EnerNOC’s COO has retired and its stock is suffering after big customer PJM accused unnamed companies of “double counting,” a practice the grid operator calls market manipulation. EnerNOC says it complies with all PJM rules. Read more »
IBM will help Indian cellular giant Bharti network its 32,000 cell towers for more efficient energy use. Think of it as a smarter way to link lots of little data centers, on a vast, distributed scale. Read more »
Silver Spring Networks and Oklahoma Gas & Electric find out that energy web portals and dashboard help people conserve, but smart thermostats cut power the most — and don’t forget to set the right electricity prices. Read more »
The cloud can make home energy management both cheap and powerful. But what if it turns out to run afoul of real — or imagined — privacy concerns? Read more »
OPower, the startup that gets homeowners to cut energy use with out in-home dashboards and gateways, is looking at home energy automation devices. What are the pros and cons of high-tech automation versus smart behavioral science? Read more »
Offshore wind power will get a $50.5 million research boost and dedicated “Wind Energy Area” in the mid-Atlantic region under a new federal plan. Google and co-investors in a $5 billion offshore wind transmission project will be pleased. Read more »
The annual smart grid show Distributech, held this week, was chock full of energy gadgets for consumers and utilities to manage home energy consumption. Will any of these succeed, and which one is your favorite? Check out our photo slide show! Read more »
Khosla-backed bio-crude startup KiOR is seeking a $1 billion loan guarantee from the DOE. The company announced a term sheet Thursday, which may or may not lead to an award, but if secured, will be crucial to the company’s plans to scale up production. Read more »
Could we see an apps store for smart meters take off in the future? SmartSynch, the company championing cellular smart meters, is trying it out with Qualcomm’s Brew MP operating platform. Read more »
Schneider Electric launched a bare bones, utility-centric line of home energy management gear on Tuesday, staking its claim to the residential energy market on the premise that homeowners will choose elegant simplicity over flashy high-tech. Read more »
General Motors has been talking for years about using its OnStar system to hook up the plug-in Chevy Volt to the smart grid and this week gave a peek into how that might happen in partnership with demand response player Comverge. Read more »
Imagine if companies could track the energy consumed by a lone click of a mouse to store photos in the cloud. It might sound like a pipe dream, but it could one day be reality. Read more »
ECOtality and Cisco are joining forces to manage home energy and car charging in a way that consumers and utilities can use. The first systems could be deployed by year’s end via the DOE-funded EV Project. Read more »
Utilities are going to have to manage nine times the data they do today if they want to adapt to the smart grid, and that will be a $34 billion market by 2020, Lux Research predicts. Read more »
EnerNOC is buying a piece of the agricultural demand response market with its purchase of Boise, Idaho-based M2M Communications. Will controlling irrigation pumps be a field of growth for the demand response industry? Read more »
Build your energy-smart home with iPhone-compatible thermostats from Home Depot. That’s the new product from Radio Thermostat, as well as the goal of the U-SNAP Alliance, which seeks to bundle Wi-Fi, ZigBee, Z Wave, FM radio and other flavors of communications for the energy-aware home. Read more »
Last week, fuel cell startup Bloom Energy launched its power purchase agreement business that repositions it from being a provider of fuel cells to a provider of the power those fuel cells generate. But what is a Bloom electron worth to Bloom’s would-be customers? Read more »
Less than 1 percent of U.S. households now use prepay electric meters. But SmartSynch and PayGo want to make them as common as prepaid mobile phones. Read more »
Can the municipal Wi-Fi concept make the leap to all-inclusive smart grid communications solution? Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Tropos Networks is trying it out, and unveiled new products and networking architecture Monday morning for everything from super-fast distribution automation gear to millions of smart meters. Read more »
Greentech startups captured four out of the five biggest U.S. venture capital rounds last year — and if it weren’t for Twitter, they might have landed all five. Read more »
Greentech marked its best year ever in 2010, and part of that is thanks to the wealth of activity across sectors during the fourth quarter. Global investment in clean energy surged, and while wind power remained the biggest greentech area, solar power saw the fastest growth. The energy efficiency sector appears to have more room for smaller players to make their mark amidst a rapidly maturing market. Meanwhile, China’s stance as a growing greentech giant continued to complicate its relationship with the United States. Companies mentioned in this report include General Electric, Intel, ZigBee, iControl, People Power and EnerNOC. For a full list of companies, and to read the full report, sign up for a free trial. Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Biofuel startup Gevo has lowered its upcoming IPO to $13 to $15 per share. That’s about $100 million, or $89 million after fees, less than the $150 million it targeted in August, but close to what analysts have predicted. Read more »
