More stories from Katie Fehrenbacher

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The biggest barrier to building all these solar thermal power plants in the Mojave desert is, unsurprisingly, cost. At this week’s Fortune Green conference the CEO of California utility PG&E, Peter Darbee, said he’s had discussions about using PG&E’s deep pockets to buy their own solar […] Read more »

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Craig Venter’s Synthetic Genomics, a startup that is looking to do no less than overthrow the petrol industry and create an artificial life form, is in the process of raising another round of funding in the “$100 million to $200 million range,” the company’s Chief Financial […] Read more »

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We just listened in on Dell CEO Michael Dell’s speech at the Fortune Green conference, during which he showed off a “never before seen” eco-inspired computer with a bamboo casing. Dell said the computer is 81 percent smaller than a standard desktop, uses 70 percent less […] Read more »

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Earth Day is starting to feel like just another holiday created to sell a lot of stuff. Our email inboxes have been bombarded over the past month with announcements from traditional tech companies touting their eco moves. As the coordinator of the first Earth Day, Denis […] Read more »

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Shai Agassi, who turned 40 this weekend, gave some new details about his plans to build infrastructure for the world’s electric vehicles at the Fortune Green conference on Monday. He detailed his startup’s subscription plans, which will mirror cell phone services (noting MetroPCS, prepaid plans, and […] