DOE Loan Rules Tightened After Fisker Failures

The Department of Energy’s loan program for the advancement of vehicle technology underwent some significant changes following Fisker Automotive’s financial problems. The Feds decided to tighten restrictions and hopefully mitigate wasteful spending, though that has done nothing to cull critics of the green energy loan program.

The United States DOE (Department of Energy) has been accused by some of frivolously giving money away to every alternative energy company that applies for financial aid, as part of its Advanced Technology Vehicle Manufacturing (ATVM) Program. That is far from true however, as companies like Carbon Motors and Bright Automotive both failed to secure government funding for their respective green car projects.

Documents released by a House committee suggest that Fisker Automotive’s financial problems were directly associated with the shut down of the Advanced Technology Vehicle Manufacturing Program. Last year the Feds cut off Fisker’s loan access after the company failed to deliver enough Fisker Karmas in the allotted time frame.

Unfortunately, Fisker may have ruined the program for everyone. Despite the success of Tesla Motors, which also received a DOE loan, the Department of Energy said that they have no plans to award the remaining $16.4 billion stockpiled for the Advanced Technology Vehicle Manufacturing Program to anyone. And can anyone blame them? After all the political sniping and companies like Fisker folding, the DOE is understandably skittish about awarding anymore loans. That means new upstarts are on their own when it comes to securing funding.

Is this a good development for the government, or a bad development for green automakers? Guess it depends on how you look at it.

Source: The Detroit News

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Tags: Department of Energy, DOE, DOE loan regulations, Fisker Automotive, Fisker Automotive financial issues, Fisker loans, green loans, green vehicle loans, U.S. Department of Energy, US DOE, US Energy Department

About the Author

Nicholas Brown writes on CleanTechnica, Gas2, Kleef&Co, and Green Building Elements. He has a keen interest in physics-intensive topics such as electricity generation, refrigeration and air conditioning technology, energy storage, and geography. His website is: Kompulsa.com.

http://www.facebook.com/mark.brooks.12764 Mark Brooks

Trying to fix US foreign oil dependency on the cheap by cherry picking Alt energy companies just isn’t going to work. Take a hint for the oil industry. When Canada wanted to scale up the Oil sands to the point it could be profitable two levels of government provided 50 billion in tax payer funded incentives over 15 years. That’s $100 per tax payer, or equal to $500 billion on a US scale. Canada is now not just energy independent, it is an EXPORTER!

Tax incentives work, trying to go cheap by cherry picking doesn’t work. The US should get serious, before its billion dollar a day imported oil habit sucks its economy into a black hole.
- Jo Borras
  
  The problem with the US’ policies in general is a widespread lack of understanding of things like “public debt”, “fiat currency”, and the purpose of taxation. Most Americans still think we need to balance a congressional budget or else “Chaahna will end up ownin’ us!”
Martin K

Considering the lame duck status of our President I’m very surprised at this turn of events. I really don’t see how mal-investment by the DOE is a negative for anyone (other than the taxpayers which probably have no idea what the DOE even does).

I’m definitely happy with the change though. Business ventures like this, which could inevitably become profitable, need to come from private investors. At least then it’s the fat cats that lose money, not you and me.
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