It’s easy to put your mouth on your money before you start your career, yet Turkey has captured the sentiment of youth in a new study that find Turkish youth will pay 10% more on renewable energy.

The study involved participants with an average age of 24, comprising 45% male and 55% female. Most participants (74 %) were associate degree and undergraduate students, followed by graduate students (15 %) and doctoral students (11 %).

The study published in Energy for Sustainable Development found a positive result – that youth are willing to pay more for renewable energy, and this will influence future decisions about budgeting and developing renewable energy,

The study led by student Furkan Acikgoz was supervised by Prof. Ozlem Yorulmaz of Turkey.

The researchers write: “Public acceptance of renewable energy will accelerate the transition from energy sources that cause high emissions to environmentally friendly energy sources to combat climate change. For this reason, it is crucial to investigate the adoption intentions of different target audiences.”

They targeted Turkish university students, who are the future decision-makers.

As an emerging economy, Turkey has a chronic current account deficit issue, and energy imports are the primary cause of this imbalance, the researchers point out. For many years, the country’s potential in renewables, especially in solar, hydro, and geothermal energy, remained untapped, leading to extensive debates.

Read More: Turkey’s hydroelectric dam threatens animal massacre

Fossil fuels, including oil, natural gas, and coal made up 81.3 percent of the primary energy supply of Turkey in 2022. The rest is supplied by 31.6 GW of hydroelectric, 25.75 GW of natural gas, 21.3 GW of coal, 11.45 GW of wind, 9.93 GW of solar, 1.7 GW of geothermal, and approximately 2 GW of biomass power plant installed capacity.

Turkey’s support for terror organizations such as Hamas (hosting and treating terror operatives in Turkish hospitals), declared publicly by its leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan make it a risky investment for countries that consider Hamas, ISIS and the the PKK as terror groups. The United States Government reports on thousands of terrorists in Turkey while Turkey declares that it is working to stop terror.

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Ormat Technologies (NYSE: ORA), a leading renewable energy company from Israel specializing in geothermal energy, rang the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange last week to celebrate its 20th year on the exchange.

Ormat’s CEO, Doron Blachar said: “We are honored to celebrate Ormat’s history as a publicly traded company by ringing the NYSE opening bell. As we reflect on 20 years of trading on the NYSE, I am proud of what we have accomplished, and am particularly proud of the Company’s continued growth in developing and providing geothermal, storage and other renewable resources across the globe.

Since Ormat began trading on the NYSE, the geothermal giant grew revenues from $219 million to over $700 million. They have expanded their portfolio from ten electricity generation and recovered energy projects to 42 complexes including 13 energy storage facilities. Some countries they operate in include the US, Kenya, Guatemala, Indonesia, Honduras, and Guadeloupe. They provide clean power to companies like eBay and their servers in Utah.

Their energy generating capacity increased from 343 MW to 1.28 GW across geothermal, energy storage, solar PV and recovered energy, which includes 170MW/298MWh of energy storage capacity.While Ormat has been publicly traded for nearly two decades, its long-term goal is to reach our goal of 1.9 to 2.0 GW portfolio by the end of 2025.

Founded in 1965 as a family business, Ormat has been in the business longer than most of us have been alive. The company owns, operates, designs, manufactures, and sells geothermal power plants primarily based on the Ormat Energy Converter – a power generation unit that converts low-, medium- and high-temperature heat into electricity. The Company has engineered, manufactured, and constructed power plants, which it currently owns or has installed for utilities and developers worldwide, totaling approximately 3,200 MW of gross capacity.

Ormat’s current total generating portfolio is 1,277 MW, comprised of a 1,107 MW geothermal and solar generation portfolio that is spread globally in the U.S., Kenya, Guatemala, Indonesia, Honduras, and Guadeloupe, and a 170 MW energy storage portfolio located in the US.

How does geothermal energy collection work?

Many areas of the world have heat generated from the earth’s core and crust that makes its way to near the surface of earth. In geothermal energy production, a production well is drilled into a known geothermal reservoir and from here water is heated and the steam turns turbines which then drive an electricity generator. Power is then stored or transmitted to power lines.

Tapping into the earth’s crust to extract energy isn’t without its concerns. Remember from our archives the eruption in Indonesia shown not to be linked to Ormat? It’s a good one to read from our archives if you are thinking about investing in this space.

