Even if assuming these costs could be justified on public policy grounds, neither the Treasury nor the Federal Reserve had the authority to commit public money in that way; in particular, the Federal Reserve's loans must be sufficiently secured to provide reasonable assurance that the loan will be fully repaid. Such collateral was not available in this case.
This ambition is closely connected to the way we produce energy, following a path that increasingly depends less on fossil fuels and is more reliant on green sources. However, the sustainability of energy systems calls for careful planning that is difficult to reconcile with the urgency we are facing in these days.