Beacon Power


Questions about the efficacy of President Barack Obama’s stimulus spending for clean-energy programs came under the spotlight on Thursday with the claim by Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney that “half” of the companies that received government support under the $90 billion program had gone out of business.

Romney attacked the program that poured billions into clean energy as part of the administration’s effort to keep the economy afloat after the 2008 financial meltdown, saying that the money could have been better spent on teachers, and accusing the president of picking “losers.” Keep reading →


The political climate generated by the collapse of Solyndra last year had a “profound impact” on the US pioneer in energy storage, the former chief executive said yesterday.

In exclusive comments to Breaking Energy at the Energy Storage Week Summit in San Jose, California, Bill Capp, the former CEO of Beacon Power, which filed for bankruptcy last October, said: Keep reading →


Just as the White House announced that it would form an independent oversight team to review the overall health of the Department of Energy loan guarantee program, yet another clean energy company that profited from its piggy bank fell this week.

This time the company is not a solar photovoltaic (PV) manufacturing company like Solyndra–which received $535 million loan guarantee from the program and filed for bankruptcy this September– but a Massachusetts-based energy storage company called Beacon Power that designs and manufactures various devices for electric grid reliability and efficiency. Beacon Power was awarded a $43 million guarantee in August 2010 for the construction of a 20 MW flywheel energy storage plant in Stephentown, New York. Keep reading →


Another alternative energy company that received a loan guarantee from the US government has filed for bankruptcy.

Beacon Power, which makes energy storage devices used to help the power grid become more efficient, filed for bankruptcy protection Sunday, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The company received a $43 million loan guarantee from the Department of Energy last August. Keep reading →