Grab your biofuel startups fast, Lux Research says — the field of contenders with game-changing technologies for turning non-food feedstocks into useful hydrocarbons is getting sparser by the minute. The report sees Big Oil and consumer products conglomerates quickly winnowing the field of the best technologies. Read more »
First Solar Chairman and former CEO Michael Ahearn is raising a $300 million venture fund, according to an SEC filing. Will the money be going to solar startups, or even cleantech? Read more »
Green IT – doing more computing for less energy — has a couple of potential breakthroughs brewing in 2011. That might give the IT industry a better view of just how important saving energy is for their customers. Read more »
General Electric is grabbing a piece of the booming data center energy business, with a $520 million offer for Lineage Power Holdings, a provider of gear for the $20 billion-per-year data center and telecom power conversion industry. Read more »
Southwest Airlines is rolling out new fuel-efficient flight-path technology that could save the company up to $60 million a year — and help the global airline industry shave its carbon footprint as well. Read more »
With 2010′s numbers rolling in, it’s becoming increasingly clear that greentech investors are shifting attention from the supply side of the clean energy equation to the demand side of reducing energy use. Read more »
Swiss grid giant ABB has put $10 million into car charging company ECOtality and linked a North American manufacturing agreement. Looks like ABB is picking its preferred winner for the U.S. car charging network to come. Read more »
Will 2011 bring recovery or retrenchment for the greentech industry? We’re tracking both the leaders and up-and-comers in the solar power, smart grid, biofuel, green vehicle and energy efficiency sectors, to discover the role that old-school energy industries are going to play in the greentech evolution. Read more »
LG entered the smart appliance fray in a big way this week, unveiling its line of Thinq appliances meant to save energy and communicate with owners and utilities via wireless networks. Hopefully, the connected appliances won’t follow the path of LG’s discontinued DIOS Internet fridge. Read more »
Chinese wind turbine maker Sinovel Wind plans to raise about 9.46 billion yuan ($1.4 billion) in what would be Shanghai’s biggest ever IPO. That’s pretty aggressive, but given China’s booming greentech economy, perhaps not unexpected. Read more »
Cutting electric vehicle charging time from hours to minutes is a holy grail of the car charging industry. But plenty of bumps lie ahead for the dream of a gas station equivalent for the EV market. Read more »
Will Jerry Brown deliver on his green energy promises in his second go-round as California governor? Read more »
The greentech industry’s 2010 showing wasn’t so bad, especially for a year that saw the world recovering from a once-in-a-generation economic meltdown. But despite this, numerous challenges exist for innovation and investment. Here are some predictions about what not to expect in next year’s greentech market. Read more »
The greentech industry’s 2010 showing wasn’t so bad, especially for a year that saw the world recovering from a once-in-a-generation economic meltdown. But despite this, venture capitalists won’t be investing in the sector like they used to, solar startups won’t see a great growth year in ... Read more at GigaOM Pro »
California’s new Renewable Auction Mechanism (RAM) represents an important new move for the state into a feed-in tariff model for solar, wind and other renewable power — but with some critical twists. What are the advantages, and the potential drawbacks, of this reverse auction FiT model? ... Read more at GigaOM Pro »
The world’s greentech industry is likely meeting the end of 2010 with a mix of relief and trepidation. Clouds are on the horizon for global investment in renewable energy, and VCs fret about realizing returns on their existing investments. Meanwhile, China boasts the world’s largest population ... Read more at GigaOM Pro »
How does one of the world’s biggest makers of technology to control buildings connect with the power grid? Honeywell is in a natural position to start answering that question with smart thermostats, home energy management, open source demand response, and a couple of quiet research projects. Read more »
Could proprietary Z-Wave be gaining ground on standards-based ZigBee in the home energy networking space? Here are a couple of recent developments that indicate Z-Wave could have a role to ... Read more at GigaOM Pro »
