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Chu: Solyndra loan unrelated to fundraiser
Energy Secretary Steven Chu is strongly denying that a major Democratic fundraiser’s investments in the failed solar company Solyndra had any influence on the Energy Department’s $535 million loan guarantee to the company.
“I was not aware, and certainly no decision we made in the loan program had anything to do with who was investing in this company,” Chu told NPR in an interview broadcast Tuesday evening.
The comments come ahead of Chu’s Thursday appearance before a House Energy and Commerce Committee panel that’s probing the loan guarantee to Solyndra, the solar panel manufacturer that went bankrupt in early September.
They are probing the decision to grant the guarantee in 2009, and the early 2011 restructuring that put private investors ahead of taxpayers in line for repayment if the company liquidated.
Chu said Kaiser's political affiliations weren't a factor. “There were people like George Kaiser who have been associated with the Democratic Party; there were other people who have been associated with the Republican Party and have been donors there,” Chu said.
“Who was backing the company had nothing to do with the work of our loan professionals — to what extent they were even aware I can't really say — but certainly at my level and the people I was talking to, we were not aware of the Democrat or Republican backers,” he added.
The GOP probe has not uncovered evidence of political favoritism.
Elsewhere in the interview, Chu defended the decision to finance the company, which ran into serious financing trouble after receiving the loan guarantee.
Chu made speeding up the loan guarantee program -- which hadn’t issued a single guarantee when President Obama took office, despite being authorized in a 2005 energy law -- a priority when he became secretary.
The Energy Department has faced criticisms over its vetting process, but Chu said the reviews were rigorous.
“We improved the process. We did not cut corners. We actually made it more thorough and diligent,” Chu said. He added that the assessment of Solyndra’s application was “very thorough” but that the company faced unexpected market headwinds.
“What was unanticipated was that the market for the price of solar modules really plummeted; we are talking about something like, over a two- or three-year period, more than 60 percent decrease,” Chu said.
Chu also said that be believes he has President Obama’s full support.
White House emails made public last week showed that Dan Carol, a green energy advocate and research director for President Obama’s 2008 election campaign, emailed White House officials calling for Chu’s ouster.
In a lengthy message early this year, Carol called on top White House officials to replace him as secretary as part of a broader set of changes in clean energy programs and leadership.
The emails show that Pete Rouse, a top adviser to Obama, rejected Carol’s call for Chu to step down, while also asking other White House officials if the president should focus more on energy.
Chu, in the NPR interview, questioned the credibility of Carol’s criticisms.
“I don’t know him, he doesn’t know me and I am not sure he knows the details of what happens in the Department of Energy,” Chu said.
