day one. And making energy prices skyrocket is just one of them.
Louis Hunt makes the false claim about President Obama: “And making energy prices skyrocket is just one of them.”
Louis must live in a strange bubble. Energy prices have been falling for a long time – not skyrocketing. Oil cost less, gasoline costs less, natural gas costs less, electricity costs less. Maybe he is only considering nuclear power which costs more and coal which is dirty and polluting.
Socialists around the world have found the answer to running out of other peoples money. Just print some more.
Printing more, happens in most administrations!
In the UK we have a system of “Robin Hood in reverse”. People in high-rise blocks of flats (apartments) in our inner cities (people generally on low wages) pay taxes that are given out to people in the suburbs or villages who have bigger houses (higher income citizens) with roof space to fit solar panels. I know people who are receiving upwards of £800 pounds per annum just for having them fitted to their roofs (and more for the trivial amount of electricity that they provide – even if they use the power for their own home, they get an addional premium for every Watt)! Taking from the poor to give to the rich – a great example of the “loony left” in action.
Will Congress approve this or can Obama make spending commitments without Congress approval? Looks odd to me.
As far as he his concerned he can. And he is pretty much right. If congress objects they have to go through district court, circuit court, then Supreme Court. By the time Obama can be found to be doing something illegal he will be out of office.
Of course Obama can spend money without asking for Congressional approval.
He has the Speaker of the House (Boehner) and Majority Leader of the Senate (McConnell) is his back pocket and they are his virtual slaves. I would guess it is something from the NSA surveillance, or a promise of dozens of pardons to these men and their cronies.
Now if one of these men ever decide to be honest and patriotic, then he has a similar deal with Chief Justice Rogers.
So Obama can rule by decree any time he wishes. He has done so many, many times.
This carping at McConnell is just plan stupid. Would you rather have elected Alison Grimes? As the U.S. government now operates, without the Presidency and the vast bureaucracy the President commands, the opposition has to have veto-proof majorities in Congress. I have no idea how long ago the Republicans held veto-proof majorities, perhaps never, but they do not hold such even now. Democrats had them just 4 years ago. Democrats had a majority in the House for 40 years (1954-1994), and the House grew into a swamp of corruption (Abscam, House post office, House bank) during that time.
The Republicans are not the problem–the electoral preferences of the American people are the problem. I have no idea what may change this if anything can.
Roberts.
The question is why? The USA has the most nimble puppet government on earth it strings pulled by the corporate elite . Why would it be choosing this type of action? Climate change is a ruse! WHY is the question that no one is answering?
Obama’s war on CO2 is strangling the American economy. His “legacy” will be disaster and corruption.
Already is.
Just might be the most corrupt U.S. government in 100 plus years.
Quite the reverse. In reality, Obama’s war on the American economy is being facilitated by the CO2 scam.
Ever wondered why Obama is giving $billions and nuclear technology to a nation that is STILL pouring bile and hatred upon th USA and STILL threatening to start a nucler war in the Middle East?
Look at his actions, and question whose side he is on.
Ralph
“climate change” is not a ruse in any way, “change” is the 100% natural state of the climate, the entire record shows constant “change”…….saying humans are the cause of the change, now that indeed is a ruse.
$12 billion for his dinner guests. Very Roman Emperor. Can he arbitrarily hand out public money?
Exactly. I wonder how much gets laundered to a secret Obama bank account. Don’t be surprised.
The eternal answer of the left, throw somebody else’s money at it.
Bread and Circuses
Reblogged this on dickstormprobizblog's Blog and commented:
Throwing good Taxpayer Dollars after Bad ones….when will Congress wake up and stop the madness?
The numbers, if I recall, are that so far under Mr. Obama something in the range of $80 billion has been wasted on guarantees like this. Also, if I recall, not one criminal or civil suit has resulted in judgements or convictions against the wasted funds.
This is really just patronage reinvented for the 21st century, where political insiders and cronies get loan guarantees (money) instead of jobs.
Under what authority is this latest round of patronage spending taking place?
