LETTER: Much-touted Crescent Dunes solar plant goes bust

Do readers remember the Crescent Dunes solar power plant in Tonopah? The project commenced some 10 years ago and was financed in part with a $737 million federal loan guarantee.

Nevada Energy fully supported the project, promising to buy power at a rate almost six times as high as the market at the time. At the same time, the company was destroying Nevada’s residential solar businesses by pushing through a measure to reduce the “buyback” of energy generated by households to less than one-sixth of the going rate.

How is the Crescent Dunes doing? It ceased operations in April. The three-quarters of a billion dollars of federal guaranteed loans have been eaten by us taxpayers, and the Department of Energy is trying to decide what to do with this albatross.

Will anyone answer for this abomination? We all know the answer to that.