The Department of Energy finalized a $117 million loan guarantee for Kahuku Wind Power LLC, the owner and operator of the Kahuku Wind Power project in Kahuku, Hawaii. The project includes the development of a 30 megawatt (MW) wind power plant that will supply electricity to approximately 7,700 households per year, and is expected to be the first to meet the local electric utility’s solar and wind energy reliability requirements. Kahuku Wind Power LLC estimates that the project will create more than 200 jobs on the island of Oahu. More information about DOE’s loan guarantee program is available at www.lgprogram.energy.gov.

Wind power installations in the second quarter of 2010 dropped by 71 percent from 2009 levels, the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) announced. Manufacturing investment also continues to lag below 2008 and 2009 levels. AWEA and a coalition of renewable energy, labor, utility and environmental organizations are urging Congress to establish a national renewable electricity standard (RES) to spur demand for renewable energy and attract manufacturing investment. The association notes that wind power’s boom and bust cycles cause layoffs and discourage investment in new manufacturing facilities. View AWEA’s full second quarter report at www.awea.org.

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SolarCity will install six new solar power systems on Rabobank branch locations throughout California. Solar installations are already under way at Rabobank’s Atascadero, Castroville, El Centro, Paso Robles, Pismo Beach and Salinas branch locations. The systems will total 200 kilowatts of new solar capacity and are expected to offset an estimated 50 percent of Rabobank’s energy use at the six sites. In a separate announcement, Rabobank said it is providing project financing for solar projects across SolarCity’s service areas.

U.S. Geothermal Inc. entered into a $30 million agreement for the engineering procurement and construction of a new power plant at its $200 million San Emidio project in northern Nevada. TAS Energy will manufacture the plant and provide a non-recourse project loan for the $30 million construction capital together with an engineering, procurement and construction services contract for phase one of the project. Phase one includes construction of a new water-cooled binary cycle power plant with an estimated output of 8.6 net MW of renewable baseload electricity, and is expected to be operational in late 2011. The $170 million second phase, which is already under way using funding assistance from the U.S. Department of Energy, will add an estimated 26.4 net MW output. Phase two is expected to be completed in 2013. U.S. Geothermal Inc. is negotiating with interested parties for a new 35 MW power purchase agreement.

AWEA announced the formation of the Offshore Wind Development Coalition to promote offshore wind energy by focusing on advocacy and education efforts. The coalition will be based in Washington, D.C. and led by Jim Lanard, the former managing director of Deepwater Wind. AWEA said the group’s creation in a natural outcome of the offshore wind industry’s growth, diversification and maturation. Offshore wind projects totaling more than 5,000 MW have been proposed and are in the planning or development stages in the United States, AWEA said. The U.S. Department of Energy estimates that of the 300,000 MW of wind power that could generate 20 percent of the country’s electricity by 2030, 50,000 MW would likely be offshore.

Google announced that it will buy wind-generated electricity from NextEra Energy Resources to sell to the grid in exchange for renewable energy certificates. The company’s Google Energy unit entered into a power purchase agreement to buy 114 MW of power from NextEra’s wind energy centers in Iowa. Power deliveries to Google Energy began on July 30.

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