In trying to make sense of this it looks like very much like smoke and mirrors. A big chunk of this is “authorizing” HUD to insure home loans related to energy efficiency. That’s a power HUD already has, more or less. But there’s no real oversight, so it’s very possible that a homeowner uses their loan in other ways, like installing a very energy-inefficient hot tub. The remainder will probably require Congressional approval in the forthcoming FY budget, so I suspect most of it will be DOA. Remember, the appropriation for Solyndra came from a Pelosi run House, while her brother listed as an EVP in the holding company.
Back in the late 1970s there were a lot of installed hot tubs pretending to be solar water heaters. This is an old scam.
It is odd. What was announced are executive actions, which bypass congress. Lately, Obama seems to be largely forgetting about that whole three separate and equal branches of government thing, and congress is mostly letting him. There will be a little fuss about extending the debt ceiling which we pretend to try to stay under, but the press will blame any shutdown talk on congress, and it seems very likely to continue getting extended without any meaningful spending restraint.
We are sadly used to leaving a legacy of excess debt to following generations, but it’s a special kind of stupid to spend our children’s and grand children’s futures away without even getting anything for it, not even an extra park or two.
Obama is not forgetting the whole three separate and equal branches of government thing, he simply doesn’t believe in it. He is a narcissist infected with DK syndrome who owes lots of favors to those who put him in the White House. And don’t think for a moment that he will try to cook up some reason to run for a third term. Most likely scenario is that he and his henchmen will prop up Hillary so she gets the nomination, then destroy her just before the election having her put away over mishandling of classified email. His argument will then be that since there is no opposition to the Republican candidate the election would be “unfair” to the American people and that he will just have to step in to run to make it a “balanced” election. Remember when he tries this that you heard it here first.
Rather think he’ll try to use a Joe Biden sock puppet. Biden has to be extensively obligated to Obama and besides, Obama has to have something on Uncle Joe.
Tom says:
Obama is not forgetting the whole three separate and equal branches of government thing, he simply doesn’t believe in it.
Then he deserves to be impeached for deliberately violating his oath of office. Presidents swear or affirm that they will abide by and defend the Constitution. That document requires three branches of government. It says nothing whatever about Executive Orders.
But career politicians won’t do anything. We need a non-politician to get things done. Today’s incumbents only want to keep their cushy jobs.
@ur momisugly Tom in Florida – We will also remember you for making the silliest political comment of 2015!
Charles – “but it’s a special kind of stupid to spend our children’s and grand children’s futures away without even getting anything for it”
Are you forgetting the holding off of 0.010 C temperature change?
CHAIRMAN LAMAR SMITH: “On the Clean Power Plan, former Obama Administration Assistant Secretary Charles McConnell said at best it will reduce global temperature by only one one-hundredth of a degree Celsius. At the same time it’s going to increase the cost of electricity. That’s going to hurt the lowest income Americans the most. How do you justify such an expensive, burdensome, onerous rule that’s really not going to do much good and isn’t this all pain and no gain.
ADMINISTRATOR GINA MCCARTHY: “No sir, I don’t agree with you. If you look at the RIA we did, the Regulatory Impact Analysis you would see it’s enormously beneficial.
CHAIRMAN SMITH: “Do you consider one one-hundredth of a degree to be enormously beneficial?”
ADMINISTRATOR MCCARTHY: “The value of this rule is not measured in that way. It is measured in showing strong domestic action which can actually trigger global action to address what’s a necessary action to protect…”
CHAIRMAN SMITH: “Do you disagree with my one one-hundredth of a degree figure? Do you disagree with the one one-hundredth of a degree?”