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Renewable energy is something we all want. Churches in the US are putting their faith and investments in them, and governments –– Germany, Australia, Israel on a smaller scale, the United Arab Emirates, Canada and even Saudi Arabia have set goals for attaining 100% renewables one day. How fast countries support businesses and award tenders for solar power plants and wind turbines depends not only on governments but the corporate funding mechanisms in place and the people who want to support green energy.

Consider that 90% of the world’s electricity companies are blocking investment in renewables (Oxford study), so sometimes we need to take matters into own own hands. 

Bonds, or more specifically, green bonds, are just one way that institutional investors – but also individuals – can fulfil client demands to be more green. Colleges investing an endowment, even unions that represent teachers, cities, labourers and artists, can consider green bonds as a carbon-forward structure that puts your clients’ money where their values are.

Today we speak with Peter Leighton, Chief Operating Officer and Co-founder, RE Royalties in Canada to learn more about how green bonds work, and what they can do for us.

Green Prophet: A wind energy farm in British Columbia. A solar park in Texas. What metrics do you look for when financing a deal? Are you looking for more companies to invest in? Tell us about a “dream” deal you would love to see.

Peter Leighton: When we examine an opportunity, we first ensure that the opportunity meets our corporate objective of acquiring a portfolio of long term, stable, and diversified royalty streams that will provide our investors with sustainable long term cash flows.

Specifically, we are looking for the following:

• Renewable or sustainable energy projects;
• Commercially viable technologies;
• Operating projects or those that will reach operation in the very near term – we like near term cash flow;
• Projects that have a strong ability to offset GHG emissions;
• Global diversification but limited to OECD countries in the near term; and
• Targeted returns in the mid-teens.

Yes, we are always looking for new clients and new opportunities!

Our dream opportunity is a developer/owner/operator who has a portfolio of operating renewable energy projects and has an opportunity to develop a new renewable energy project and/or projects but needs financing to realize on that opportunity.  We love it when the opportunity has a tight time line because we firmly believe that our speed to close a transaction is unmatched in the industry and we think this give us a competitive edge in the market place and helps our clients do what they want to do – build more renewable energy projects more quickly.

What has been the perception of renewables since Covid-19, before and after. 

A2: When I first started working in the renewable energy space some 25 years ago, there was a broad perception that renewable energy was expensive and a bit of a science experiment.  What we have seen in the last 10 years, however, is an order of magnitude decrease in the cost of renewables, specifically wind and solar, combined with an order of magnitude increase in the efficiency of both generation technologies. 

Immediately prior to Covid-19, I would say that most people still saw renewables as being a bit of a fad, even though in 2018 over $200 billion was invested in renewables across the globe, more money than was invested in either the Mining Industry or the Oil and Gas Industry during the same time. 

I do not think that any of us can predict the long-term impact of Covid-19 on energy intensive industries such as transportation, home and office heating, and industry in general.  We do know that right now, solar and wind are the cheapest sources of new electricity in more than 2/3 of the world and are expected to be the cheapest everywhere by 2030.

One thing that Covid-19 has proven is that renewables are really quite resilient. In Q2 2020 there was a total investment in renewables of $69.9B compared to Q2 2019 investment of $70.1B, a decline of less than 1%. Even despite the economic impact of Covid-19, the investment in renewables remains robust.

Covid-19 has, and will continue to change the way our society consumes energy and the form of energy we utilise but I do not think it will reduce our overall demand for energy   

What do you think is driving up the price of Tesla stock?

A3: If I knew the answer to this question, I would be living off of my capital gains instead of taking part in this interview!  I do follow Tesla and I do believe that the age of the electrical vehicle has finally arrived.  Economically and environmentally it just makes sense.  Carbon and other emissions alone almost make the business case.  Then when you add in the fuel cost savings, and the reduction in  operating expenses, (approximately 30,000 moving parts in an internal combustion engine versus approximately 20 moving parts in an electric engine), not to mention the reduction in noise pollution, the case for EV’s is pretty solid.

The other thing that Tesla has done very well, is to bring some of the best innovative aspects of the technology sector to what has been a static automotive sector.  Tesla is pushing the boundaries on materials, manufacturing, distribution, and pricing, and their shareholders are getting rewarded based on tech valuations instead of traditional automotive manufacturing valuations.      

What kind of risks are your investors looking to avert? 

A4:  Our shareholders and our green bond investors have told us that they like the fact that investing in either our shares or our green bonds provide them with capital protection, immediate cash flow and attractive risk adjusted returns.  We believe that we deliver on the trifecta of growth and yield while helping the planet.  Our approach is much like a lead-off hitter in baseball; we are aiming for doubles while targeting a very high on base percentage.

