"Green Re-election Scam Fund?" This is Bigger Then WATERGATE.

"Green Re-election Scam Fund?" This is Bigger Then WATERGATE.HT: TheAstuteBlogger.(Powerline).A lawsuit recently filed in the United States Court of Claims may shed further light on the corruption of the Obama administration’s “green energy” programs. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of XP Vehicles, Inc. and Limnia, Inc., companies that competed for Department of Energy loans under a Congressionally-authorized program.
The owners of XP eventually realized that there was no real competition, and that the whole Department of Energy program was a scam intended to funnel money to Obama and Democratic Party campaign contributors and political allies.
They allege in addition that DOE misappropriated proprietary technology that they submitted in connection with their loan applications, and gave that technology to Obama administration cronies.

Are the allegations true? I don’t know.

They certainly are consistent with what we know about the administration’s green energy programs, and there is no doubt about the fact that companies like Tesla and Fisker, which won out in preference to these plaintiffs, were 1) politically connected, and 2) failures in the marketplace.
What we can say for sure is that programs of this sort are destined for disaster. There is no reason why the government should be in the business of favoring some private companies over others; if it does so, either the reality or the appearance of political favoritism is inevitable. It is time to drive a stake through the whole enterprise of government involvement in “green energy.” Read the full the XP Vehicles complaint in its entirety here.

U.S. green energy program loophole enables U.S. company to earn millions of Dollars without even selling oil.

U.S. green energy program loophole enables U.S. company to earn millions of Dollars without even selling oil.(Oilprice). By. James Burgess.
A cargo train filled with biofuels crossed the border between the US and Canada 24 times between the 15th of June and the 28th of June 2010; not once did it unload its cargo, yet it still earned millions of dollars.
CBC News of Canada was the first to pick up on this story on the 3rd of December 2012, and began their own investigation into the possible explanations behind this odd behaviour.
CN Rail, the operator of the train, stated their innocence in the matter as they had only “received shipping directions from the customer, which, under law, it has an obligation to meet. CN discharged its obligations with respect to those movements in strict compliance with its obligations as a common carrier, and was compensated accordingly.” Even so, they still managed to earn C$2.6 million in shipping fees.
During their investigation CBC managed to obtain an internal email which stated that the cars of the train were all reconfigured between each trip but that the cargo was never actually unloaded, because “each move per car across the border is revenue generated”, the sale of the cargo itself was inconsequential.
The cargo of the train was owned by Bioversal Trading Inc., or its US partner Verdero, depending on what stage of the trip it was at. The companies “made several million dollars importing and exporting the fuel to exploit a loophole in a U.S. green energy program.” Each time the loaded train crossed the border the cargo earned its owner a certain amount of Renewable Identification Numbers (RINs), which were awarded by the US EPA to “promote and track production and importation of renewable fuels such as ethanol and biodiesel.” The RINs were supposed to be retired each time the shipment passed the border, but due to a glitch not all of them were. This enabled Bioversal to accumulate over 12 million RINs from the 24 trips, worth between 50 cents and $1 each, which they can then sell on to oil companies that haven’t met the EPA’s renewable fuel requirements.Both the Canada Border Services Agency and the US EPA have launched investigations into the possibility of fraud, although the companies claim that the practice was totally legal.Read the full story here.

Video - Obamanomics: A Legacy of Wasteful Spending.

Good stuff, though the video actually understates the indictment against Obama. There is no mention, for instance, about all the new spending for Obamacare that will begin to take effect over the next few years.
But not everything can be covered in a 5-minute video. And I suspect the video is more effective because it closes instead with some discussion of the corrupt insider dealing of Obama’s so-called green energy programs.Read the full story here.

Video - Paul Ryan on Big Brother Climate Bill: "This bill is not about science, it's not about cost and benefits. It's about ideology."

HT: AstuteBlogger.

