SunEdison Inc (OTCMKTS:SUNEQ), a solar power firm, received millions of dollars from the United States government just before it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in late April, says a new report.
According to a new report from Vermont Watchdog, the bankruptcy company garnered approximately $5 million in federal grants and loans from Washington. This means that the federal government has picked yet another lose in its growing list of supported solar companies.
The company had to file for Chapter 11 after it accumulated more than $16 billion in debt. The stock collapsed 99 percent in the last 12 months after the solar firm expanded too quickly, purchased too many assets and faced numerous legal woes. It has started to sell its renewable energy project assets all over the world, which total roughly 500.
It isn’t just SunEdison that is facing financial difficulties. Its yieldcos – TerraForm Power Inc and TerraForm Global Inc – could follow its parent company into bankruptcy, too. TerraForm Power owns Sheffield Wind Farm, which has generated a lot of controversy in Vermont since 2006.
Here is what the watchdog group writes:
“Then there is the checkered history of First Wind, the company that built the turbines that were part of SunEdison’s $2.4 billion takeover in March 2015. It was then that SunEdison created TerraForm, a yeildco (a type of subsidiary that focuses on maintaining operating assets) to take over Sheffield Wind, among other former First Wind assets.
Rob Pforzheimer, a Sutton resident living near Sheffield Wind who has led community resistance against it since even before the project’s 2006 Public Service Board hearings, recalled some of First Wind’s history for Watchdog. He said that First Wind changed its name after developing a suspect reputation in Maine, which included lawsuits regarding noise complaints over its turbines there.
‘Before they were First Wind, they were called UPC Wind Management,’ said Pforheimer. ‘They had lots of projects in Maine, and they were really heavy-handed in getting those done.’
Pforzheimer said the suspect business practices go back further still. Before its days in Maine, UPC Wind had created a subsidiary company called Italian Vento Power Corp., which built wind projects in Sicily and Sardinia.”
It was reported last month that SunEdison’s bankruptcy is even bigger than Solyndra’s. We all know that Solyndra was touted by the Obama administration as the solar company of the future.
So, now you can add SunEdison to the federal governments list of failed investments.
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