Jigar Shah is a former environmentalist financier and serves as the Director of the Loan Programs Office in the Biden administration U.S. Department of Energy.

Shah is the co-founder and former president of Generate Capital, a venture fund which finances environmentalist projects as “decarbonization solutions.” ^{1 2}

In November 2023, a Senate-led investigation was launched into Shah’s relationship with former employers on suspicion that he was engaged in multiple conflicts of interest.

Career

Shah grew up in Illinois and holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and an MBA from the University of Maryland College Park. ³

Shah founded SunEdison, a solar energy company that introduced “pay as you save” financing. ⁴ SunEdison became the fastest growing weather-dependent energy firms in the United States, only for it to declare Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2016. At the time of its bankruptcy filing, the company reported having assets of $20.7 billion and liabilities of $16.1 billion. Its stated reason for filing was lack of liquidity to operate and insufficient assets to satisfy the claims of SunEdison creditors. ⁵

Shah also was the founding CEO of Carbon War Room, a nonprofit founded by Richard Branson and Virgin Unite to connect business leaders with climate-change advocacy groups. ⁶

Biden Administration

Jigar Shah is the Director of the Loan Programs Office in the Biden administration’s Department of Energy, as of 2023. In this role, he produces a monthly report on loans requested from this federal program. In October 2023, he reported that there were $162.2 billion in loans requested across 181 applicants at a rate of 1.9 new applicants per week. The largest loan category was “renewable energy.” ⁷

Controversies

In November 2023, Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY), the ranking Republican on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, called on Department of Energy Counsel Susan Beard to conduct an ethics review of Shah and his Loan Programs Office. ⁸ Barrasso was prompted to do so by a Free Beacon report on Shah’s connections to the Cleantech Leaders Roundtable, a trade association Shah used to lead that has been acting as a mediator between loan applicants and Shah’s federal office. ⁹

In October, Shah approved a $3 billion loan to Sunnova, a solar energy company. Some of Sunnova’s board members are also board members of Cleantech. “The potential for conflicts of interest, especially in light of a $3 billion loan approval for Sunnova, a company [that] shares a board member with Cleantech Leaders Roundtable, cannot be overlooked,” wrote Sen. Barrasso. Barrasso also noted a political conflict of interest: Anne Slaughter Andrew, one of the board members shared between Sunnova and Cleantech, is the wife of former Democratic National Committee chair Joe Andrew. ¹⁰

Furthermore, Sen. Barrasso pointed out a discrepancy between Shah’s testimony to the Senate committee in October, in which Shah claimed he does not lead the loan approval process, and a Wall Street Journal article from 2022 which reported that Shah courts companies into the program. ¹¹ In addition to asking the Department of Energy to look into Shah’s relationship with Cleantech, Barrasso asked the Counsel to examine Shah’s compliance with the ethics pledge that members of the Biden administration cannot work with former employers for two years after joining the executive branch. ¹²

1. “Jigar Shah.” Energy.gov. Accessed December 2, 2023. https://www.energy.gov/lpo/person/jigar-shah.
2. Generate Capital. Accessed December 2, 2023. https://generatecapital.com.
3. “Jigar Shah.” Energy.gov. Accessed December 2, 2023. https://www.energy.gov/lpo/person/jigar-shah.
4. “Jigar Shah.” Energy.gov. Accessed December 2, 2023. https://www.energy.gov/lpo/person/jigar-shah.
5. Hals, Tom and Groom, Nichola. “Solar developer SunEdison in bankruptcy as aggressive growth plan unravels.” Reuters, April 22, 2016. Accessed December 3, 2023. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-sunedison-inc-bankruptcy-idUSKCN0XI1TC/
6. “Jigar Shah.” Energy.gov. Accessed December 2, 2023. https://www.energy.gov/lpo/person/jigar-shah.
7. “October 2023 Monthly Application Activity Report.” Energy.gov. Accessed December 2, 2023. https://www.energy.gov/lpo/articles/october-2023-monthly-application-activity-report.
8. Goodman, Alana. “Senator Ramps Up Scrutiny of ‘Political Influence’ at Department of Energy in Wake of Free Beacon Report.” Free Beacon, November 9, 2023. Accessed December 3, 2023. https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/senator-ramps-up-scrutiny-of-political-influence-at-department-of-energy-in-wake-of-free-beacon-report/.
9. ^[1] Goodman, Alana. “Biden’s Energy Loan Czar Founded a Trade Association. Now It’s Selling Access to Him.” Free Beacon, October 6, 2023. Accessed December 3, 2023. https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/bidens-energy-loan-czar-founded-a-trade-association-now-its-selling-access-to-him/.
10. Goodman, Alana. “Senator Ramps Up Scrutiny of ‘Political Influence’ at Department of Energy in Wake of Free Beacon Report.” Free Beacon, November 9, 2023. Accessed December 3, 2023. https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/senator-ramps-up-scrutiny-of-political-influence-at-department-of-energy-in-wake-of-free-beacon-report/.
11. Goodman, Alana. “Senator Ramps Up Scrutiny of ‘Political Influence’ at Department of Energy in Wake of Free Beacon Report.” Free Beacon, November 9, 2023. Accessed December 3, 2023. https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/senator-ramps-up-scrutiny-of-political-influence-at-department-of-energy-in-wake-of-free-beacon-report/.
12. Goodman, Alana. “Senator Ramps Up Scrutiny of ‘Political Influence’ at Department of Energy in Wake of Free Beacon Report.” Free Beacon, November 9, 2023. Accessed December 3, 2023. https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/senator-ramps-up-scrutiny-of-political-influence-at-department-of-energy-in-wake-of-free-beacon-report/.