ADMINISTRATOR MCCARTHY: “I’m not disagreeing that this action in and of itself will not make all the difference we need to address climate action, but what I’m saying is that if we don’t take action domestically we will never get started and we’ll never…”
Read more: http://www.climatedepot.com/2015/07/15/epa-chief-admits-obama-regs-have-no-measurable-climate-impact-one-one-hundredth-of-a-degree-epa-chief-mccarthy-defends-regs-as-enormously-beneficial-symbolic-impact/#ixzz3jxPsOENF
Washington, D.C. — Today, the Energy & Environment Legal Institute (E&E Legal), a 501 (c) (3) watchdog group, released an investigative report, Private Interests & Public Office: Coordination Between Governors, the Obama White House and the Tom Steyer-“Founded and Funded” Network of Advocacy Groups to Advance the “Climate” Agenda
http://0z37.mj.am/link/0z37/k757gtp/2/4-DwYh4tu1yM9cXPU7pQ2g/aHR0cDovL2VlbGVnYWwub3JnL3dwLWNvbnRlbnQvdXBsb2Fkcy8yMDE1LzA4L0VFLUxlZ2FsLTExMWQtZXRjLVN0ZXllci1ldC1hbC1SZXBvcnQtOC0yNC0xNS1GaW5hbC5wZGY
I think is was Will Rogers who said “Best government money can buy!”
Straight out of Mel Brook’s “The Producers”. Renewable energy is the “Broadway flop”.
You got it Walt.
They get enough to retire and they can’t be legally sued for the scam.
The government should be spending this huge amount of money on contracts to harden (from EMP) the complete electrical grid and sub-pathways. This $12B would be enough to do autos, trucks, & trains too.
Those campaign contributions are paying off indeed.
Whew! I’m relieved to hear that there really is plenty of money to go around for pet projects.
/snark
I’d love to hear just what are the “responsible steps” to address climate change. I could use a good laugh.
I’d also like to see how much that $12 billion affects the global average temperature, but then that would have me weeping.
If we wanted to put a stop to this type of
looting the American taxpayer and their succeeding generationsspending, we should start sending the IRS around the neighborhood to collect – upfront, in cash – the money to pay for the various programs like this.For example, a quick, round number calculation spits out that $12Bn/350mm population is about $3.40 for each person in the US. So someone comes to the door to collect $13.60 for your family of four. What’s the big deal if it will save the planet, right? However, the next day they come around to collect $22.84, $6.28, $37.72, and $16.34 for four other “responsible” programs that were just announced. And the next day… and so on. Oh, and those withholdings in your paycheck? You should get your whole check and then open your wallet to pay out those withheld amounts when the tax collector comes around.
If we had immediate pay-as-you-go taxation in the US, my guess is there would be very, very little spending on nonsense and not a heck of a lot of deficit spending. When your pocket is picked, you don’t notice until it is too late and there’s not much you can do about it after the fact. But when you have to open your wallet and count out the cash, it tends to focus the mind on how much and where the money is going.
/end wishful thinking that there could be such a thing as “responsible” spending in D.C.
I think you made an arithmetic mistake -$34
Yep, Gary. In a hurry and lost or added a zero in there somewhere ==> $34. Thanks.
And I used a round 350 million for the US population. So while I was taking a closer look, I found the US population is more like 320 million.
It’s worse than I thought.
H.R. says:
It’s worse than I thought.
It’s even worse than that. Back in 2004 I read that there were 34 million illegals in the U.S. They’re still using that number. A big fraction don’t pay any taxes. So we have to make up the difference.
HR, when the federal government started the paycheck withholding tax my grandfather told my dad that when that money starts rolling in the politicians will spend us broke. I guess the withholding started in WW2.
Yes, withholding started in WW 2 but just prior to this you paid at the end of the year. And some didn’t have the money to pay so withholding was brought in.
Increased income taxes were supposed to end when the war ended but then there was the Cold War and so on.
Prior to WW 2 very few people paid income taxes.
When it became fashionable to tax the very wealthy, foundations were created to beat these taxes. Now look how foundation money is spent. Should have just left it so that wealthy heirs could instead squander the money.
Renewable drivers. Limited-use technology. Waste in China. The Press and Academia going into overdrive in order to obscure local consequences to the environment. The “green” myth lives on. Misaligned development is probable.
Obama Bin Lootin’.
+1
Still is.
Obama can’t get Congress to give money to his friends (FriendsOfObama), so he gets banks, etc., to give money to FOO, by giving the banks “loan guarantees.”
Sooner or later, a court must declare that an Executive created loan guarantee is bogus, and the banks get stiffed. Then they won’t be lending money to FOO.
