Tempers Flare on Capitol Hill Over Silence of Solar Execs

Susan Phillips

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Susan Phillips tells stories about the consequences of political decisions on people's every day lives. She has worked as a reporter for WHYY since 2004. Susan's coverage of the 2008 Presidential election resulted in a story on the front page of the New York Times. In 2010 she traveled to Haiti to cover the earthquake. That same year she produced an award-winning series on Pennsylvania's natural gas rush called "The Shale Game." She received a 2013 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Journalism Award for her work covering natural gas drilling in Pennsylvania. She has also won several Edward R. Murrow awards for her work with StateImpact. In 2013/14 she spent a year at MIT as a Knight Science Journalism Fellow. She has also been a Metcalf Fellow, an MBL Logan Science Journalism Fellow and reported from Marrakech on the 2016 climate talks as an International Reporting Project Fellow. A graduate of Columbia School of Journalism, she earned her Bachelor's degree in International Relations from George Washington University.

September 23, 2011 | 1:38 PM

Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images

Solyndra CEO Brian Harrison (L) and CFO Bill Stover are sworn in at the start of the hearing.

Solyndra executives remained mum on Capitol Hill today, despite efforts by Congress to get them to explain how they went bankrupt after receiving more than $500 million dollars in taxpayer funds from the Department of Energy. ABC News reports that Pennsylvania Republican Tim Murphy, from Pittsburgh, became frustrated by the silence of Solyndra CEO Brian Harrison.

Rep. Tim Murphy (R-Pa.) appeared annoyed, asking the men to explain their “plan to pay back the taxpayers $535 million you owe them.”
“And when will you pay them back? Mr. Harrison?” he pressed.
No reply.

Harrison and Solyndra CFO W.G. Stover have invoked their Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination.
This may or may not be relevant to Solyndra’s fate, but the solar rush in Pennsylvania and New Jersey may be coming to an end. A new report from solar analysts about SRECS, or solar renewable energy credits, portends a crash. The solar boom that had solar panels cropping up all over New Jersey’s telephone polls lately depends on government incentives and subsidies. Power companies are required to use renewable energy or buy credits. Those credits, called SREC’s, are now plentiful and cheap. So it looks like this major solar incentive may be a victim of its own success.