Great Green Fleece: Air Force Spends $59 Per Gallon for Biofuel

Great Green Fleece: Air Force Spends $59 Per Gallon for Biofuel.(Heritage).The U.S. Air Force spent $59 per gallon on biofuels for a demonstration last month intended to show the promise of the alternative energy source. That’s more than double what the U.S. Navy spent as part of its so-called Great Green Fleet demonstration.
The total cost for the 11,000 gallons of synthetic jet fuel from Gevo Inc., a Colorado-based company, amounts to $639,000.
For its demonstration, Navy officials spent $12 million on 450,000 gallons of fuel, or approximately $26 a gallon. Combining the fuel with petroleum in a 50-50 mixture reduces the cost per gallon to around $15, more than four times the cost of petroleum alone. The company providing the Navy’s biofuel, Solazyme, was a recipient of stimulus grant funding.
The report from Reuters also indicated that among Gevo’s financial backers is Vinod Khosla, a venture capitalist whose firm owns 27 percent of the company. Reuters noted that Khosla has donated overwhelmingly to Democratic candidates in recent elections.
Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus has repeatedly touted the benefits of expanding the Navy’s use of alternative fuel sources such as biofuels.
“It was worthwhile to show that biofuels can compete and can be used in every single thing that we do in the Navy. Everything before now has been a test. This shows that we can use biofuels and other alternative energies in an operational manner,” said Mabus in a conference call following the Naval exercise’s conclusion.
Mabus and other Defense Department officials have cited increases in petroleum prices as the reason for exploring biofuel integration, which drew criticism from Republican officials.
“You are not the secretary of energy, you are the secretary of the Navy,” said Rep. Randy Forbes (R-VA). Forbes says he supports green energy, but facing budget priorities, finds the expenses inappropriate.Repeated attempts to clarify the assumptions made by Mabus and other Pentagon officials have not been forthcoming, even to members of Congress or the Congressional Research Service:

“One of Washington’s most influential naval analysts was equally flummoxed. “What is the Navy’s specific projection for how quickly prices for advanced biofuels will drop to levels competitive with those for petroleum-based fuels?” Ronald O’Rourke and his colleagues at the Congressional Research Service ask in a June 2012 report on military energy initiatives (.pdf). ”What studies did the Navy or DOD [Department of Defense] conduct to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of developing a domestic advanced biofuels industry?”
Apparently, no one at the Navy could be bothered to tell him the answer – if an answer existed, that is.”

Hmmmm.......Green re-election fund scam.Read the full story here.

"Great Green Fleet" burns massive amounts of 'Greenbacks'.

"Great Green Fleet" burns massive amounts of 'Greenbacks'.(Chron).HT: PrariePundit.As the Navy ran exercises with biofuel-powered planes and vessels near Hawaii on Wednesday and Thursday, top Obama administration officials hit back against earlier criticism that the endeavor was a waste of taxpayer dollars.
Navy Secretary Ray Mabus said the "Great Green Fleet" test exercises for the first time proved that aircraft carriers, FA-18 jets and other equipment can run on advanced biofuels without any modifications - a major milestone in his quest to find an alternative to fuels derived from foreign oil.
"It was worthwhile to show that biofuels can compete and can be used in every single thing that we do in the Navy," Mabus said in a conference call with reporters Thursday.
Critics have blasted the exercises as too costly, especially as the Defense Department heads toward congressionally mandated budget cuts. In preparation for this week's exercise, the Navy spent $12 million buying 450,000 gallons of alternative fuels, which works out to just under $27 per gallon. Once blended 50-50 with petroleum fuel, the final cost settled around $15 per gallon.
Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., has accused the Obama administration of trying to foist a "green agenda" on the Pentagon.
Noting the budget cuts ahead, Inhofe said the Defense Department "can't afford business as usual, yet they are being coerced into spending $27 a gallon."
And last week, Thomas Pyle, the president of the oil industry-funded Institute for Energy Research, asked congressional leaders to investigate a Navy exercise he said made no sense "with huge reductions in resources for national defense already under way."
During the exercises Wednesday, foreign military leaders and top Pentagon brass watched as helicopters and other aircraft running on advanced biofuels landed on and lifted off from the USS Nimitz aircraft carrier, which itself was running on the alternative fuels. Attack aircraft were refueled in the air with a blend of petroleum-based fuels and advanced biofuel, and a separate refueling took place at sea.
Algae and cooking oil
The advanced biofuels used to power the Navy vessels came from a mix of algae and cooking oil, sold by San Francisco-based Solazyme and Louisiana-based Dynamic Fuels, a joint venture of Tyson Foods and Syntroleum Corp.
Mabus also signed a statement of cooperation with the Royal Australian Navy to guide future collaboration on using biofuels for military operations, which he described as essential to blunting the costs of price spikes and supply fluctuations in foreign oil.
"Our reliance on foreign oil is a very significant and very well recognized military vulnerability," Mabus said.
Mabus said every $1 increase in the price of oil translates into $30 million in additional costs for the Navy.
White House energy and climate change adviser Heather Zichal told reporters that criticism of the Great Green Fleet was shortsighted.
"We can't be timid about embracing new forms of energy like biofuels," Zichal said.The only reason we will be buying foreign sourced oil and gas is because of the bad policies of the Obama administration which is still trying to strangle the domestic production of oil and gas on federal controlled sites. They are still blocking drilling on 87 percent of offshore areas while they helped to finance offshore drilling off the coast of Brazil. 
We have a much better chance of becoming energy independent through drilling than we ever will through expensive biofuels. Why would you pay $27 a gallon for fuel when you can produce it for a fraction of that from domestic resources? It only makes sense if you continue to buy into the outsourcing of our energy security by this administration.
Mabus and others in this administration act like the shale revolution never happened. Is that because they plan to kill it if Obama is reelected? There is just no rational explanation for the policy they are pushing on green energy or their blocking of drilling on federal controlled sites.Read the full story here.

