bjbjLULU GWEN IFILL: Next, the future for solar energy in the U.S., now clouded by the
collapse of a California company backed by government loans. NewsHour correspondent Spencer
Michels reports. SPENCER MICHELS: The solar industry boasts that it's growing fast, installing
roof top panels that turn sunlight into electricity at a record pace. This year, it expects to
create enough electricity to power 350,000 homes, double last year's rate. And that,
say proponents, saves a lot of fossil fuel. LYNDON RIVE, SolarCity: The average cost of
electricity would be just under 10 cents. SPENCER MICHELS: Lyndon Rive is the founder
and CEO of the privately held company SolarCity in an industry that gets various forms of
government subsidies, including tax credits and loan guarantees, that make it cheaper
for companies to borrow money to expand. LYNDON RIVE: The solar industry has grown 60 percent
year on year. Last year, it grew 50 percent. This year, it's grown 60 percent. There's
over 5,000 companies that are in the solar industry. SPENCER MICHELS: His firm, SolarCity,
operating in 11 states, is the largest solar installer in the U.S. with 1,300 employees,
500 of them hired in the last 12 months. Nationally, solar employs 100,000 workers. Yet industry
groups and leaders have seen trouble signs ahead for a while. Dan Reicher, director of
Stanford's Center for Energy Policy, says the industry is at risk. DAN REICHER, Stanford's
Center for Energy Policy: We may not see the loan guarantee program extended. We may see
a major cut in federal support for clean energy research and development. There's going to
be a major battle next year over extending some key tax credits for clean energy. SPENCER
MICHELS: Despite its growth, solar still supplies less than 1 percent of American electricity.
The troubled economy has hurt investment in solar, and competition from China has undercut
U.S. sales. Several solar companies have failed, including OptiSolar in 2009, victims of what
insiders call consolidation of the industry. LYNDON RIVE: Those companies that cannot keep
up with the innovation and the reduction of costs, they will go out of business. But it's
for the health of the entire industry. SPENCER MICHELS: And then this year came the collapse
of Solyndra, a California company making cylindrical solar panels, a firm President Obama visited
and touted in May of 2010. The company found it couldn't compete with cheaper Chinese-made
flat panels, so it defaulted on a government loan of half-a-billion dollars The incident
has contributed to a growing national debate on the value of green energy. SolarCity's
Rive is concerned that Solyndra's failure will make an embarrassed administration and
a skittish Congress hold back on what he calls incentives or subsidies to help this fledgling
industry, the kinds of government support the oil industry has always enjoyed. LYNDON
RIVE: Now, if all the incentives disappeared, absolutely, that would be catastrophic for
the solar industry. SPENCER MICHELS: House Republicans highlighted the Solyndra failure
in a committee hearing last month titled "How Obama's Green Energy Agenda Is Killing Jobs."
Rep. Darrell Issa of California chaired the event. REP. DARRELL ISSA, R-Calif., Oversight
and Government Reform Committee chairman: The guise of green jobs has become a political
rallying cry designed to unite environmentalists, union leaders to consolidate an ideological-based
agenda. This would be OK if, in fact, it produced the jobs. And it didn't. SPENCER MICHELS:
While the White House claimed that its investment in clean energy created 225,000 jobs by last
January, Issa charged, the government used gimmick accounting in tallying green jobs.
In any case, Rive said the political reaction immediately slowed down a big project SolarCity
had planned to equip military bases, including Hickam Air Force Base in Hawaii, with solar
power. A government loan guarantee the company was expecting didn't come through. LYNDON
RIVE: It has affected us slightly on a project called SolarStrong. The effect that it has
caused, it has caused is a slight delay. SolarStrong, our project which deploys solar to 160,000
military homes, will still proceed. We will just now go ahead and raise the capital without
the loan guarantees. SPENCER MICHELS: Around the country, conservatives have begun attacking
the administration's support for alternative energy of all kinds. In Sacramento, Calif.,
for example, conservative activist Eric Eisenhammer founded the Coalition of Energy Users to fight
government spending on green power. ERIC EISENHAMMER, Coalition of Energy Users: The green energy
industry involves a lot of hedge fund managers who are making a lot money off it. And a lot
of these guys are also making large donations to politicians and then they're getting these
massive taxpayer-funded subsidies in return. But it's for an economic model that doesn't
really pan out. Green energy is a few times more expensive than conventional energy. So,
I don't believe that it really competes very well in a free market. SPENCER MICHELS: But
President Obama voiced his continuing support for green energy subsidies. PRESIDENT BARACK
OBAMA: A lot of these small startups, they can get angel investors, they can get several
million dollars to get a company going, but it's very hard for them to then scale up,
particularly if these are new cutting-edge technologies. It's hard for them to find private
investors. And part of what's happening is China and Europe, other countries, are putting
enormous subsidies into these companies and giving them incentives to move offshore. SPENCER
MICHELS: Since the Solyndra collapse, the administration has announced several new loan
guarantees, claiming green energy is a big job creator, a view shared by Stanford's Reicher.
DAN REICHER: Go in and retrofit somebody's home to make it more energy-efficient, there's
a lot of jobs there. Put solar panels on the roof, there's a lot of jobs there. Make the
chemicals that you need ultimately to make a solar panel, there's jobs there. There's
a lot of jobs here to be created in clean energy broadly. SPENCER MICHELS: Reicher sees
tremendous growth potential for green energy. DAN REICHER: I think the government has a
serious role to play, and I would hate to see too serious a pullback, particularly at
a moment when the Chinese role is on the rise, when the German role is on the rise, when
many other countries around the world are realizing the importance in terms of jobs
and economic development of what will literally be a multitrillion-dollar industry over the
next couple of decades. SPENCER MICHELS: Still, even some Democrats think the Solyndra debacle
invites a cautious approach. California Treasurer Bill Lockyer heads a state agency that grants
exemptions from paying sales tax to green energy companies. He wants to delay new exemptions.
BILL LOCKYER, California state treasurer: We want solar power. We want these jobs in
our state. But let's do it smartly. Let's try to avoid these bad results like the Solyndra
disaster, if we can avoid it. Let's see if there's a effective way to do it that doesn't
cost taxpayers money. SPENCER MICHELS: People on all sides of the debate acknowledge that
Solyndra's collapse has intensified the battle. DAN REICHER: I think this has become a political
football in Washington. And Solyndra has crystallized this in an unfortunate way. SPENCER MICHELS:
Both proponents and detractors of government support for green energy show little sign
of backing down. h?|i h?|i urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags City urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags
country-region urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags place urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags
State GWEN IFILL: Next, the future for solar energy in the U Normal Microsoft Office Word
GWEN IFILL: Next, the future for solar energy in the U Title Microsoft Office Word Document
MSWordDoc Word.Document.8