Solar Trust of America files bankruptcy

[Psephos]

Source: Thomson Reuters

April 2 (Reuters) - Solar Trust of America LLC, which holds the development rights for the world's largest solar power project, on Monday filed for bankruptcy protection after its majority owner began insolvency proceedings in Germany.

The Oakland-based company has held rights for the 1,000-megawatt Blythe Solar Power Project in the Southern California desert, which last April won $2.1 billion of conditional loan guarantees from the U.S. Department of Energy. It is unclear how the bankruptcy will affect that project.

Solar Trust said it ran short of liquidity after Solar Millennium AG, which holds a 70 percent stake, sought court protection in December. Solar Millennium then tried to sell that stake to solarhybrid AG, but that transaction collapsed when solarhybrid also sought court protection in Germany.

Edward Kleinschmidt, Solar Trust of America's chief operating officer, in a court filing said the company has already missed two quarterly rent payments on the Blythe project, and cannot make several other payments due imminently.

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Read more: http://newsandinsight.thomsonreuters.com/Legal/News/2012/04_-_April/Solar_Trust_of_America_files_bankruptcy/

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As Bloomberg notes: "The company joins Energy Conversion Devices Inc., a U.S. solar manufacturer that suspended production last year; LSP Energy LP, the owner of a natural-gas-fired power plant in Mississippi; Ener1 Inc., maker of lithium-ion batteries for plug-in electric cars; solar-panel maker Solyndra LLC; and energy storage company Beacon Power Corp. (BCONQ) in bankruptcy."

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-04-02/solar-millennium-s-u-s-units-file-for-bankruptcy-protection-1-.html

[Old and In the Way]

1. But we have $24BB we can give taxbreaks to Big Oil.

So we can stay energy dependent on Big Oil's product.

[wordpix]

2. small is beautiful thinking hasn't sunk into solar yet

The solar cos. want to build this installation 200+ mi. from LA in the middle of nowhere - for what? To provide power to LA? Just put up the panels on every home in LA and call it a mega installation. Get it done. We need 300 million solar roofs now, not some mega project 200 miles from where it's needed.

Geesh.

[Atypical Liberal]

3. They want centralized control with high barrier to entry.

What you propose makes sense - unless you are trying to monetize a scarce resource.

One of the biggest reasons why distributed solar (or distributed anything) isn't taking off is because if everyone generated their own power there would be no central control over energy profits like there are with oil.

They don't want distributed power. They want a centralized power generation facility with a huge capital outlay to prevent competition.

[Psephos]

4. You nailed it.

This Zero Hedge post fills in the blanks. Read the latter part of the article where CITI et al. enter the discussion.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/worlds-largest-solar-plant-21-billion-energy-department-loan-guarantee-files-bankruptcy

[wordpix]

6. Chu should be fired for this + Solyndra. This is #2 Big Mistake

O should cut him loose immediately.

[BB_Troll]

15. Chu is a huge liability for this election year.

[wordpix]

18. I also blame him for approving oil exploration off VA's coast, even though it's Interior's call

I don't see Chu saying NO, we don't need to explore b/c we've got this solar and wind tech going so we don't need more oil.

very bad for the entire E. Coast if oil is found.

[wordpix]

5. you are right and I say, let the chips fall where they may

Some smart solar co. is going to install panels on thousands of homes and start making real money the hard way (by working), instead of doing it the centralized Wall St.-and-gov-loan way.

[JDPriestly]

12. Precisely. Atypical Liberal. They want a product they can sell.

If they have a product to sell, they can grab big salaries for very little work.

They want centralized energy production for the same reason that they want planned obsolescence.

[Old and In the Way]

16. Decentralized applications should have been the gov. investment strategy all along.

Solar presents an opportunity to create jobs - manufacturing, sales, installation, maintenance. By definition, this would be labor intensive...precisely what we need to create private sector jobs. The national security and personal energy security aspects are also addressed. Give small business and home owner the economic incentives to do this and market will follow.

[quakerboy]

7. Yup

The government should have provided the 2.1 billion in loan guarantees to a program to get individual homes outfitted.

I believe it could be done for far less, but at 10k per install(pulled numbers from a LA installer stating their normal 5 kWh system was $35k, Minus $20k local rebate, and federal tax rebate of 5k), that would be 210,000 rooftop installs. 1,050,000 kWh, or 1,050-megawatt.

So a larger capacity. Without making a big installation in the desert, without upsetting any local tribes or environmentalists, with no need to create wires to carry the power into the city, No chance of some trucker running into a pole and knocking the power out, no transmission loss to reach the city. Etc.

[happerbolic]

9. 100% Spot on - word

[ronnie624]

10. That's it.

Every building needs to be equipped with the ability to produce some portion of its power usage through solar generation, and plenty of public revenue should be devoted to that end. It's perfectly logical.

Unfortunately, profit is more important than logic when our government formulates its policies.

[JDPriestly]

11. wordpix, you are right. I would love to have panels on my LA

home. And I would if they were affordable for me.

[happerbolic]

8. I find it odd sometime....

...with all the vacant rooftops of businesses, homes, big rig trailer tops as well as train cars, etc.. that when empty parcels of land are used instead... almost as if it was intentional to cause some turmoil in some of the local residency of what a scar it is on the surroundings... hasn't this story already been played out, when it used to be mandated by some states that a certain percentage of auto manufacturer's car lines must meet a fuel economic standard - and the response from the 'well kicked back from oil' executives would push out such a silly looking p.o.c. that no body would buy, just to claim they were abiding by that state's standards?

too lazy in their blatancies... just let the stoogey populace do it for us...

[AdHocSolver]

13. The best way to make solar work is through distributed power generation.

Having one large generating station run by a single operator that controls power generation and distribution over a large area is how the corporations are able to rip off the public.

Solar and wind power can be generated and distributed locally in many areas. It does not require billions of dollars and huge teams of engineers and technicians to build and install such systems as it does for centralized energy production such as coal-, oil-, or nuclear-powered plants.

K and R.

[alp227]

14. at least there will soon be tariffs on Chinese solar panels

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/21/business/energy-environment/us-to-place-tariffs-on-chinese-solar-panels.html

the solar industry in China gets such a HUGE amount of corporate welfare, the Solyndra loan looks as cheap as a cup of coffee.

[Egalitarian Thug]

17. Do you think we will ever figure out that great things cannot be accomplished

when the first priority is quarterly profits? No corporation or collection of corporations would or could have built Boulder (Hoover) Dam. Same for space travel, the interstate highway system, even our railway network wouldn't have been done except for the government legalizing outright theft of private property.

Capitalism is not self sufficient, period. It is utterly dependent on societal subsidization to form and continue and so has an obligation to serve that society first.

[Uncle Joe]

19. Kudos to worrdpix and Atypical Liberal for posts # 2 & 3.

Thanks for the thread, Psephos.