"Another one bites the Dust" - Stimulus-Backed Solar Facility Touted By Harry Reid Shuts Down.

"Another one bites the Dust" - Stimulus-Backed Solar Facility Touted By Harry Reid Shuts Down.(Heritage).By Lachlan Markay.A federally-funded solar production facility in Nevada has ceased operations, according to a former employee at the facility. The closure could prove troublesome for the company’s political allies.
The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports that the North Las Vegas production facility for solar panel manufacturer Amonix has not operated since May. The plant was backed by $6 million in federal green energy “investment,” and touted at length by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
The Review-Journal reports:

Rene Kenerly, a former material and supply manager at Amonix, said the plant has been idle since May 1, when he was laid off. At its peak, the plant had ramped up to about 700 employees working three shifts a day to produce solar panels for a utility customer in Amarosa, Colo., he said.
“I don’t think they had a lot of training,” Kenerly said. “There were a lot of quality issues. A lot of stuff was coming back because it had some functionality issues.”

The Review-Journal was unable to confirm with Amonix that it had ceased operations at the facility. Scribe’s attempt to confirm the report likewise went unanswered.
If solar panel production at the facility has permanently ceased, it could prove awkward for Reid, who touted the “permanent green jobs” that Amonix’s Nevada business supposedly represented. The company laid off 200 employees in January.
In May of 2010, Reid attended a groundbreaking ceremony for the facility. “Amonix is taking full advantage of a tax credit from the Recovery Act and is helping Nevada lead the way in producing clean energy,” Reid said at the time. “I’ve pushed hard to establish a clean energy industry in Nevada that will diversify our economy and protect us from future economic downturns.”Amonix would be the second Nevada-based – and Reid-backed – green energy project to hit dire financial straits in recent weeks. Nevada Geothermal, which received a $535 million stimulus loan guarantee, announced in a recent SEC filing that “material uncertainties exist which cast significant doubt upon the company’s ability to continue as a going concern.”According to the New York Times, Reid “pressur[ed] the Department of Interior to move more quickly on applications to build clean energy projects on federally owned land and urg[ed] other member of Congress to expand federal tax incentives to help build geothermal plants, benefits that Nevada Geothermal has taken advantage of.”Hmmmm.........."Green re-election scam".Read the full story here.

"Sunny Side of your wallet Up?" - Germans Cough Up for Solar Subsidies, American's next?

