By Mark Chediak and Ari Natter | Bloomberg
The Biden administration finalized a record $15 billion loan guarantee to PG&E Corp. in one of the Biden’s administration’s final acts before President-elect Donald Trump takes power Monday.
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The loan is the biggest in the history of the US Energy Department’s Loan Programs Office. It will help finance a portfolio of projects for the California utility giant to meet forecast power demand growth and upgrade its grid, the agency said Friday.
The Energy Department conditionally offered the financing to PG&E about a month ago. The closing marks one of the fastest ever for its loans office, where funding typically faces months of scrutiny before being finalized.
The financing is the first to come from a new loan program created in President Joe Biden’s signature climate law, the Inflation Reduction Act, which also supercharged the Loan Programs Office with billions of dollars in new loan authority. Trump has threatened to undo much of his predecessor’s clean energy policies, castigating Democratic spending programs as the “green new scam.”
The funds will go toward a portfolio of projects PG&E including refurbishing hydropower plants, adding battery storage and upgrading transmission lines.
PG&E, which has seen its rates rise dramatically because of wildfire prevention costs, said the loan will save its customers close to $1 billion over the life of its financing.
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