Solyndra got $535 million in Obama green energy loans and went bankrupt within two years.
Obama's next green energy disaster makes Solyndra look like child's play.
And what just happened to keep it alive will cost taxpayers dearly.
Ivanpah Solar Plant Incinerated 6000 Birds a Year and Still Couldn't Hit Its Power Targets
Obama fast-tracked Ivanpah solar facility through environmental review in 2011 as part of his stimulus push.
The Department of Energy issued $1.6 billion in federal loan guarantees to build it in the Mojave Desert.
The Treasury Department kicked in another $539 million grant – covering roughly 30% of construction costs before a single mirror was installed.
The plant opened in 2014 to glowing press coverage about the clean energy future.
Federal biologists confirmed that approximately 6,000 birds are incinerated mid-air every year after flying into the plant's concentrated solar beams – a phenomenon researchers called a "mega-trap."
Desert tortoises were relocated from the construction site, with biologists hired by the plant's own operators privately warning that for every tortoise moved, one dies.
The plant ran at a 17% capacity factor in 2023 – against an expected 25% to 30%.
It needs natural gas heaters just to keep the system operational.
The technology it runs on – concentrated solar thermal – has been lapped by cheaper photovoltaic panels that now cost a fraction of what Ivanpah produces.
UC Berkeley energy economist Severin Borenstein said the technology at Ivanpah "is no longer really competitive with a new solar farm that uses conventional solar panels."
The CPUC Voted Unanimously to Override Trump the Utilities and the Plants Own Operators
PG&E – the utility forced to buy Ivanpah's overpriced electricity – negotiated a deal with plant operators to terminate its contracts and shut down two of the three units by 2026.
Southern California Edison was moving toward a similar exit.
The Trump administration supported closure and the Biden administration had supported closure before that.
Ivanpah’s operators, NRG Energy, signed the shutdown agreements.
In December 2025, the California Public Utilities Commission voted unanimously to block it.
California regulators argued that walking away would leave more than $300 million in grid infrastructure – paid for by ratepayers – stranded with nothing to justify the cost.
What they left out: keeping it running costs electricity customers roughly $100 million more per year than power from newer solar alternatives, according to analyst estimates.
The choice California made is this – absorb a one-time infrastructure loss, or charge customers $100 million extra every single year going forward.
Customers were stuck with the bill for this green energy debacle.
Daniel Turner, founder of energy advocacy group Power The Future, told Fox News Digital the plant "makes no economic sense to keep afloat" and is being kept alive for political reasons, with costs passed on to customers.
"At some point," Turner said, "you have to stop throwing good money after bad."
Obama Federal Loan Guarantees Built Solyndra Then Ivanpah and Taxpayers Are on the Hook for Both
Solyndra went bankrupt in 2011 after receiving $535 million in Obama loan guarantees.
Ivanpah received three times that – and between $730 million and $780 million of the $1.6 billion federal loan remains unpaid.
That's the bill taxpayers are stuck with if the plant closes – money that was never coming back from the moment Obama's Department of Energy rushed the project out the door without proper review.
The pattern is the same every time: government picks a winner, the market proves it wrong, and politicians refuse to admit failure because admitting failure means admitting the money is gone.
The restaurant owner nearest to Ivanpah – Lazarus Dabour of the Mad Greek in Baker, California – told Fox News Digital his summer electricity bills run between $10,000 and $12,000.
That's what it costs when Democrats spend someone else's money on ideas that don't work and then make everyone else pay to keep the wreckage running.
Sources:
- Michael Dorgan, "Obama-backed $2.2B green energy 'boondoggle' leaves taxpayers on the hook," Fox News, May 2, 2026.
- "Ivanpah Solar Power Facility," Wikipedia, updated April 2026.
- "California blocks off switch for Ivanpah," Las Vegas Review-Journal, December 28, 2025.
- "Ivanpah Solar Project at Nevada-California border lives on as regulators reject plan to shut it down," 8 News Now, December 2025.
- "Recapping the Obama Administration Green Energy Stimulus Failures," Institute for Energy Research, February 2014.