I need to do research on Erc Massa and First Wind. He was outer for his tickling scandal, but he was attacking Obama over this.
First Wind is essentially half owned by hedge fund D.E. Shaw which paid National Economic Director Larry Summers $5.2 million for working one day a week up until a year ago. The other half is essentially owned by Madison-Dearborn, a company that chief of staff Rahm Emanuel has characterized as a good friend. Last year, First Wind received a GIFT from the administration’s federal Stimulus program of $115 Million.
Indeed, Congressman Massa went up against some very powerful people in Washington, DC.
Congressman Eric Massa February 15, 2010 Letter to President Obama
February 15, 2010
President Barack Obama
President of the United States of America
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500-0005
Dear Mr. President:
In recent months, I have learned of some very troubling news regarding the use of stimulus funds for supporting wind industry jobs abroad. I do not believe this use of U.S. taxpayer dollars is in accordance with the purposes of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and I request that your Administration refrain from giving any awards to wind companies tunneling money to foreign corporations. Sending money abroad to support jobs in other countries while continuing to ignore problems facing the American wind industry is simply bad policy.
To date, I do not believe the use of stimulus funds to support wind projects in the U.S. has met the promises of substantial job creation and clean renewable energy. With these and other federal funds, we must make wise investments in the American people by weighing the job and energy creation prospects of each proposal. Quite simply, the potential benefits offered by a project should be commensurate with the size of the investment. I am not convinced that this is the case right now.
While it is true that these funds are used only to support American-based projects, the development corporations and the suppliers involved are, more often than not, headquartered outside of the U.S. This means that ultimately, a large portion of the nearly $2 billion invested in wind projects through the ARRA will go directly to supporting foreign businesses that compete with American workers. The stimulus package was meant to bolster American productivity, not hand over control of an entire industry to other countries, including China.
Instead of dumping billions of dollars into so many wind projects that support very few domestic jobs and produce limited energy benefits, while propping-up foreign industries at the expense of U.S. taxpayers, I believe your Administration should focus on addressing the underlying problems of the American wind industry. If we are to have successful American wind energy development, we must have an industry built by American workers that supply real energy to American homes and reduce our dependence on dirty fossil fuels. I believe it is necessary to slow down the wildly haphazard “progress” in wind power development which is having a destructive impact on many small communities. We need to address these and many other concerns because frankly, the current policy is not working.
As it stands now and as it has been proven by stimulus investments in wind power, our nation is dangerously reliant on foreign wind corporations. As with so many other industries, we have been surpassed by our foreign competitors in the wind sector. Even worse, now we are funding them. This is entirely wrong.
Moving forward, we must take a critical look into the American wind industry that we see today and develop comprehensive, long-term plans that address the many serious issues facing wind power in this country. The goal must be to use wise investments in this energy source to safely, responsibly, and effectively create clean energy while also establishing strong manufacturing and construction sectors that will build a truly American industry supported by American jobs.
Eric JJ. Massa Member of Congress
Cc: Steven Chu, Secretary of Energy
http://batr.org/ericmassa.html
http://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/congressman-eric-massa-went-up
On Sept. 11, 2009, Democrat congressman Eric Massa of the 29th Congressional District of New York — yes, this district actually exists — wrote President Obama a letter regarding the Obama administration’s $74.6 million grant to Canadaigua Power Partners, LLC, and Canandaigua Power Partners II, LLC, in Cohocton, N.Y. These companies, according to Massa, “act as shell companies that deceptively operate on behalf of First Wind, which is currently under investigation by New York State Attorney General Cuomo for corruption charges in Cohocton and across the Northeast.”
In fact, wrote Massa, “Constituents in our region see these projects as criminal actions … the award of $74.6 million to corrupt companies that have changed names time and again forming new LLCs and new Inc.s but maintaining their business model of lie, cheat and corrupt at the expense of taxpayers has stirred great unrest.” Remember, this is a Democratic congressman.
First Wind is a green power company that produces windmills, the giant pieces of idiocy littering our landscapes.
Its project in Cohocton, N.Y. — the project Massa rips — was so poorly done originally that residents reported that the turbines sounded like jet engines.
From March 31, 2007 to March 31, 2008, First Wind had revenue of $12 million and net losses of $73 million. Those losses forced First Wind to take out loans in the amount of $191 million. And up until October, the New York attorney general’s office was investigating First Wind for its possible participation in bribery of public officials for land use purposes.
Broke and under investigation. Not exactly a great candidate for stimulus. But that didn’t stop the Obama administration. Why? Because First Wind is supported principally by Madison Dearborn Partners and the D.E. Shaw Group.
Madison Dearborn Partners, not coincidentally, is Obama Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel’s “best source of funds,” according to the Washington Examiner. During his congressional career, employees of Madison Dearborn gave Emanuel $93,600. And Emanuel is instrumental in oversight of the stimulus.
