From Bloomberg News:

The company listed assets of $73.9 million and debt of $90.5 million as of Dec. 31 in Chapter 11 papers filed today in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan. Ener1 has been affected by competing battery developers in China and South Korea, “which generally have a lower cost manufacturing base” and lower labor and raw material costs, interim Chief Executive Officer Alex Sorokin said in the petition.

Like Solyndra, Ener1 was a company touted by President Obama as being a shining example of his vision for taxpayer-subsidized clean energy.

The day following President Barack Obama’s 2011 State of the Union Address, Vice President Joe Biden toured Ener1’s lithium-ion battery system manufacturing facility in Greenfield, Indiana and said:

As you heard President Obama say last night, this Administration is forging a new path forward by making sure America doesn’t just lead in the 21st Century, but dominates in the 21st Century. We’re not just creating new jobs-but sparking whole new industries that will ensure our competitiveness for decades to come-industries like electric vehicle manufacturing.

Ener1’s EnerDel unit, which is based in Indianapolis, Indiana, likewise received a Solyndra-style shout out from Mr. Obama during a 2009 swing through Indiana. During his remarks, Mr. Obama said:

See, I’m committed to a strategy that ensures America leads in the design and the deployment of the next generation of clean-energy vehicles.  This is not just an investment to produce vehicles today; this is an investment in our capacity to develop new technologies tomorrow.  This is about creating the infrastructure of innovation.

Indiana is the second largest recipient of grant funding, and it’s a perfect example of what this will mean.  You’ve got Purdue University, Notre Dame, Indiana University, and Ivy Tech, and they’re all going to be receiving grant funding to develop degree and training programs for electric vehicles.  That’s number one.  We’ve got EnerDel, a small business in Indianapolis that will develop batteries for hybrid and electric vehicles.

Payoffs on these public investments don’t always come right away.  Some technologies don’t pan out; some companies fail.  But I will not walk away from the promise of clean energy.

We’re not going to cede the wind industry or the solar industry or the battery industry to China or Germany because we’re too timid to make that same commitment here in the United States.  We’ve subsidized oil for a very long time, long enough. It’s time to end the taxpayer giveaways to an industry that’s never been more profitable. We’ve got to double down on a clean-energy industry that’s never been more promising.

The White House on Friday sent more internal documents to Republicans investigating the $535 million loan guarantee to failed solar firm Solyndra, arguing that the cache of emails should satisfy GOP investigators.

The emails show senior White House aides discussing the need to coordinate messaging with the Energy Department and others ahead of Solyndra layoffs that occurred in early November 2010.

Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee have been pressuring the White House for weeks to release more Solyndra documents, after officials provided about 135 pages of emails in response to a GOP subpoena.

The newly released documents will likely provide fodder for the ongoing, months-long Republican investigation into the loan guarantee. House Republicans have signaled that they intend to make it a top political priority when Congress returns next week.

The White House sent 66 additional pages of documents to the committee Friday in an effort to quell persistent Republican allegations that the administration approved the Solyndra loan guarantee for political reasons.

Read more at The Hill.

An electric vehicle manufacturer that received a $529 million loan from the Energy Department is recalling 239 vehicles.

The Transportation Department’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) said Thursday that the company, Fisker Automotive, will recall its Karma vehicles made between July 1, 2011, and Nov. 3, 2011, because of a faulty electric battery component that could cause a fire.

“Within the high-voltage battery, certain hose clamps may have been positioned incorrectly during assembly. If positioned incorrectly, the batter compartment cover could interfere with the hose clamps, potentially causing a coolant leak from the cooling hose,” NHTSA said in its recall notice Thursday.

“If coolant enters the battery compartment, an electrical short could occur possibly resulting in a fire.”

The Energy Department issued a $529 million loan to Fisker in April 2010 for the development of its plug-in electric vehicles.

The administration has come under fire for issuing the loan after ABC News reported in October that Fisker is making its vehicles in Finland because it could not find a contractor in America to manufacture them.

Read more here.

New light bulb efficiency standards will begin phasing in on Jan. 1 despite intense opposition from conservatives, who have blasted the rules as a textbook unnecessary federal regulation.

While Republicans secured inclusion of a measure blocking funding for enforcement of the standards in a year-end spending bill, energy efficiency groups say the provision will have little practical impact. The Energy Department rules will nonetheless go into effect at the start of 2012.

“The [spending bill] cut funding for enforcement, however the law is still in effect,” said Jack Gillis, spokesman for the Consumer Federation of America. “It is our expectation that companies will still comply with the law.”

Steven Nadel, executive director of the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, said companies have been preparing for the new light bulb efficiency standards since Congress passed the 2007 energy law requiring traditional incandescent light bulbs to be 30 percent more efficient starting in 2012.