Q5: The Middle East is opening up channels to renewable energy to mitigate carbon emissions and to diversify away from oil. What country or two in the Middle East would be an ideal partner for growing your firm’s values? How would you give them value? 

A5: We have spent some time looking at renewable diesel opportunities in Canada with groups refining waste products into transportation fuels and we have also been looking at a few renewable natural gas opportunities in both Europe and Ontario. 

To date, we have not been exposed to any opportunities in the Middle East.  Our values are aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals as set out in 2015 and we would be open to exploring any opportunity that allows us to meet our corporate objective of acquiring a portfolio of long term, stable, and diversified royalty streams that will provide our investors with sustainable long term cash flows while helping to reduce global carbon emissions.

Who should invest in green bonds?

A6: We think our green bonds are an ideal investment for anyone who wants to earn a solid, safe return while helping the planet.  These bonds will offer a strong fixed income return of 6% per annum, and the proceeds will be used to invest in renewable energy projects that will help reduce global carbon emissions and help mitigate climate change. One unique aspect of our green bond offering is that the ability to invest in these bonds is truly democratic; the minimum investment size is only $5,000, and the bonds are eligible for registered accounts. This means that investors can purchase the green bonds in their RSP, RESP, TFSA, or RIF accounts.

Are companies/institutions using your investment as part of their CSR Corporate Social Responsibility plan? Can they use it as carbon credits, for the media? What are you seeing interest in there?

A7: Yes, companies/institutions could use an investment in either our green bonds or our shares as part of their Corporate Social Responsibility plan.  The projects we invest in currently offset 321,667 tonnes of CO2 equivalent emission, and any investor would be able to point to their support of that emission reduction.

Any advantages with you being Canadian for US/foreign investors? Explain.

A8: The Canadian securities regulations require a high degree of disclosure and transparency so that fact that we are traded on the Canadian exchange may be an advantage for some foreign investors.  The fact that we trade in Canadian dollars may also be some advantage to either US/foreign investors who are looking to increase their exposure to the Canadian dollar.  Some investors in very low interest rate environments such as Europe or Japan may also find the 6% yield on our green bonds very attractive.  Even in the United States, a 6% yield on the bonds look attractive.

About RE Royalties

RE Royalties Ltd. is a specialty finance company created in 2016 that creates stable long-term cash flow streams by utilizing a royalty financing model to provide loans to, and acquires revenue-based royalties from, renewable and clean energy projects and companies globally. The company’s mission is to provide innovative financing for climate change solutions. RE Royalties is a publicly traded company on the TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol “RE”, and the first to pioneer the royalty-financing model for renewable energy projects.

Bio – Peter Leighton, Chief Operating Officer and Co-founder, RE Royalties

Peter Leighton is an experienced renewable energy executive with over 20 years of experience in project development and mergers and acquisitions in the energy sector. He is the Co-Founder and Chief Operating Officer of RE Royalties, an innovative finance company specializing in renewable energy. With climate change a pressing issue globally, RE Royalties has become an important source of capital for renewable energy projects. In 2016, RE Royalties officially launched as the first company to take the royalty-financing model, well proven in other industries, and apply it to the renewable energy sector. RE Royalties is a publicly traded company on the TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol “RE”.

Peter is the former President and Chief Operating Officer of Finavera, where he delivered $750 million worth of wind energy projects from the embryonic stages of development through to the ready to build stage. He also worked as the Chief Operating Officer of Accenture’s Business Services for Utilities, the Director of Clean Energy B.C. from 2010 to 2016, and Health Shared Services B.C. from 2009 to 2018. This year Peter was named as an Honouree to Canada’s Clean50 for 2020. Peter holds a Bachelor of Science Degree (BSc) in Geography/ Geology from Queen’s University and a Master, Business Administration (MBA) from the University of British Columbia.

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The New York Stock Exchange-traded company Ormat Technologies (NYSE:ORA) has built what’s being cited as the world’s largest geothermal plant. Geothermal plants tap into heat emitted by the earth’s core, turning this otherwise wasted heat into electricity. The 100 MW plant now online in New Zealand is being called the world’s largest: the Ngatamariki geothermal power plant cost $142 million USD to build ($12 million off target) and it is the biggest “singular binary power plant” ever constructed.  

Ormat says its energy converters are fed by a high temperature (380°F / 193°C) geothermal fluid. But until now only steam turbines or a hybrid combination using steam (and water) were in use. This new plant doesn’t use water, thereby keeping underground water reservoirs intact, and emissions low, the company reports.

