Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee
Current state of the Department of Energy Loan Guarantee Program 1
The purpose of the hearing is to receive testimony on the current state of the Department of Energy Loan Guarantee Program, authorized under Title 17 of the Energy Policy Act of 2005, and how the delivery of services to support the deployment of clean energy technologies might be improved.
Witnesses- David Frantz, Director of Loan Guarantee Program, Department of Energy
- Andy Karsner, Distinguished Fellow, Council on Competitiveness
- Kevin Book, Senior Vice President, Energy Policy, Oil & Alternative Energy, Friedman Billings Ramsey & Company, Inc.
- James Asselstine, Managing Director, Barclays Capital
Forget huge loan guarantees for nuclear. What is needed is solutions that can be implemented right now to cut emissions. The first new nuclear plant is at least a decade away with it’s 1 GW of power. In the meantime, we could build 100 GW of solar and wind power. Solar thermal with heat storage in the southwest is what should be first priority, because it’s steady dispatchable base load power can displace old coal plants.
With enough incentive 100 GW of solar thermal (CSP) alone could be built by 2020. CSP and wind, which is the greenest of all and cheap, should be our top priorities for new energy sources.
http://www.rsc.org/delivery/_ArticleLinking/DisplayHTMLArticleforfree.cfm?JournalCode=EE&;Year=2009&ManuscriptID=b809990c&Iss=Advance_Article
It is good to see that $50 billon of nuclear pork has been cut from the stimulus bill. I say cut it all and give it to these two.