Keep spending other people’s money until it runs out.
Pointman
There are remarkable strides being made in solar PV cost reduction, but of course this administration is betting on all the wrong bets in tech, rooftops of the rich, and fraudsters. The benefits that make it to the industry leaders will be held up as success stories and used as cover for the tranche of bad apples. This pattern is familiar now.
PV solar power can never overcome dirty power if it is connected to the grid. The PV cells may get more efficient, but it is stilling highly variable power and goes off at night.
At least we will have clean energy while reading the demands of international lenders in coming years.
“Despite an old saying that taxes are the price we pay for civilization, an absolute majority of the record-breaking tax money collected by the federal government today is simply transferred by politicians from people who are not likely to vote for them to people who are more likely to vote for them.” – Thomas Sowell
‘Perhaps President Obama believes his administration has learned from that experience.’
They have. They’ve developed new ways to either cover up or hide the failures.
I hope Repubs don’t think this thing they are handed is too big to fail. Probably US needs a ‘buffoon’ like Trump to put humpty dumpty together again.
A lot of WUWT readers may historically be “democrats,” or “liberals.” I would consider myself a democrat if that party had not been surreptitiously taken over by Marxist ideals and people.
We have to recognize that decent government is withering. And largely because of of our big-business sell-out elected officials.
If you have not noticed, the Republican party is going through this right now. The inside-the-beltway conservatives have upset rank-and-file Americans, who have Trump as an antidote. These locked-in conservatives are just as bought-and-paid-for as the democrats – by the banks, etc.
If you generally consider yourself a “democrat,” “liberal,” or “progressive,” but see this unfortunate turn away from decent government, you need to be honest about it, recognize it, and begin speaking out.
Several years ago, I decided to go ahead and grab some genuine original-source studies on global warming. I had no expertise on the subject, but I know principles of science, and how to lie with statistics.
I quickly ran into “ground zero” of MBH98, and was stunned that this was one of the foundational supports for The-End-Is-Near-Send-Money.
I then ran into Mann’s 2004 corrigendum. I had never encountered a “corrigendum” before. This led me to MM03, which had prompted Mann 2004.
I broke with my fellow liberals on the global warming idea. I then was compelled to figure out how the global warming deal was such as cause celebre. This really showed me that much of my compatriots were motivated more by a cult-like mentality where the orthodoxy cannot be questioned or you face ostracism, and the ever-stalking Bad Guy must be countered at all turns; if you break rank and do not parrot the party line, the only option in this simplistic, cult-like world is to be cast from “All-good” to “All-bad.”
It is tragic that we on the liberal side have bought into this. Instead of recognizing that frank Communists were guiding our best intentions away from good government, we fell for the “red-baiting” cover story.
Now, we have a frank socialist as the leading nominee for our party, and our VP saying, it is just a question of how much socialism should we have.
There are four direct solutions:
if you consider yourself a “democrat,” “liberal,” or “progressive,” speak up when and where you can, recognizing that you are going against black-and-white cult thinking. This indoctrination is not as complete in some as others.
1 Define your principles. I myself believe that regulated capitalism produces wealth, and lots of good things. I have a decent set of principles that underlie my political positions. If I reflect on these, I cannot be swayed too far afield. I am more for students than teachers, so I am more for high education standards rather than for political alliances with teacher unions. Sorry, I just really have a passion for bringing kids up the right way; your pension will have to suffer.
2 We need VERY open government. In my mind, this includes possible ideas such as training citizens to be able to look over the shoulder of government regulators of industry – i.e., be trained to know what protections and oil rig should have, then be able to shadow a regulator as he or she reviews oil rig, coal mine, etc. Also, we the people should be able to audit how IRS selects nonprofits to investigate or harass, etc. Campaign finance, who visits with any elected official, etc.
3 Congressional term limits. Cozy relationships grow and grow. We need these to be broken regularly. I have no idea how this would ever happen, since congress would have to vote themselves out of a job. But somehow we need to achieve this, or we are locked in place for corruption and stagnation.