The plant was built in two years and will reach an annual output of 700 GWH, about enough energy to power 80,000 homes in New Zealand. 

Active over decades in Israel, Ormat has installed a total of about 350 MW of geothermal energy power plants in 14 sites in New Zealand already. Around the world, its sum total of geothermally-produced energy is about 1600 MW.

Ormat officially based in the US, but with its operations and R&D in Israel. It has benefitted from Solyndra loans, offered by the US government to create clean energy in Nevada.

Read more on geothermal energy:
Ormat Set to Release Alaska’s Geothermal Energy Potential
Ormat Lands Its Largest Geothermal Deal in New Zealand
Utility-Scale Solar Projects Become a Casualty of Republican Hostage-Taking 
Despite Solyndra Bankruptcy, Solar Grew 69% From Obama Policy

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But the Ethiopian Electric Power Corporation (EEPCO) recognizes the danger of relying too much on hydropower, which is an erratic and possibly endangered source of energy. While the country has the staggering potential to produce 45,000 megawatts of hydroelectricity, geothermal also offers promise – so much so that the World Bank has backed a plan to conduct preliminary exploration and drilling.

Towards the end of last month, the Development Bank of Ethiopia unveiled plans to spend USD 20 million to explore sites in the country that have especially good geothermal potential.

The bank has plans to spend an additional USD20 million at a later stage, The Guardian reports.

This initiative is made possible by a USD40 million World Bank grant issued in May last year designed to spur renewable energy generation in Ethiopia and environmentalists are no doubt hopeful that a new focus on geothermal may relax hydroelectric ambitions.

International Rivers, which has been following Ethiopia’s dam boom very closely, paid a recent visit to the construction site of the Grand Renaissance Dam and expressed a number of concerns namely.

These include the probable displacement of more than 5,000 villagers, the risk of erosion and sedimentation and an apparent dismissal of these risks ahead of construction, as well as habitat loss.

“Ethiopia has been heavily deforested, but the Benishangul-Gumuz region where the dam is being built is one of the few places in the country where remnant forest vegetation still exists,” the environmental advocacy group wrote in a field report.

“The local community depends heavily on forest resources for their livelihoods (e.g., hunting, gathering of fruits, honey, firewood, medicinal plants, etc). The dam reservoir is expected to flood 1,680 square kilometers, 90% of which is forest. Road construction to the site will also impact forests.”

Geothermal, by contrast, is one of the most benign sources of renewable energy available.

When initial exploration is complete, certain private companies will be invited to build and operate geothermal power plants, including Britain’s Cluff Geothermal.

Managing Director George Day told the paper that they have already conducted a “scoping environmental impact assessment” near the town of Metehara, and that the country’s regulatory framework is not yet prepared for independent power producers.

They are hopeful, however, that these barriers will come down within the next six months or so.

:: The Guardian

Image of Dallol Geothermal Area, Shutterstock

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“It reduces CO2 emissions by 223,638 kg CO2/yr or 47% compared with conventional chiller/LPG boiler cooling and heating systems,” the company’s President and Founder Khaled Al Sabawi told Green Prophet, and the project was constructed using 100% local labor and Palestinian engineering and support staff.

Construction of the AUM geothermal system began in July, 2010 and involved drilling 420 boreholes in a vertical configuration 100 meters into the ground.

But unlike drilling for shale oil, geothermal energy is considered to be one of the cleanest, most efficient and safest forms of renewable energy, Al Sabawi explains.

“The only dangers of geothermal are the same potential dangers associated with any electrical appliance in general, but this is very minimal.”

“Considering the CO2 emission reductions, the higher efficiency, lower required maintenance, added to comfort to occupants, and most importantly affordability, geothermal is an excellent alternative to fossil fuels.”

Nonetheless, the firm had to gain permission from a formidable collection of agencies and ministries before he could proceed with this project, which received blessings from Pope Benedict XVI in 2009. (The University belongs to the Latin Patriarch in Jerusalem)

“In addition to an environmental impact assessment, we were required to receive approval from the Ministry of Industry and Trade, Ministry of Interior, Jordanian Intelligence Agency, Ministry of Energy, Ministry of Environment, Ministry of Water, the Prime Minister’s Office, the Engineering Association, and the Contractors Union. No joke,” said Al Sabawi.

Following AUM’s success, Al Sabawi says his company has received a lot of inquiries from within Jordan.

