Obama's solar panel plant gets raided by FBI

[500,000]

The FBI executed an early-morning raid today on the solar panel plant that President Barack Obama swung by last year and celebrated for their green-friendly products.

The headquarters of Solyndra, Inc. in Fremont, California was the site of this morning’s bust, which has left the plant’s top brass saying they are unsure of why it even happened. Agents on the scene were mum to reporters, but a spokesman for the company suggested it could have something to do with the $535 million in loan guarantees that were awarded to them recently by (OBAMA) the Department of Energy.
Despite the federal assistance, Solyndra announced earlier this month that they will be shutting its doors and only this week filed for bankruptcy. In a statement released last week, Solyndra said that the company could not stay afloat with foreign manufacturers offering competitive prices that couldn’t be matched domestically.

Prices for solar panels have dropped by nearly half as of late because of foreign competition.

Regardless of what the FBI was on the look-out for, Solyndra says they weren’t expecting feds to come over unannounced this morning.

"It was quite a shock," Solyndra spokesman Dave Miller told Silicon Valley’s Mercury News today. "When I got here at 7 a.m. they were already here."

The last time a federal appearance garnered as much attention for Solyndra was back in May 2010 when Obama dropped by. The president was supportive of the plant’s products that would help Americans go green while giving money to the America economy, saying that Solyndra was paving the way for a “brighter and more prosperous future.” But barely a year later, Solyndra has been unable to make ends meet, even with the help of the US government.

Republicans have been skeptical of the investment all along, however, with some right wing reps going as far as to call Obama’s backing “a dubious investment” when the commander-in-chief first offered his support.
The FBI has only commented that the raid is being carried out as part of a investigation being put together by the Energy Department, so feds could be considering if federal loans to Solyndra were mismanaged in the months leading up to the company’s demise. FBI Public Affairs Specialist Peter D. Lee has confirmed to reporters only that the raid indeed occurred but that all documents relating to the probe are currently sealed.

In addition to the assistance loans from the government, Solyndra owes private investors an addition $69 million

http://rt.com/usa/news/solar-plant-fbi-solyndra-133/

[Gerry]

I'm not a bit surprised. This company got loan guarantees to the tune of $535 million and spent all of it except $8 million in one year. These were federally backed loans.

I am sure there are many, many people that want to know where the $527 million went in less than a year, especially now that the company is closing and laying off nearly 1,100 employees.

Does Obama own This plant? Because he visited it he owns it? Does that means he owns the local community college and hospital? Damn, had no idea he owned these facilities. Commander in Chief has it's perks.


Seriously, look at what has and is happening.

Over a decade ago the Solar Panel market was wide ass open. But there was no push here in the US to get serious about it. Too much oil company and coal company influence and money.

It was that time, 10-12 years ago, that the US could have dominated this market and technology on a global level. But, leave it to the lobbyists to push this new tech to the back, the Chinese went from 12% of the market to now dominating nearly 70% of the solar panel/film market. Less than 2 years ago, Rutgers University installed $10 million in solar panels to cut its energy usage...ALL materials, ALL controls, ALL installation done by the Chinese. That is such a kick in the balls by a US corporation or University. But it is also a damn shame that the US can not even be competitive in its own backyard.

That one project has been so successful that Rutgers will now create a 32 acre Solar Panel Farm right on its own campus and property, a $41 million dollar project. "...facility will generate $1.2 million in electricity annually with no upfront cost to the university".

Now, go back to the article posted...and look at what is being posted by other sources:

“Solyndra could not achieve full-scale operations rapidly enough to compete in the near term with the resources of larger foreign manufacturers,” the company says today in a statement. They go on that a slowing demand for solar panels coupled with a global market has rendered them unable to continue. Financial analyst Adam Krop adds to Bloomberg that he doesn’t expect anyone to step up and give the company another go. “I don’t see anyone swooping in,” says the analyst from Ardour Capitol Partner in New York. “I don’t see this technology as very viable in the long-term."

