Solyndra, the well-funded manufacturer of cylindrical CIGS solar cells, is sending in the paperwork to obtain loans from the Department of Energy to build and operate a solar factory. These applications are going to become a great way to get a detailed view of its manufacturing plans. Someone sent us the environmental assessment documents and here are some fun facts. The company is currently building a 110-megawatt facility in Fremont, Calif. and wants to follow up with a 420-megawatt plant that will contain six production lines. The 110-megawatt facility will be partially built with DOE loans but the 420-megawatt facility will require loans. The larger facility will break ground, ideally, in 2010 and be fully built out by 2011, according to the application. The 420-megawatt facility will employ about 120 people, according to Solyndra's application. It will consist of over 609,000 square feet. 532,200 square feet will be dedicated to manufacturing space, around 64,000 will go to office space, 11,000 will go to a cafeteria and another 4,000 square feet will go to a company gym. The gym is a drop in the bucket. Besides, healthy employees keep costs down so putting a gym in the factory is perfectly legit. (Anything that doesn't lead to Wall Street employees getting money is actually OK in my book at this point.) But it is sort of fun to point out and no doubt there will be some that try to exploit the system. The next nine months should produce an interesting array of documents.