4 Recognize the rhetorical tricks used to paint political pictures. The “war on women,” the “greedy banks,” etc. With your principles, get to the bottom of these issues and ask yourself if not having everyone pay for some women’s birth control is or is not a “war on women.” Ask yourself: when is it proper to redistribute wealth/use power of taxation? taxation is a big deal – should it be used to allow some women to have a life style they prefer without themselves having to pay the $20/month? Nope. Doesn’t fit the tax principles I have: there are things the private market can do far better than govt, and there are things the govt can do far better than private market. A woman affording the very modest cost of BC, a life style option and not a necessity of life, ought to be left to the private market, as it has been doing very well since the 1950s. -So, I break rank rather than buy in to the rhetoric of “war on women.”
Maybe, soon enough, we “democrats” and “liberals” can clean house like Trump is doing by highlighting the entrenched political inside-the-beltway” class on the conservative side.
I have a slightly different take, along the same lines, as a long-time liberal. All of these “War on XXX” memes have worn me out (yeah, some of them began in Republican years!), since there is never a credible campaign hitched to the “war” rhetoric. However, “We” have not allowed anything to happen to the parties, in my view, because “we” cannot afford to affect the parties. Heck, “pay to play” is as American as [Shari’s] apple pie, but the game has outgrown my budget. And how long did we cruise along, just fine, before we discovered party politics, at which moment the US went to Hell in a handbasket? About 2 seconds; and don’t forget dems used to be republicans, and reps used to be whigs, and now my head is spinning. Why do we need just 2 parties, when neither of the 2 we have has a clue? Why dress dreck in political clothing, just to sell the mannequins? Just present the dreck, let me dismiss it, and then move on….
I just noticed the next comment down (ScienceABC123 @7:25 am), who adds “Progressives/leftists never admit their plans fail….”. The Right never admits failure, either, and both sides gleefully ignore the real harm done by even well meaning programs that are allowed to operate without oversight. Bad ideas on the Right and Left, born of similar corporate interests with different cognomens, rarely pass ideological filtering, i.e., stripped of rhetoric, these ideas sink (and stink) on their own terms, and are fully capable of embarrassing members of any political party. We to the left of center may be puzzled as to why our leaders consider anything so anti-social as dismantling our economy–the very Engine of our freedom and democracy–as some kind of liberal beacon in a bleak (read Dickensian) capitalist-controlled, slave-powered 19th-Century British Imperial Hell. Anti-social acts may be “Communist” (but not “communist”), but never “socialist”.
And, for Heaven’s sake, when did the ideals of the Founding Fathers become “communist?” I realize it is fashionable to dismiss the Preamble to the Constitution as somehow “not part of” the Constitution, but it is the entire justification in a sentence for our departure from the British plan. It is a small departure, however, on paper, and is perhaps best seen as the culmination-in-codification of that first great attempt to forge a legal definition of Democracy in the English-speaking world, the Magna Carta. My favorite parts stand out in HD: “… promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, ….” In other words, we are in this together (collectively, socially), it will be a difficult, on-going balancing act, but together we can prosper.
I may be older than you and have been a Democrat my whole life and will remain so. Some Democrats believe in agw. I don’t. Some Democrats believe in all kinds of different things. Just because the media puts a label on people doesn’t mean they have to conform to a set system that says that because you believe this you must be that. What nonsense! History has taught me that Democrats at their best have represented the working man, fought for racial and ethnic equality and ecconomic opportunity. References to Marxism because a person favors a higher tax on hedge fund mavens is so much exageration.
Additionly it always amazes me that so many smart people do not remember that a union teacher really helped them along the way.
Hornblower
History has taught me that Democrats at their worst have represented the union bosses and bankers and government bribers against the working man, fought fanatically
forAGAINST racial and ethnic equality from the early 1800’s through the Civil Rights Act of the 1960’s and against economic opportunity in favor of always ever-stronger government socialism since the 1870’s – and all of its ills and favoritism towards the ruling class that government favoritism uses and requires – who have been democrats.The old time Democratic party “passed away” about the time of the Party convention in 1968.