“The major manufacturers have already made the investments to follow the law,” he said. “They’re law-abiding companies who aren’t going to break the law.”

Read more here.

Unlike Solyndra, which went bankrupt after receiving the loan from the government leaving taxpayer on the hook, SunPower’s deal is more complicated.  Many questions are being raised about how the company was able to obtain the loan and what they did after they got the money.  Questions include:

• How could the Department of Energy give a loan to a company that was under a shareholder suit alleging securities fraud and misrepresentations?
• The son of Rep. George Miller (D-CA) who was paid $178,000 to lobby on behalf of the company represented SunPower as a lobbyist.  Why did Rep. George Miller tour the SunPower facility – which is outside his congressional district – and what other official action did Rep. Miller take on behalf of the company that is represented by his lobbyist son?
• Did the company’s hefty political contributions to the Obama campaign and the DCCC play a role in the deal?
• Did U.S. taxpayers help pay for the company to open a facility in Mexico after the announcement of the loan?
• Was the U.S. government aware that company executives were in the process of selling a portion of the company to a French company – an action that was undertaken two weeks after the loan was awarded?  Did the loan allow insider’s to cash out leaving other investors holding on to the stock that has dropped by more than 60% since the loan was awarded?

Questionable Finances

In 2009, a year before the DOE awarded the loan, investors in SunPower filed a class action lawsuit against the company alleging SunPower and certain of the Company`s executive officers were in violation of federal securities laws.

The lawsuit alleged the company knew or recklessly disregarded and failed to disclose or indicate the following: (1) that the Company made unsubstantiated accounting entries during the Class Period; (2) that, as a result, the Company’s financial results were overstated during the Class Period; (3) that the Company’s financial results were not prepared in accordance with Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (“GAAP”); (4) that the Company lacked adequate internal and financial controls; and (5) as a result of the above, the Company’s financial statements were materially false and misleading at all relevant times.”

Despite questions about potential violations of federal securities law, the Department of Energy approved the loan guarantee in 2010.

All to create 10-15 permanent jobs. That’s not some silly estimate, its what the Department itself thought would result from the billion dollar loan.

House Republicans released an email Friday evening showing that a senior Treasury Department official in August expressed concern that the Energy Department’s early 2011 restructuring of the solar company Solyndra’s $535 million loan guarantee may have been illegal.

The restructuring put private investors, who were providing another $75 million to the struggling company, first in line for repayment if the company went under. In addition, House Republicans probing Solyndra – which collapsed several weeks ago – say DOE may have violated requirements to consult with Treasury on the revision of the loan agreement.

The Energy and Commerce Committee’s GOP leaders wrote to Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner Friday seeking documents about Treasury’s communication with the White House, DOE and other agencies on the financing.

They are questioning whether DOE ran afoul of a provision in a 2005 statute, which first authorized the loan program, that requires DOE to consult with Treasury on loan guarantees and major subsequent changes in the terms.

“In the course of our investigation, we have uncovered information that raises questions as to whether the Department of Energy satisfied the requirement to consult with the Department of the Treasury about the $535 million loan guarantee issued to Solyndra in September 2009 and the restructuring of that agreement in February 2011,” states the letter from Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.) and Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.), who heads the committee’s investigations panel.

They cite an August 17, 2011, email from Treasury’s Assistant Secretary for Financial Markets Mary J. Miller to Jeffrey D. Zients, the deputy director of the White House Office of Management and Budget.

The email, according to the Republicans, states:

[O]ur legal counsel believes that the statute and the DOE regulations both require that the guaranteed loan should not be subordinate to any loan or other debt obligation. The DOE regulations also state that DOE shall consult with OMB and Treasury before any ‘deviation’ is granted from the financial terms of the Loan Guarantee Agreement. In February, we requested in writing that DOE seek the Department of Justice’s approval of any proposed restructuring. To our knowledge, that has never happened.

Read the whole thing here.

On today’s edition of Coffee and Markets, Brad Jackson and Ben Domenech are joined by Lachlan Markay, investigative reporter for the Heritage Foundation to discuss the ever evolving Solyndra scandal, the President’s insistence that is was a good investment of taxpayer money, and which green-energy company may be the next Solyndra.

We’re brought to you as always by BigGovernment and Stephen Clouse and Associates. If you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

Related Links:

White House Knew Solyndra Was In Trouble, Emails Indicate
Obama: No regrets over Solyndra
Emails Show White House Officials Said “Oblivious” Department of Energy Meant “Bad Days Are Coming”
Is Harry Reid-Backed Nevada Geothermal the Next Solyndra?
Lachlan Markay at Heritage Foundation

Follow Brad on Twitter
Follow Ben on Twitter
Lachlan Markay on Twitter

The hosts and guests of Coffee and Markets speak only for ourselves, not any clients or employers.