SAN FRANCISCO (Dow Jones)--The federal government is investigating a claim that solar-panel maker First Solar Inc.'s (FSLR) recent $400 million acquisition of a smaller rival wrongly included pending applications to use federal land.
In early May, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management in Sacramento, Calif., received a citizen's report claiming that OptiSolar Inc. of Hayward, Calif., had sold its land-use applications pending at the BLM to First Solar as part of the deal. The agency referred the matter to the California BLM's inspector general's office, which is investigating the claim.
It's unclear whether First Solar's acquisition of OptiSolar included a straight purchase of the land-use applications and if it did, whether such an arrangement violates any regulations.
The special agent in charge of investigations for the inspector general's Western region wasn't immediately available to comment on the case. But a BLM spokeswoman said the citizen's report "was a concern to us."
The concern is that such applications could become unofficial currency amid a land rush spurred by increasingly aggressive renewable energy requirements in California and other western states, and as Congress considers a national renewable energy mandate.
"From our perspective, clearly (the applications) have no value," said Jan Bedrosian, a spokeswoman for the BLM in Sacramento. "The application itself conveys no right."
Proposals by President Barack Obama and Congressional Democrats to accelerate development of renewable energy, over concerns about climate change and security of the nation's energy supply, have boosted interest in renewable energy development, even as the recession and a dramatic reduction in financing have slowed down the industry. California requires utilities to use renewable sources for a fifth of their retail power by 2013, a mandate that would expand to one-third renewables by 2020 under pending legislation... read more
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