“The saving are so obvious to the public within the first year of operation. We anticipate a large demand , especially with expected rise in fuels and electricity tariff. Both for commercial and residential applications.”

One of the world’s top energy entrepreneurs and the first licensed geothermal expert in the Middle East and North Africa, Al Sabawi has scooped several awards in the short four years since he founded MENA Geothermal. And his firm is growing rapidly.

Jordan currently imports 46% of its energy and consistently finds itself resorting to dirty and non-renewable sources, including oil shale, to meet the population’s growing demand.

Incorporating clean technology such as solar and geothermal could give the Kingdom greater energy independence and security, something that Al Sabawi would like to see.

“MENA Geothermal has officially opened up an office in Amman, Jordan,” says Al Sabawi, and is currently working on a new, large residential project in the capital.

“Our goal is to make the use of geothermal technology widespread in the MENA region – which is the most energy intensive region in the world – and promote sustainable urban development.”

Lead image via the AUM Facebook page, all others courtesy MENA Geothermal

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 The ten acre campus has been designed to maximize the benefits of solar energy and will include 500,000 square feet of green space that will be open to the public.

The first building, which the team hopes will achieve LEED Platinum status, will comprise Cornell and Technion’s core learning space. And it’s going to be the greenest building the east coast has seen since the first wave of pilgrims arrived on the Mayflower in 1620!

Not only will it be built using recycled materials, but the solar-powered facility will maximize daylight through passive design and benefit from a digitally-operable ventilation system.

All other buildings, including housing for staff and students, a public atria and corporate space, will strive for a minimum of LEED Silver.

The four acre geothermal field will have 400 wells that will harvest the earth’s internal thermal power to heat and cool buildings and the solar array will generate a whopping 1.8 MW per day at peek!

An electrical power fuel cell will also contribute to the project’s grid independence.

In addition to plans to treat and recycle storm water, a bevy of green walls, green roofs, rain gardens and even an urban forest are in the pipeline.

Basically, Cornell and Technion are aiming for nothing short of the most amazing net-zero energy facility in all of America, and the biggest public green space in New York City.

Now… how about we bring more of this great green action to the Middle East?

All images copyright Cornell University

:: Arch Daily

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For Masdar, which has boosted its clean energy profile in Abu Dhabi and across the Emirates with clean technology proving both plausible and profitable, the goal is to take solar power a step further into Saudi, with its vast desert and massive amount of sun.While not giving much away in his statement, he did say Masdar hopes to jumpstart clean technology and energy in the Gulf Kingdom.

“We will proactively seek true partnerships in Saudi Arabia,” he was quoted by Construction Week Online as saying.

“We have achieved our objective of becoming a catalyst that will help change the mindset and extended our energy reach into sophisticated fields,” he said.

One thing going for Jaber, he said, was Masdar’s ability to learn from its mistakes and taking those errors into new investments in Saudi.

“We have a first-mover advantage. We have lessons learned. Why would we allow our partners in Saudi Arabia – or anywhere else, whether it is Egypt, Jordan or Morocco – to commit the same mistakes we did?”

In May, the Saudi government made good on their promise to push clean technology, announcing it wanted to bring in investment of around $109 billion for the creation of its solar industry and hopes that by 2032, one-third of the country’s energy will be solar.

Saudi’s solar, wind and geothermal

The government said it hopes to create 41,000 megawatts of solar capacity over the next two decades. And solar is not the only clean energy they are looking at, with wind and geothermal also expected to contribute 21,000 megawatts.

But despite the ambitious goals of developing solar energy in the country, Saudi Arabia faces a small issue of profitability. While Masdar said it can deliver on making the sector see large profits, economists in the country question whether clean energy will be a viable enough investment in the near future to make these goals a reality.

Jamal Aziz Abdallah of the National Industrial Clusters Development Program (NICDP) told Green Prophet that with enough interest and development in solar and other clean energy development, “companies will quickly find our market viable.”

He pointed to First Solar and SunPower alongside Masdar as being key to increasing interest in making the government’s push possible.

“The future of clean energy in the Kingdom will largely depend on how the government responds to queries and bids,” he continued. “If they allow for job creation and other aspects of clean energy along with investment, then I see no reason why it won’t boost the economy in general.”

Image of Saudi Arabia sun from Shutterstock

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For years, the goldmine for Israeli cleantech companies has been the American economy. And as Israel deploys innovative technologies across the Atlantic, it is increasingly breaking ground and gaining profits ahead of American companies.

