Clean energy companies reeling; OptiSolar halts manufacturing; Wind and biodiesel companies layoff workers
OptiSolar said today that it will shut down its two manufacturing plants and lay off most of its workers because it was unable to tap enough financing to secure its long-term growth.
Just last year OptiSolar had announced that it would build the massive 550 megawatts Topaz solar farm in California’s Central Coast. Pacific Gas and Electric had agreed to buy all of the plant’s electricity output. But the credit freeze left it unable to secure funding to build the plant and finance other projects.
Earlier this month OptiSolar sold its pipeline of unfinished projects to Tempe, Ariz., -based First Solar in a $400 million all stock transaction. Included in that transaction was the landmark Topaz energy project. At the time OptiSolar said that it would stay in the cleantech business as a solar cell manufacturer and was counting on a federal loan guarantee of some $300 million to complete construction of its Sacramento thin-film solar cell plant.
But with the government guarantee taking longer than expected to secure and unable to find a buyer, OptiSolar opted to shut down its factories in Sacramento and Hayward, Calif., and lay off 200 workers.
OptiSolar spokesman Alan Bernheimer told the San Francisco Chronicle that it could resume production at the Hayward facility if someone purchased it but he warned that it would take a buyer “with resources, cash flow, the ability to invest in research and development.” Such buyers are hard to come by these days.
Clean energy companies across the board have been announcing layoffs. They include Spanish developer Acciona Windpower, which said today that it would cut 65 jobs in the U.S. Last week biofuel maker Imperium Renewables cut 24 employees, or the majority of its workers at its plant in Washington state.
Just last year, across all sectors — wind, solar, or biofuel — clean energy companies experienced record growth but the sector has been knocked out by the bad economy.
