The Department of Energy on Thursday announced that it had recovered some $200 million in taxpayer dollars loaned to a failed solar energy startup by the Obama administration.
That money represents just part of the $737 million that the Department of Energy previously issued to Tonopah Solar Energy in 2011; $424 million was still outstanding at the time the settlement was reached. The deal still requires the approval of a U.S. bankruptcy court to proceed.
“President Trump will always stand with the hardworking taxpayers of America,” a senior administration official told the Washington Free Beacon, “and today’s massive $200 million settlement agreement by the Department of Energy secures taxpayer money that was squandered by the previous administration’s failed energy pet projects.”
The settlement is the conclusion of efforts by both the Obama and Trump administrations to shore up the flailing solar energy project, which promised to be revolutionary but ended in bankruptcy. Its eventual collapse recalls other ill-fated Obama-era investments in green energy, including the $500 million bilked out of federal coffers by failed solar panel startup Solyndra. – READ MORE
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