By Bernie at Planck's Constant:
China has lessons for Marxists the world
over regarding government subsidized Solar energy (are you listening
Obama?) - even with the largest building boom (1)
in world history, there is not enough profit to be made to keep a solar
panel company in business, despite China's generous handouts and loans.
Leading solar panel maker in China declares bankruptcy
Photo Credit: Xinhua/Shen Peng
In the photo above taken on 26 Sep 2011, a worker forklifts solar
panel products at Suntech Power in Wuxi, east China's Jiangsu Province.
China's leading solar panel maker, a New York-listed private company
based in Wuxi, declared bankruptcy on 20 Mar 2013 (2).
As well, a few days later, German car parts supplier Bosch announced
it would discontinue its solar panel manufacturing business (3).
This will not deter our President from making more investments in
green energy businesses that will ultimately fail. Despite state and
government subsidies, promises of lower utility rates to encourage
voters to accept these projects have not panned out; even the U.S.
Department of Energy experts in the matter say that solar costs three
and a half times that of coal. Indeed, rates for electricity in Boulder
City, Colorado did in fact increase (4).
I can't figure out which is the greater hoax: that subsidizing green
energy is good for our country or that Obama is not a Marxist.
(4):
Nevada Journal, 20 mAR 2012, Obama to tout green energy ‘investments’ at solar facility employing 5 workers, relying on $54 million in taxpayer subsidies
President
Obama will tout investments in “renewable” energy Wednesday at the
local Copper Mountain Solar 1 plant, although the plant has only five
full-time employees.
The plant, owned by San Diego-based energy company Sempra, was
built in late 2010 at a cost of $141 million. Funding included $42
million in federal-government tax credits and $12 million in tax-rebate
commitments from the state of Nevada.
...
Solar 1 is the largest solar photovoltaic (PV) power plant in the
country and is regarded as a “revenue generator” by Sempra. According to
the Las Vegas Sun, Boulder City expects to receive over $60 million in
lease revenue from the plant.
...
In addition to wanting to create many new jobs, President Obama has
claimed green-energy investment will decrease America’s energy costs and
reduce the country’s dependency on foreign oil.
In Boulder City, however, renewables have produced no lower energy
costs. Instead, in late 2009, the city approved a 35 percent rate hike,
while power generated by Copper Mountain is to go to Southern California
— rather than serve Nevadans whose taxes helped finance the plant.
...
Nationally, solar energy is unlikely to help the president achieve
his goal of lower energy costs. Geoffrey Lawrence, deputy policy
director at the Nevada Policy Research Institute, the free-market think
tank that publishes Nevada Journal, noted in his Solutions 2013 report
that, even according to the U.S. Department of Energy, solar-PV energy
will cost three and a half times more than energy from traditional
sources such as coal.
(posted here with permission - go leave Bernie a comment here)
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