As for D.E. Shaw, White House economic adviser Lawrence Summers was paid $5.2 million in 2008 and 2007 by the company — to work for one day a week, according to the New York Times. Also according to the Times, “Summers said in an interview that his experience at Shaw, however brief, gave him valuable insight into the practical realities of Wall Street, insight he is now putting to use in shaping economic policy in the White House.”
The Obama administration is so dominated by obfuscatory aureate and magniloquent verbosity that it believes it can get away with literally anything. This administration creates dollars out of thin air to pay fictitious employees in figmental places. It’s no wonder that so far, the Obama administration has stimulated precisely nothing in the real world.
http://cohoctonwindwatch.blogspot.com/2011/09/thousands-of-jobs-scammed-or-created.html
Taxpayer-Funded Wind Farms Prompt Concern from Democrats and Republicans; Jobs for China?
Two New York Democrats; Sen. Chuck Schumer and Rep. Eric Massa; are among the lawmakers criticizing specific wind projects that are getting hundreds of millions in taxpayer subsidies.
By Fred Lucas
December 28, 2009
Two New York Democrats – Sen. Chuck Schumer and Rep. Eric Massa – are among the lawmakers criticizing specific wind-power projects that are getting hundreds of millions in taxpayer subsidies.
A “definitive agreement” was reached on one of those projects two weeks ago, according to a Dec. 20 news release from the Austin, Texas-based Cielo Wind Power. The deal is between Cielo, U.S. Renewable Energy Group and China-based Shenyang Power Group.
The $1.5 billion project – which is getting $450 million in stimulus funds – is supposed to create 2,000 to 3,000 jobs. The problem is, most of those jobs will be in China, Sen. Schumer said, because that’s where the wind turbines will be constructed. Another 300 temporary jobs will be created in Texas.
Ex-partner of Boston wind exec charged
Sunday, November 15, 2009 11:53 AM
The Massachusetts native who helped found controversial wind-energy developers Cape Wind and First Wind expressed surprise late last week at news that his one-time partner in a separate wind-energy company in Italy has been arrested and charged with fraud.
“I read about it in the papers, and I was very surprised,” Brian Caffyn said from Hong Kong, where he is now building wind-energy farms in China and the Philipines.
“I know of no fraud with (former partners) Oreste (Vigorito) and IVPC,” said Caffyn, a Cape Cod native and Babson College graduate.
IVPC is Italian Vento Power Corp., a company that Caffyn, 50, once owned with Vigorito, a well-known Italian soccer club president. The pair worked together for seven years in Italy and even lived next door to each other for a time.
Last week, the Italian finance police arrested Vigorito, his Sicilian business associate Vito Nicastri and two others, according to the Financial Times. Eleven others were charged in a probe dubbed “Gone with the Wind” that began in 2007, the Financial Times said.
The group is accused of committing fraud by obtaining millions in public subsidies to build wind farms that either never worked properly or did not supply the promised amounts of energy, the Financial Times reported.
http://www.istockanalyst.com/article/viewiStockNews/articleid/3638058
GE To Power Mongolia’s First Wind Farm
November 18, 2011 By Joshua S Hill
General Electric (GE) announced yesterday that it had signed an agreement with Newcom LLC to provide Mongolia with the technology and supplies to build its very first wind farm.
The $100-million project will be situated some 70 kilometres southeast of Mongolia’s capital city, Ulaanbaatar, and is set to finish construction and open sometime in 2012.
Source: Clean Technica (http://s.tt/13UWC)
http://cleantechnica.com/2011/11/18/ge-to-power-mongolia%E2%80%99s-first-wind-farm/
First Wind wants to pull Bowers Mountain wind project — for now
By Nick Sambides Jr., BDN Staff
Posted Nov. 16, 2011, at 7:54 p.m.
LINCOLN, Maine — Saying it needs more time to answer critics, a Massachusetts-based wind company wants to withdraw its application for a permit to build a 27-turbine wind farm northwest of Grand Lake Stream on the Penobscot and Washington county line, it said Wednesday.
The Land Use Regulation Commission will review First Wind’s withdrawal application next month, said Matt Kearns, the company’s vice president of development in the northeastern U.S.
Nobody knows whether the withdrawal will be permanent, he said.
“We have to figure that out. We are very open to discussions with stakeholders,” Kearns said Wednesday. “We are going to take a look at the project. What we heard from the commission is that the project met 99 out of 100 siting criteria and the one they had issue with was the scenic criteria, which were difficult to evaluate.”
Project critics said the site is inappropriate for industrial wind development, would ruin land values and views, threaten wildlife and harm businesses that use the woods such as woodland guides.