No More Solyndras Act

Floor Speech

The House in Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union had under consideration the bill (H.R. 6213) to limit further taxpayer exposure from the loan guarantee program established under title XVII of the Energy Policy Act of 2005:

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chair, contrary to all the rhetoric around this legislation, H.R. 6213 does not terminate the Title 17 loan guarantee program. In fact, when Republicans were offered a chance to end this Bush-era initiative in the Energy and Commerce Committee, the motion failed by a vote of 3-39.

Instead, H.R. 6213 retains the $34 billion of existing loan guarantee authority--and then arbitrarily limits the competition for that authority to the roughly 50 projects that had submitted their applications before the end of 2011. In other words, under this bill, a loan guarantee commitment can be issued in 2020 to a company that applied in 2010--but any better, cheaper or more promising proposal that arises between now and then need not apply.

This is the worst kind of governing by bumper sticker, and it has unfortunately become emblematic of the Republican majority in the 112th Congress.

Mr. Chair, we can and should be investing in clean energy. We simply cannot afford to cede this rapidly growing market to the Chinese and other international competitors. In that regard, the Title 17 loan guarantee program has caused tens of billions of dollars in private capital to be invested in clean energy projects. It has helped double renewable energy generation. It has created 60,000 jobs and saved over 300 million gallons of gasoline. And it has done all of this with a default rate of 3 percent, which is less than the half the default rate in the federal student loan program whose current interest rates a bipartisan majority in this House recently voted to extend.

It is time to stop demagoguing and time to start governing. I urge a no vote.

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