Dribs and Drabs From the SOTU; Add Another Solar Company To The List Of Those Going Bankrupt

Updates

September 7, 2013: add a natural gas minivan company to the list.

August 15, 2013: add VPG to the list. 

April 26, 2013: add SoloPower to the group of failed solar panel companies to the list below; funded by state of Oregon; not by US taxpayers

April 8, 2013: Flabeg Solar U.S. Corp., a $30 million solar plant located near the Pittsburgh International Airport has shut its doors four years after receiving nearly $10.2 million in tax credits from the Obama Administration as part of the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act. For more, click here.

Original Post

I guess the administration is looking to set up another slush fund. This slush fund would take money from the oil and gas industry and place it into a lock box / white box in which research on gas-free vehicles would take place. Sort of like the DOE / Solyndra debacle, I suppose.

This is sort of what I imagine the slush fund to look like three years after inception (I've not checked all the links; these are from an old post and some of the links may have broken):

The complete list of faltering or bankrupt green-energy companies:

1. Evergreen Solar ($24 million)*
2. SpectraWatt ($500,000)*
3. Solyndra ($535 million)*
4. Beacon Power ($69 million)* -- see "update/correction" below
5. AES’s subsidiary Eastern Energy ($17.1 million) -- see "update/correction" below
6. Nevada Geothermal ($98.5 million)
7. SunPower ($1.5 billion)
8. First Solar ($1.46 billion)
9. Babcock and Brown ($178 million)
10. EnerDel’s subsidiary Ener1 ($118.5 million)*
11. Amonix ($5.9 million)
12. National Renewable Energy Lab ($200 million)
13. Fisker Automotive ($528 million)
14. Abound Solar ($374 million)*
15. A123 Systems ($279 million)*
16. Willard and Kelsey Solar Group ($6 million) -- see "update/correction" below
17. Johnson Controls ($299 million)
18. Schneider Electric ($86 million) -- see "update/correction" below
19. Brightsource ($1.6 billion)
20. ECOtality ($126.2 million)
21. Raser Technologies ($33 million)*
22. Energy Conversion Devices ($13.3 million)*
23. Mountain Plaza, Inc. ($2 million)*
24. Olsen’s Crop Service and Olsen’s Mills Acquisition Company ($10 million)*
25. Range Fuels ($80 million)*
26. Thompson River Power ($6.4 million)*
27. Stirling Energy Systems ($7 million)*
28. LSP Energy ($2.1 billion)* -- see "update/correction" below
29. UniSolar ($100 million)* -- see "update/correction" below
30. Azure Dynamics ($120 million)* -- see "update/correction" below
31. GreenVolts ($500,000)
32. Vestas ($50 million)
33. LG Chem’s subsidiary Compact Power ($150 million) -- see "correction" below
34. Nordic Windpower ($16 million)*
35. Navistar ($10 million)
36. Satcon ($3 million)*
37. Nissan Leaf battery facility, Smyrna, TN (see November 15, 2012, update above) 
38. Twin Creeks Technologies, Senatobia, MS ($26  million)* (see November 30, 2012, update above)

* Indicates filed for bankruptcy.

Of all the companies listed, this remains my favorite:

Twin Creeks Technologies. This is their $26 million website [update: surprisingly, this link is still up].  I assume this link will break soon -- the website is a single page, completely white except for a "sunburst" icon and "twincreeks technologies" all in lower case. That's the website. I can't make this stuff up. Here's the story:

Mississippi taxpayers may have only an empty Senatobia building and some solar panel equipment to show for nearly $26 million in loans provided to Twin Creeks Technologies.

The California-based solar technology firm is liquidating, and a company that bought Twin Creeks' assets does not intend to take over its agreement with Mississippi. The contract called for Twin Creeks to invest at least $132 million and create at least 500 jobs.

"Mississippi taxpayers may have only an empty Senatobia building and some solar panel equipment to show for nearly $26 million in loans" -- as you can see, this is not quite accurate. They also got a single page website with the logo.

If the administration is successful in establishing this slush fund, the two winners* would be: a) the unions; b) GM; and, c) Tesla. The losers: those buying gasoline. These costs would be passed on to the consumer. But Americans are content/satisfied, so this idea has potential. Oh, I forgot, the other winner would be the Chinese company making the flaming batteries for Boeing's 787 Dreamliner.

*I count "unions" and "GM" as one in this particular case.

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Update: since the original list was posted, the source for this list, The Foundry, has noted some "corrections" which may affect the above list. None of the companies nor the government have contacted me to say the figures are incorrect. However, this from The Foundry:

Figures for four companies have been updated: Beacon Power received $43 million from the U.S. government, not $69 million as originally reported. Azure Dynamics received $5.4 million from the federal government, not $120 million as originally reported. Compact Power Inc. received $151 million as part of the stimulus, not $150 million as originally reported. Willard and Kelsey Solar Group received $700,981 in government funding, not $6 million as originally reported.

The following companies have been removed from the original list: AES’s subsidiary Eastern Energy, LSP Energy, Schneider Electric, and Uni-Solar did not receive government-backed loans, based on additional research. The National Renewable Energy Lab did received $200 million in stimulus funding, but it is a government laboratory.