Even as the DOE Loan Guarantee is imperiled by the House’s proposed budget cuts, the department continues to offer loan guarantees to support solar and other renewable energy projects. Last week the DOE awarded a $197-million conditional loan guarantee to SoloPower to support its development of a solar manufacturing plant in economically depressed Oregon.

San Jose, Calif.,-based SoloPower produces modules on flexible substrates and is targeting industrial rooftops as its primary market. SoloPower plans to build a PV manufacturing plant in Wilsonville, Ore., capable of producing 400 megawatts of thin-film photovoltaic modules annually. The plant will also employ roughly 270 people during construction and 500 people upon reaching full-production capacity.

SoloPower’s $197-million conditional commitment guarantee will assure that, should the company default on loans or other financing it ultimately receives for the project, the debt will be covered by Uncle Sam. Since the program began in 2005, it committed $26 billion to support energy projects. Not a single company or project out of the 23 awardees has defaulted on a loan guarantee.

Even Solyndra, which has had a rough time lately, is still in the game. The company won a $535 million loan guarantee in 2009 to expand its operations, but late last year had to revisit its expansion plans.

“Right now they’re down, but they’re not out,” said Lux Research, Inc. analyst Matthew Feinstein.

Part of the reason for the lack of defaults is that the DOE does extensive research into the companies it approves for the guarantees—that and the competitive nature of the program.

“This is a very competitive field in solar. These loan guarantees are always in high demand,” said Feinstein. “Companies applying for loan guarantees really have to be ready to produce a good technology at a scale, not really to win the guarantee but to do well as a business. if they scale something bad and then go into the market completely uncompetitively, they’re not going to do well as a company."

At this point, it’s unclear whether other solar companies are close to securing a loan guarantee.

“The last one we had foreseen was SoloPower,” Feinstein said.

It’s also unclear whether House Republicans will be able to gut the loan guarantee program. In the meantime the DOE will stay the course.

“The Department of Energy is continuing to offer and close conditional commitments,” said DOE spokesperson Ebony Meeks.

Pictured: One of SoloPower’s project sites, courtesy of the U.S. Dept. of Energy.