At a campaign fundraiser alongside President Obama last night, former President Clinton panned the surprise news conference that presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney held last week outside the headquarters of the failed solar energy company Solyndra.

Romney's news conference was timed to coincide with the two-year anniversary of Obama's own high-profile visit to Solyndra, during which the president lavished praise on a company that had received $535 million in Department of Energy loan guarantees. Within 15 months of that visit, Solyndra filed for bankruptcy (E&ENews PM, May 31).

"Governor Romney goes out to a company that had a loan that didn't work out and says, 'Oh, this is a whole bust.' Here's what I know: We ranked first or second in the world in every major scientific survey in the capacity to generate electricity from the sun and the wind," Clinton said in his remarks at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York last night.

"During the worst of the meltdown, clean-energy jobs grew twice as fast as the rest of the economy, paid 35 percent more."

Clinton said the success Germany has had and the 300,000 jobs it has created by embracing solar energy are something the United States should emulate.

"They're a fourth our size, and only half as capable to generate solar energy," he said. "If we did what they did, that's a million jobs alone."

Clinton said that the green energy revolution "is sweeping the globe" and that the Republican Party stands alone in denying its necessity.

Clinton's comments come as the Obama campaign has jumped on the bankruptcy of a Massachusetts solar energy company that received a loan from a state renewable energy fund during Romney's term as governor to call his Solyndra attacks hypocritical.

Konarka Technologies received its $1.5 million loan in 2003 just weeks after Romney was sworn in as governor. On Friday, the thin-film solar panel maker filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection and shut down operations.

Howard Berke, chairman, president and CEO of Konarka, released a statement saying the company was unable to obtain new financing despite some interest from foreign investors, including the Chinese government. Berke called the shutdown "a tragedy for Konarka's shareholders and employees and for the development of alternative energy in the United States."

But as Democrats have jumped on the Konarka news to blast Romney, Republicans have been quick to point out that the loan award decision was made in late 2002, before Romney took office, and that the award was made through the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative, a quasi-public agency not directly under the control of the governor. Republicans have also pointed out that additional state loans were made to Konarka after Romney left office and was replaced by a Democrat, Deval Patrick.

Romney campaign spokeswoman Andrea Saul said that Democrats are trying to use Konarka as a distraction. She also doubled down on the campaign's Solyndra attacks, which have focused on the Solyndra investors who also raised large sums of money for the president's 2008 campaign.

"President Obama has a lot of questions to answer about why he used taxpayer dollars to reward wealthy campaign donors for bad ideas like Solyndra, yet he is unwilling to focus on creating jobs for the millions of Americans who are struggling," Saul said.