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Politics : The Solyndra Scandal -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: joseffy who wrote (562)	8/15/2012 3:05:43 PM
From: Hope Praytochange	1 Recommendation Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1400

Emails Give Fresh Solyndra Details By RYAN TRACY Secretary of Energy Steven Chu fought back opposition from some of President Barack Obama's top economic advisers at a White House meeting last summer to ensure government backing of a $1.4 billion project slated to use solar panels made by now-bankrupt Solyndra LLC, according to newly released emails. The emails, disclosed by Republicans on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, shed fresh light on Mr. Chu's role in shepherding a loan-guarantee application for the project. The project later stalled after Solyndra filed for bankruptcy protection last fall, triggering a political battle over the Obama administration's backing for renewable-energy companies as part of an economic-stimulus effort. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has seized on Solyndra as an example of wasted taxpayer money. The Obama administration points to other successful loans and says the program was designed to take risks. The project's backer, warehouse owner Prologis Inc., PLD +0.24%still plans to install panels on about 750 warehouse roofs across the country and says it is working to secure agreements to sell solar power eventually generated to local utilities. Prologis said Thursday it hasn't yet installed any panels or drawn down any loans from Bank of America Corp., the project lender. Under the deal worked out last year, taxpayers would cover losses on the loans if Prologis and its partner can't repay them, and the Energy Department must approve any solar installations before they move forward. Energy Department spokesman Damien LaVera said the department had "appealed to the White House to resolve legitimate disagreements between agencies so worthwhile applications that had been judged on the merits by career staff and been identified as strong candidates could move forward." He said that was "exactly the opposite" of accusations made by Republicans that the White House pressured the department to approve certain loan deals based on political considerations. Two days after Mr. Chu visited the White House on June 14, 2011, an Energy Department official boasted to a colleague that Mr. Chu's performance was "close to an annihilation" of those who questioned the deal, according to the emails released Thursday. The skeptics included Jacob Lew, who was then the director of the White House Office of Management and Budget and is now White House chief of staff, and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, according to the emails. The content of some of the emails was earlier reported by the Washington Post. Top administration officials objected that the Prologis deal, which eventually allowed the company to install solar panels over at least four years, wasn't consistent with the 2009 economic-stimulus law's focus on near-term job creation, according to an email in which a second Energy Department official described the June 14 meeting. Funding for the federal loan guarantee came from funds set aside for the stimulus effort. William Daley, then the White House chief of staff, sided with Mr. Chu, allowing the deal to go forward. "Kind of nuts that Chu defeated Treas Sec, OMB head, and NEC head," the second Department of Energy official wrote in an email to a colleague on June 16. NEC refers to the White House's National Economic Council. A Treasury Department spokeswoman declined to comment on Mr. Geithner's behalf. Efforts to reach Mr. Daley on Thursday were unsuccessful. Eric Schultz, a White House spokesman, said "internal debates about complex programs like this should be expected, and the White House playing a role in assisting interagency discussion surrounding that process is entirely appropriate." When the Prologis deal was made final last Sept. 30, Mr. Chu said it would be the "largest rooftop solar deployment in U.S. history" and would serve as a model for other projects. Rep. Darrell Issa (R., Calif.), the oversight committee chairman, wrote Mr. Obama Wednesday asking for further White House emails and documents tied to the loan program. He said the documents already obtained "show that senior members of the administration were aware of substantial risk to taxpayers and objected to the way funds were being distributed. They were overruled." Tensions between Treasury, the Office of Management and Budget and the Department of Energy, all of which had a role in reviewing energy-loan deals, were nothing new. Mr. Chu, in a June 24 email drafted as part of preparation for a briefing to the president about the loan program, said Treasury and OMB often felt deals led to "unjust enrichment" of loan applicants by allowing them too high a return on their taxpayer-backed investment. Following the June 14 meeting at the White House, Mr. Lew pulled aside a Department of Energy official and said the Obama administration wasn't "trying to kill the program," according to one of the emails released Thursday. It quoted Mr. Lew as saying he was just "protecting the president." The Office of Management and Budget said that comment referred to the need to properly vet projects.