3 August '10
10:02 AM UTC
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Cleantech

A123 Looks for Boost From $17.1M Energy Department Loan for Batteries

UPDATE: A123 stock (NASDAQ: AONE) is up almost 5 percent to $11.05 at 11:42 a.m.

Could A123 be on its way back up?

The Watertown, Mass., battery maker got a boost yesterday when the Department of Energy gave a conditional commitment for a $17.1 million loan guarantee to AES Energy Storage, which will use A123 lithium ion batteries to build an energy storage system.

The 20 megawatt project, in Johnson City, New York, will allow renewable energy to play a bigger role in energy transmission by storing energy from intermittent sources such as wind and solar in A123 batteries. When demand spikes, power companies can use the stored energy rather than burning fossil fuels to balance its load. Read More »

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11 November '09
3:25 PM UTC
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Funding

DOE Hires Venture Capitalist to Oversee Key Cleantech Funding Program

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Back in March, as the first draft of the Obama administration’s massive green energy investment program began to emerge, we asked if the Department of the Treasury was poised to become cleantech’s new venture capital fund (The Treasury: clean energy’s new VC).

It turns out that we were wrong. Treasury only administers the Obama administration’s green energy funds. The Department of Energy is where the power is, since it actually decides who gets the money. For confirmation of DOE’s growing power, look no further than this press release announcing the appointment of Jonathan Silver, a Washington-based venture capitalist, as the executive director of the DOE’s loan program office. DOE (not Treasury) is clean energy’s new VC. The appointment is yet another indication of the agency’s transformation as one of Washington’s leading funding sources.

In this role, Silver will decide what clean energy and automobile companies get money. Besides the energy loan guarantees, Silver is also in charge of the Department’s Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing (ATVM) program. Read More »

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2 July '09
5:42 PM UTC
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Cleantech
Wind

Beacon Power, Nordic Windpower Secure $59M in DOE Funding

Beacon Power and Nordic Windpower have scored financing in the form of loan guarantees from the Department of Energy. They are the second and third companies to land the coveted financing since Energy Secretary Steven Chu relaunched the program, vowing to speed up the review of loan applications.

The loan guarantees, which are not part of the stimulus funding, were created as part of the Energy Policy Act of 2005 and are administered by the Treasury Department.

Tyngsboro, Mass.,-based Beacon Power will get $43 million in loan guarantees and plans to use the money to build a 20-megawatt flywheel energy storage plant in Stephentown, N.Y., GreenTechMedia reports. The total project is expected to cost $69 million.

Nordic Windpower, a developer of low cost two-blade turbines secured $16 million in loan guarantees to expand a wind turbine assembly factory in Pocatello, Idaho. The Berkeley, Calif., company recently appointed Thomas Carbone as its new CEO. In the past the company has raised venture capital from Goldman Sachs, Impax Asset Management, I2BF Venture Capital and Pulsar Energy Capital.

BrightSource Energy, according to GreenTechMedia, has applied for federal financing to support the construction of two utility-scale solar power plants with  300 megawatts in combined capacity. The developer plans to sell the electric to Pacific Gas and Electric under a long-term power purchase agreement.

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