The green folly right here at home

Going local again here.  As I have stated, I do so when a news item in our city has broader implications.

One of my steady writing gigs is the cover story and other local feature in each monthly issue of a local business magazine.  For last year's October issue, my editor had me profile a solar panel manufacturer that had started up a few months before.

As is my routine for embarking on such assignments, I went out to the industrial park where the plant was located.  It was the middle of the afternoon on a weekday, and I was immediately struck by the absence of any cars in the parking lot.  I was able to get into the lobby, though, although, again, there was a dearth of warm bodies.  I rang a buzzer and eventually a gal who identified herself as the plant manager came out to greet me.  I asked her about the appropriate person for an interview.  She told me it would be the CEO, so we began the process, concluded by e-mail, of setting that up.  The day came for the interview and I went back out there.  Again, no cars in the lot. One idle eighteen-wheeler by the receiving bays.

The CEO and I had a nearly hour-long conversation in his office.  He was a good-looking young fellow with a go-getter demeanor.  Told me about his back ground in the overall renewable-energy field.  Spoke knowledgeably about a raw silicon supplier in South Korea, and the different grades of photovoltaic cells.  Talked about how his main market was folks living off-grid and how the firm was expanding into African countries where energy development was still being sorted out.

Very impressive, I thought, but, um, where are the people here?

Anyway, the above-the-fold headline in our local paper this morning was about how this company is suppose  to be paying back a bunch of local money that it obtained in the form of tax abatements, grants and loans, and is not doing so.  The company had told the city that it expected to employ 80 people by the end of 2012.  As of February 2013, it still only had 15.  The city is looking at foreclosure proceedings.

This guy had told me that his model was different from that of companies like Solyndra and that his growth forecasts were solidly backed up.  As I say, he had that charge-ahead way about him and, despite the eerie silence of the place during my two visits, I was ready to be convinced.

Turns out the city, in its efforts to be ever-so green and diverse and amenable to young professionals, blew my hard-earned tax dollars on yet another gravy train rider.   We got took.