We have some financial analyst commenting that he does not see this technology be viable in the long term. Who in the hell does he work for? I guess he missed the Rutgers story from April of this year. That is a $51 million investment by just one company in the US. And, such projects come with a pile of tax incentives and write offs for clean or alternative energy.

And then there is this...

Spectrawatt Inc and Everygreen Solar Inc., two other American-based solar power manufacturers, also called it quits in August. With the latest forfeit from Solyndra, stocks for both First Solar Inc. and Suntech Power Holdings dropped on Wednesday. Clean energy factories abroad also saw stocks drops, with companies in China all seeing declines this week.

It looks like this $41 million project will go to a Chinese company as well.

[Mike Cruz]

Doc, the game is on. At least he has an excuse to be drinking.

[Gerry]

Wish the FBI and other federal agencies were this aggressive with the Trillions that disappeared in 2007 and 2008.

I think a whole bunch of federal contractors, bankers, legislators, and administrative offices should have been raided.

[biggedon]

green-friendly products.

[Raider]

"Does Obama own This plant? Because he visited it he owns it? Does that means he owns the local community college and hospital? Damn, had no idea he owned these facilities. Commander in Chief has it's perks."

Wish the FBI and other federal agencies were this aggressive with the Trillions that disappeared in 2007 and 2008.

Is this the best SPIN you can put on a $527 MILLION dollar loss to taxpayers? Sarcasm and blaming Bush just isn't going to cut it.... And when you compare the Trillions in TARP money in 07/08, try being HONEST with yourself and the rest of us and INCLUDE the hundreds of BILLIONS of UNspent TARP money that went to the Obama administration, We the Tax Payer want to know where all that money went too..

Here we have a solar company "Solyndra" that was doomed from the very start and was awarded a Federal loan by the Obama administration who just so happened to be on the receiving end of countless campaign contributions, Was this is another payback for all the contributions they made in helping elect Barack Obama to office? it sure does look like it.




Solyndra Investigation Begins Critical Look at Federally Funded Green Ventures
By Jim Angle
Published September 09, 2011
FoxNews.com



The solar energy firm Solyndra was once the poster child of the Obama administration's efforts to create green jobs. Now, it’s the target of both criminal and congressional investigations.

"Because there's so much concern about where the money went, how it was spent, and is there fraud and abuse," said Cliff Stearns, R-Fla., chairman of a House subcommittee investigating Solyndra.

And Ronnie Greene of the Center for Public Integrity notes that Solyndra was key in the Obama administration's efforts to promote alternative energy.

"It really was in a lot of ways the flagship because it was the first energy loan guarantee by the administration and it was announced with great fanfare back in 2009," he said.

Solyndra got a $535 million loan from the federal government, the first in tens of billions of dollars in loans to green companies, which President Obama personally touted in a visit to the company last year.

But earlier this week, the FBI and the inspector general of the Energy Department raided the company's offices.

An outside investigation of the loan to Solyndra found that earlier this year, the company asked the federal government for more time to repay the loan, which resulted in a very unusual arrangement.

"As part of that agreement,” Greene said, "the Department of Energy was allowed to sit in on board meetings of Solyndra incorporated."

That suggests to Greene and others that the administration should have had some sense that the company, along with taxpayers' money, was in jeopardy.

"These are the key months in which Solyndra's fortunes really failed,” Greene said. “They really fell down, so it's important to hear from DOE on what did you see, what did you hear, did that raise alarm bells with you?"

The founder and other executives of the company contributed and raised large amounts of money for Obama. And they were cozy enough to visit the White House often.

"It appears to be at least 20 times,” said Stearns. "So what were they doing at the White House?"

If the White House was objective about the company, he asks, why was it so intimately involved with the company's executives? And why, Stearns and a congressional committee want to know, are hedge funds first in line to get their money back before the taxpayers?

"It's a very unusual arrangement,” Stearns said. "I think the Department of Energy has to tell us how they could do this and whether it is, shall we say, breaking the law."

