There's certainly been no shortage of rhetoric lately in regards to the billions in stimulus money set aside for new energy projects. I'm sure you've heard it all by now. "The stimulus isn't working." "Where are all the jobs?" "Unemployment is still rising."

While I'm not going to sit here and defend or ridicule the stimulus, no one really should have expected the results of the stimulus to be apparent by now.

How can we possibly know if this thing's going to work until all the money has been distributed, and all those projects get underway? And even then, many of these projects won't be ready for years.

So is the stimulus going to work? Who the hell knows? Maybe it will, maybe it won't. But I believe it's a bit premature to start judging its effectiveness before it's even had an opportunity to kick in.

Of course, I won't lie. I'm pretty impatient myself when it comes to waiting for the government to get those energy grants out. After all, there's a lot of renewable energy projects being held back right now as we wait for guidance on this stuff

So needless to say, I was pleased to listen in on the conference call that the Treasury Department and the DOE hosted yesterday. While we already knew the initial $3 billion in grants would be coming out this year, we finally got word that the application portal will go live on August 1. Certainly we would've like to have seen that sooner. But at least now we have a definitive date in place.

The grants are not taxable, and are expected to be paid within 60 days after the applications are received - assuming all requirements are met. The projects must also be placed in service by the end of 2010.

Once these grants are distributed, we believe that financing will begin to flow again, and the momentum we saw in 2006 and 2007 will return.

But again, we won't know for sure until the money starts flowing and projects get underway.

Jeff