"Sunny Side of your wallet Up?" - Germans Cough Up for Solar Subsidies, American's next?(Spiegel).By Alexander Neubacher and Catalina Schröder.Solar subsidies cost German consumers billions of dollars a year and are widely regarded as inefficient. Even environmentalists are concerned that Berlin's focus on solar comes at the detriment of other renewables. But the solar industry has a powerful lobby, and politicians have proven powerless to resist.Germany's new environment minister Peter Altmaier had only been in office a week before he traveled to Bonn for an urgent appointment. Important representatives from the German renewable energy industry were expecting him, including Frank Asbeck, CEO of the Bonn based Solarworld AG. And they were not to be put off. They wanted to know from Altmaier, who assumed his office in May, what was going to happen with solar industry subsidies.
Ultimately, the lawmakers agreed on a plan that makes considerable concessions to the solar industry, saddling energy consumers with billions in additional costs. The plan calls for funding to install up to 25 additional gigawatts of solar power in the coming years, nearly doubling the current supply. "It's a compromise made at the expense of third parties," says energy expert Holger Krawinkel at the Federation of German Consumer Organizations, "and a disastrous debut for new Environment Minister Peter Altmaier." A new study by Georg Erdmann, professor of energy systems at Berlin's Technical University, reveals just how far Germany's current center-right governing coalition -- made up of Chancellor Angela Merkel's CDU and the business-friendly Free Democrats (FDP) -- has strayed from its own self-imposed goals. Erdmann has calculated the effects that the latest changes to the EEG will have between now and 2030. He believes that subsidies for renewable energy, including an expansion of the power grid, will saddle energy consumers with costs well over €300 billion ($377 billion).
An environmental surcharge known as the EEG contribution, which is already added to German energy bills, will rise sharply. This renewable energy surcharge currently amounts to 3.59 cents per kilowatt hour. Chancellor Angela Merkel previously promised to cap it at 3.5 cents, but Erdmann's calculations show the EEG contribution jumping to "over 10 cents per kilowatt hour," or nearly three times what the chancellor pledged.
Photovoltaics are threatening to become the costliest mistake in the history of German energy policy. Photovoltaic power plant operators and homeowners with solar panels on their rooftops are expected to pocket around €9 billion ($11.3 billion) this year, yet they contribute barely 4 percent of the country's power supply, and only erratically at that.
When night falls, all solar modules go offline in one fell swoop; in the winter, they barely generate power during the daytime. During the summer, meanwhile, they sometimes generate too much power around midday, without enough storage capacity to capture it all. The distribution network is also not laid out in a way that would allow the country's thousands of owners of photovoltaic arrays -- a term used to denote an installation of several panels working together -- to feed into the grid as well as draw power from it. To keep the lights on, Germany ends up importing nuclear power from France and the Czech Republic. Grid operator Tennet even resorted to tapping an aging fossil fuel-fired power plant in Austria to compensate for shortages in solar power.Hmmm.....A view in to America's 'Green energy' future?Read the full story here.

Republicans critical of Navy's 'Great Green Fleet', $26 a gallon fuel

Republicans critical of Navy's 'Great Green Fleet', $26 a gallon fuel.(Fox).The Navy is steaming ahead with an initiative to power ships with biofuel, despite criticism the so-called “green fuel” costs nearly seven times more than conventional fuel. This month marks the first time the Navy is using biofuel in an operational setting -- sending five ships to a multi-nation exercise off the coast of Hawaii. A Navy official told FoxNews.com on Monday that sailing the so-called “Great Green Fleet” this month on the 50-50 blend of alternative and conventional fuel is part of Navy Secretary Ray Mabus’ plan to have half the Navy fleet on alternative fuel by 2020. The spokesman also confirmed the fuel -- which does not require engine modifications -- costs $26 a gallon compared to $3.60 a gallon for conventional fuel. However, he pointed out the cost was for a one-day supply and that prices will drop when the Pentagon, among the country’s biggest fuel users, buys more. "I don't believe it's the job of the Navy to be involved in building ... new technologies. I don't believe we can afford it," said Arizona Sen. John McCain, the ranking Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, according to Reuters. The so-called "drop-in" fuels are derived from seeds, algae and chicken fat.Read the full story here.

"Another Solyndra" - Abound Solar received a $400 million U.S. loan guarantee, now in "Free Fall".

 

Free fall!

