Katie is a Senior Writer & Features Editor for GigaOM and has been covering cutting-edge technology, startups and innovators in Silicon Valley for close to a decade. She launched GigaOM’s greentech channel in 2007 and closely tracks energy entrepreneurs and investors.
Connecting the ends of the Earth with internet access will require tapping into various types of clean power. Google’s Project Loon is just the latest wacky way to use renewable energy to connect the world. Read more »
VC-backed LED startup Luminus Devices has been sold off to a Chinese lighting company. Following in the footsteps of solar, electric cars, and batteries, LED technology is now also getting bought up by Chinese players. Read more »
Cloud-based business software can save significant energy, according to a new report from Berkeley Lab. To prove this the researchers built a model that crunches the data around the cloud and energy. Read more »
Now part of the cable connected home experience from Comcast: a learning thermostat service and remote-controlled LED light bulbs. Read more »
There’s a growing amount of research that says the Internet has a greater net positive effect on the environment than a negative one. But the research is still new and the question is very complex. Read more »
The Internet and the digital revolution can be a major player in fighting climate change, says Al Gore at a Google event. Read more »
Will design contribute to this growing trend of Silicon Valley turning into a hits-driven ecosystem, not unlike Hollywood? Read more »
Five-month-old startup N3twork has emerged from stealth with $12 million from Valley investors. We’ll have to wait until later this year for its product to unstealth, too. Read more »
Social pressure influences everything in our lives from our habits to our clothing choices to the food we eat. It also can be harnessed as a power tool to reduce energy consumption in our homes. Read more »
Google’s latest clean power play takes the search engine giant all the way to a Swedish wind farm, which will eventually crank out and pump clean power across the country to a data center in Finland. Read more »
Verizon is now the latest customer of Silicon Valley’s buzzy fuel cell company Bloom Energy. The trend of telecom and Internet companies increasingly turning to clean power options continues to grow. Read more »
Silicon Valley will soon be getting a reminder of the power of thinking big: a life-sized bronzed statue of Nikola Tesla in Palo Alto, Calif. Read more »
Following the collapse of the first wave of cleantech investing, and an attention on digital technology, Silicon Valley has moved even further away from using tech to fight climate change. And that’s too bad. Read more »
Google’s huge clean power investing project now includes Africa for the first time — a large solar panel farm being built in South Africa. Read more »
Tesla is tripling the size of its Supercharger network across the U.S., and doing so a year ahead of schedule. Read more »
Thomas Siebel’s energy data startup C3 keeps on raising money for its utility big data play. Will this be a break out year for the company? Read more »
Apple has hired former EPA Chief Lisa Jackson. Sounds like Apple’s attention to clean power for its data centers, lowering its carbon emissions and removing toxic chemicals from devices will only get stronger. Read more »
Electric car maker Tesla Motors has hit a major milestone in the lifetime of any successful public company: it started trading at over $100 per share. Read more »
Adobe continues its design tear and acquihires San Francisco consultancy Ideacodes. It’s the third acquisition in the past 6 months that Adobe hopes will help it transition its Creative Suite to the cloud. Read more »
A developer in Atlanta has made an unofficial Nest app for Google Glass. Nest goes wearable! Read more »
If Better Place files for bankruptcy in a few days, as reported by Fortune, it would represent a sober end to a high-flying dream that raised hundreds of millions of dollars. Read more »
The long disturbing tale of electric car maker Fisker Automotive keeps on going, and keeps getting more weird. Read more »
Rockstar designer Paul Adams has ditched Facebook for startup Intercom. Before Facebook, Adam’s design work was integral with Google+ and circles. He’s not the first designer to leave Facebook after a 2 year stint. Read more »
Tesla has now paid off its loan to the U.S. government entirely, plus interest, meaning U.S. taxpayers actually made a $20 million profit. Read more »
Adobe has acquired another design tool, following its Behance buy — the Brookyln based mobile app design shop Thumb Labs. Read more »
Is $20 million the final valuation of electric car maker Fisker Automotive? Yikes, that’s what a group is reportedly bidding on Fisker for, and which would be less than 1% of its original valuation. Read more »
Google’s moonshot lab Google X is buying up Makani Power, a startup that makes a kite-like wind power device. It’s probably the best place for the long shot, big idea that is high altitude wind. Read more »
Electric car maker Tesla Motors could make history again, if it pays off its loan from the Department of Energy many years before its due. According to a tweet from the CEO that could be as early as today. Read more »
Venture capital-backed lithium ion battery startup Amprius is finally moving into commercial production, with an announcement that it has OEM partners in place, and will start making its second-gen batteries later this year. Read more »
Quantum computers, which have recently been bought by Google and Lockheed Martin, aren’t just sophisticated computers, they need to operate at near absolute zero temperatures to deliver their quantum effects, and that’s a tricky problem. Read more »
An air battery — long the holy grail of battery researchers — could see commercialization next year by startup Eos Energy Storage. Read more »
Bijan Sabet and Fred Wilson continue a long tradition of a couple investors utterly dominating their sectors by betting on what they know, and getting in early before others even know there is an opportunity. Read more »
Everlane and True & Co are part of a new wave of e-commerce startups that are using emotion and design to sell goods. Read more »
Startup Re:char hopes to deliver a low cost Android gadget plug-in that can test the moisture content and fertility of soil. Kenyan farmers get ready to meet the latest in data analytics and cloud services. Read more »
As a boom of solar panels continues to be installed on buildings throughout the U.S., companies, groups and even every day people can make money off of funding this clean energy transition. Read more »
Tesla is now officially a success according to blind-sided investors and media. Tesla didn’t emerge last week with a win, it’s taken a decade to deliver and true game-changing innovation takes a very long time. Read more »
Tesla could raise another $830 million in a new offering in a combination of selling common stock, and issuing senior convertible notes. That means Tesla can pay back its DOE loan early, among other things. Read more »
Orange, the French telco giant, unveiled the first 6 startups in its inaugural accelerator program, including startups building hardware and software for the developing world, and startups using data to make clouds and online identities secure. Read more »
Peer-to-peer car sharing company RelayRides has bought up startup Wheelz, partly for its automated system that lets users easily unlock and drive away in a car without having to get a key from the owner. Read more »
The Valley’s fuel cell startup Bloom Energy has now raised over $1.1 billion, according to a report. While Bloom has gotten strong traction, particularly with data center operators, fuel cell manufacturing is difficult and capital intensive business. Read more »
