$2 Billion in DOE Conditional Loan Guarantees for Two 250MW CSP Plants

The DOE loan guarantee program has disbursed $30.7 billion and claims to have created or saved 62,350 jobs.

Add $2 billion more to the dollar total and 1,800 to the jobs total with today's news.

U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu just announced the offer of conditional commitments to provide loan guarantees to support two 250-megawatt concentrating solar power (CSP) projects:

• The Mojave Solar Project, sponsored by Abengoa Solar in San Bernardino County, California is being offered a $1.2 billion loan guarantee.
• The Genesis Solar Project, sponsored by NextEra Energy Resources on land managed by the BLM in Riverside County, California is being offered up to a $681.6 million loan guarantee.

Both projects employ parabolic trough solar thermal technology, and power from both projects will be sold to Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E).

I've heard some PV executives claim that CSP projects can't be built without loan guarantees -- and that any project without a loan guarantee is doomed.

Brett Prior, Greentech Media Research's CSP expert, made the point that although the loan guarantee program has been criticized for moving too slowly, it looks like the DOE is finally granting approvals for these large projects. He adds that while it is a difficult and arduous process, if you can reduce your borrowing cost by 1 percent or 2 percent on these enormous projects, then the economics make sense.

We've covered the details and the pros and cons of the loan guarantee program here. And we covered another recent modest loan guarantee for FRV's 20-megawatt Apex project here.

Here's a list of the DOE loan guarantees to date -- not including the most recent three projects.