"Another Solyndra" - Abound Solar received a $400 million U.S. loan guarantee, now in "Free Fall".(BB).Abound Solar Inc., a U.S. solar manufacturer that was awarded a $400 million U.S. loan guarantee, will suspend operations and file for bankruptcy because its panels were too expensive to compete. Abound borrowed about $70 million against the guarantee, the Loveland, Colorado-based company said today in a statement. It plans to file for bankruptcy protection in Wilmington, Delaware, next week. The failure will follow that of Solyndra LLC, which shut down in August after receiving a $535 million loan guarantee from the same U.S. Energy Department program. Abound stopped production in February to focus on reducing costs after a global oversupply and increasing competition from China drove down the price of solar panels by half last year.U.S. taxpayers may lose $40 million to $60 million on the loan after Abound’s assets are sold and the bankruptcy proceeding closes, Damien LaVera, an Energy Department spokesman, said in a statement today. “When the floor fell out on the price of solar panels, Abound’s product was no longer cost competitive,” LaVera said. Hmmmm......Another "Obamination".Read the full story here.

Video - Rep. Issa Exposes the Obama Administration's Green Jobs Scam.

Rep. Issa Exposes the Obama Administration's Green Jobs Scam.(Forbes).Does the teenage kid who sells used records count as someone who has a green job? What about an oil lobbyist, or someone who works at an antique shop? Those all count as “Green Jobs” according to the Obama Administration’s top statistician at the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The “Green Jobs” initiative cost $38.6 billion or $5 million per job and now through the Oversight Committee’s work we are learning more about how the Obama administration gambled away tax payer dollars to support their ideological interests. Take a look at the Oversight Committee’s excerpt video above.
Nearly every myth they highlighted has since been proven to be just that, a myth, founded on nothing but ideology.
Solyndra and the dubious counting methods employed by the Obama Administration are just further proof of the Green Jobs Scam. Indeed, as Morris et.al., predicted “To attempt to transform modern society on the scale proposed by the green jobs literature is an effort of staggering complexity and scale. To do so based on the wishful thinking and bad economics embodied in the green jobs literature would be the height of irresponsibility.” In light of the dubious counting methods employed by BLS, it seems the Green Jobs Scam was indeed the height of irresponsibility.Read the full story here.

"OBAMANOMICS" - The New Math of Renewable Energy: $50 = $100.

"OBAMANOMICS" - The New Math of Renewable Energy: $50 = $100.(Heritage).Suppose you could produce $50 of electricity but it cost you $100 to do so. Would that make any sense? It would if you work at the White House. In a speech at a wind-turbine blade manufacturer in Iowa, President Obama called for extending two sets of subsidies that turn energy economics upside down and force higher costs on consumers and taxpayers. The first extension is for the production tax credit (PTC), which is set to expire at the end of the year. It provides wind-energy producers with a subsidy of about 40 percent of the wholesale cost of electricity. So, when a wind-energy producer sells $50 worth of electricity, Uncle Sam adds another $20 for a total revenue of $70 to the producer. The second extension is for the Advanced Energy Manufacturing Credit—originally funded in President Obama’s “stimulus” bill. This 30 percent credit cuts the cost of $100 worth of equipment to just $70. So there you have it. Fifty dollars of actual revenue is bumped up to $70 with the PTC and $100 of costs are cut to $70 after the special tax credit. That is, $50 = $100 after taxpayers make up the difference. When wind-energy advocates claim that wind power is on the verge of being competitive, they mean that after the PTC and the manufacturing credit, wind is almost, maybe someday soon, or maybe later (and only if you ignore transmission costs and fickleness of supply problems) on par with conventional power. What a deal. Perhaps not all of the costs of the wind farm will qualify for the manufacturing credit, but don’t despair. There is more. Many states and regions have renewable power mandates that force consumers to buy renewable electricity—regardless of costs. So there is almost no limit to how expensive renewable electricity can be and still generate a profit for the supplier. And even that’s not all. Many renewable energy projects and manufacturers receive federal loan guarantees that cut millions of dollars off their costs. In green-energy math, $50 may be greater than $100. No matter how slick the financial shell games may be—subsidies on top of subsidies on top of mandates—overpriced electricity cannot boost the economy. It may seem like a boost if you are the one getting the subsidy…at least for a while. The workers at the Iowa plant better hope their presidential green-energy photo op works out better for them than it did for Solyndra’s employees.Hmmmm.......'Snake oil' business.Read the full story here.