Just last week, shares of the Reno, Nevada-based unit of Israeli geothermal company, Ormat Technologies (NYSE: ORA), rose more than 2.7 percent to $18.78 in the US stock exchange yesterday, the most since Feb. 24,  Bloomberg Businessweek reported. The rise came from a new $61.2 million engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract the company signed on April 25–for two air-cooled Ormat Energy Converters that will be installed at an unspecified North American geothermal plant–that has traders expecting company earnings per share to jump by 30 cents over 2012 and 2013, according to Avondale Partners LLC, interviewed in the article.

Ormat Technologies, is a US subsidiary of Israel-based Ormat Industries (ORMT)–which owns 60 percent of ORA–and was originally founded in the sleepy Israeli city of Yavne, located south of Tel Aviv, in 1972. For over fourty years, the company has been developing geothermal resources, by tapping the natural resources and also building recovered energy-based power plants nearby. It has also branched out to other cleantech fields, such as rooftop solar power, salt wells developments, waste heat recovery systems, and even spent oil-to-energy systems.

Since then, the company has become internationally renowned, with 80 patents and 1,370 MW of geothermal and recovered energy power plants in 71 countries worldwide. At the end of the three-month financial period ending on December 31, 2011, Ormat reported a 33 percent increased in revenue for a total of $124 million for the period.

Ormat will be reporting its 2012 first-quarter earnings on May 8, with Bloomber estimating that sals will have increased 14 percent to $112 million. The company stock has already increased 4.2 percent this year, sending valuations to 36 times estimated earnings.

But even as international expansion is winning Ormat international private sector partnerships and U.S. government financing, the company is also racking up profit back home in Israel. Ormat Industries rose 0.7 percent to 18.52 shekels in the Tel Aviv stock exchange on April 24, Bloomberg reported.

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Ormat will grow Nevada’s geothermal power 25% with a US Department of Energy loan guarantee

Three geothermal projects totaling 113 MW from Israel’s geothermal giant Ormat got approvals just in time to get US government support under the Recovery Act Section 1705 loan guarantee this week. Nevada has some of the best geothermal potential among the US states, but has barely begun to develop it: the 113 MW will increase Nevada’s geothermal power production by nearly 25%.

Under the same program as Solyndra if Ormat Nevada Inc could line up an investor with up private financing by September 30th, the US Department of Energy would provide a US government guarantee to back the loan in the unlikely event that Ormat was not able to repay its investors.

However the loan guarantee has been anathema to the party that now controls the US congress (Utility-Scale Renewable Projects Become a Casualty of Republican Hostage-Taking) and will end this week.

Last year, Ormat Nevada Inc thought it might not make it (Ormat Abandons loan Guarantee Program)  but this week, the company finalized its loan from John Hancock just in time for it to be guaranteed under one of the last of the DOE loan guarantees, before the program is prematurely shut down at the end of the month.

Nevada will get utility-scale deployment of Ormat Energy Converter modules that have been used around the world. The modules are pre-engineered units containing a turbine-generator set, preheater, condenser, integrated vaporizer and feed pump that convert geothermal energy to electricity.

The financing will support clean, sustainable power generation in Nevada for virtually ever. Geothermal projects begun in the 19th century in early adopter nations like New Zealand are still regularly delivering baseload power. It is a safe bet. Ormat holds over 80 US patents and has more than four decades of experience developing geothermal and heat-recovery power and has 1,370 MW of capacity churning out clean electrons around the world.

Ormat has signed a power purchase agreement with Nevada Power Company for its first twenty years of production of low carbon energy generation that causes no asthma or climate change.

But sadly, the project marks one of the last to escape the Republican (“Tea Party”) hammer that will end the Democrats’ push for renewable energy that they begun in 2009, with the Recovery Act economic stimulus. The renewal of the Section 1705 loan guarantees was always going to be tricky after the new Republican majority since 2010.

Congressional Republicans, never fans of renewable energy, adamantly unaware of climate change, and now more than ever force-fed into congress by a gushing hose of funding from the $50 billion Koch Brothers fossil energy money and armed with cute Grover Norquist pledges to not believe in climate change, have found in the Solyndra bankruptcy the perfect  excuse to ram through a shut down of the loan guarantee program, killing off all kinds of renewable energy.

Related stories:

Ormat Set to Release Alaska’s Geothermal Energy Potential
Ormat Lands Its Largest Geothermal Deal in New Zealand
Utility-Scale Solar Projects Become a Casualty of Republican Hostage-Taking
Despite Solyndra Bankruptcy, Solar Grew 69% From Obama Policy

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