GOP’s Solyndra Witch-Hunt Halts Project to Employ Veterans Putting Solar Panels on Military Housing

GOP’s Solyndra Witch-Hunt Halts Project to Employ Veterans Putting Solar Panels on Military Housing

By Stephen Lacey on Sep 28, 2011 at 3:25 pm

The GOP has apparently succeeded in its goal of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

The push to do something — anything — to make government investments in clean energy look bad after the Solyndra bankruptcy is hindering the development of some major job-creating solar projects.

The most recent victim is SolarCity, a solar-services provider http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2011/09/08/314146/solar-comes-of-age-solarcity-double-pv-systems-homes/">that was set to develop the largest residential solar project in the world. The company was offered a conditional commitment on September 2nd for a $275 million loan guarantee to finance, install and maintain solar systems on 160,000 military rooftops around the country — effectively doubling the number of residential systems online in the U.S. today.

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We have the potential to double residential solar PV installations in this country in a few short years while putting hundreds of military personnel to work. It would be a shame to allow this project become collateral damage of political over-reach.

SecularAnimist says:
September 28, 2011 at 4:01 pm

Stephen Lacey wrote: “The GOP has apparently succeeded in its goal of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.”

Let’s be very clear: the goal of the GOP is precisely to destroy the US solar power industry, to destroy the US wind power industry, to destroy the US electric vehicle industry, to destroy energy efficiency initiatives, to destroy green jobs initiatives, and to destroy the EPA — in short, to destroy anything and everything that threatens the profits of the fossil fuel corporations or loosens the death-grip of the fossil fuel corporations on the US economy and political system.

SolarCity isn’t “collateral damage” of the attacks on the Solyndra loan guarantee — it is the next target, exactly because it is so successful.