A House committee has subpoenaed the chief executive officer of the company to testify next week. The investigation of Solyndra along with tens of billions of dollars in loans to other green ventures is only beginning.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011...#ixzz1XVjgkfKb

[ilovedomains]

.

[Raider]

Politician, Chief and Crook Obama owes the tax payers of this country an explanation for granting a loan that should of NEVER been granted.

And he's done this to other donors as well, granting loans and special favors to whoever donated to his campaign... Aside from the all the corruption and backroom deals, I want to know what happened to the 1000 jobs we were promised by Mr. Hope and Change.

Obama is another Bill Clinton in the way he was whoring out the White House.


Obama playing favorites with OUR TAX DOLLARS





Did Obama Administration Cut Corners For a Green Energy Company?


By MATTHEW MOSK and RONNIE GREENE
ABC NEWS and IWATCH NEWS
May 24, 2011

The Obama administration bypassed procedural steps meant to protect taxpayers as it hurried to approve an energy loan guarantee to a politically-connected California solar power startup, ABC News and the Center for Public Integrity's iWatch News have learned.

The Energy Department in March 2009 announced its intention to award Solyndra Inc. a $535 million loan guarantee before receiving final copies of outside reviews typically used to vet such deals. An independent federal auditor who has reviewed the energy loan program said moving so quickly without completing thorough reviews risked exposing the program to claims of political influence and put taxpayers at greater risk.

"There's a consequence if you don't follow a rigorous process that's transparent," said Franklin Rusco, an analyst with the Government Accountability Office. "It makes the agency more susceptible to outside pressures, potentially."

The Solyndra loan guarantee, advertised by the administration as part of its signature effort to create jobs while weaning the U.S. from traditional energy sources, already has drawn scrutiny on Capitol Hill. Republican members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee have requested documents from the Energy Department as part of an investigation into how the company qualified for government support and then, a year later, closed a plant, laid off workers, and eventually had to renegotiate the terms of the loan guarantee. The shortcuts at the dawn of the deal identified by government auditors have stoked more questions.

READ the full story from iWatch News.

[Raider]

It's looking more and more like Obama used $535 Million dollars of stimulus money to repay Solyndra for their generous campaign contributions... The Treasury dept is now joining the FBI and Congress in the investigation....

Obama who has been scandal free since being elected is now facing his first scandal that will most likely linger on through his re-election campaign, making him even more UN Re-electable. Hooray for that!.

Obama is proving he's just another crooked President who can be BOUGHT, no different than Bill Clinton.

Treasury Joins FBI, Congress in Investigating Stimulus Loan to Failed Solar Panel Company

[Raider]

Bastards!

Solyndra Execs Plead Fifth at Congressional Hearing More Than a Dozen Times
Published September 23, 2011
FoxNews.com




Top executives from a bankrupt California solar energy company pleaded the Fifth Amendment more than a dozen times Friday in a congressional hearing that went nowhere but gave members the opportunity to pose dozens of questions about the loss of a half billion dollars in government loans.

Solyndra Inc. CEO Brian Harrison and the company's chief financial officer, Bill Stover, had notified the House Energy and Commerce Committee they were going to invoke their Fifth Amendment right to decline to testify to avoid self-incrimination.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011...#ixzz1YuWvrEl9

[500,000]

It's looking more and more like Obama used $535 Million dollars of stimulus money to repay Solyndra for their generous campaign contributions... The Treasury dept is now joining the FBI and Congress in the investigation....

Obama who has been scandal free since being elected is now facing his first scandal that will most likely linger on through his re-election campaign, making him even more UN Re-electable. Hooray for that!.

Obama is proving he's just another crooked President who can be BOUGHT, no different than Bill Clinton.

Treasury Joins FBI, Congress in Investigating Stimulus Loan to Failed Solar Panel Company

The only reason the FBI raided that place was to keep all files top secret and to protect Obama

[H2FC]

The only reason the FBI raided that place was to keep all files top secret and to protect Obama

In other words in the eyes of Fox News and the rich supporting republicans "He's dammed if he does and dammed if he don't". Right?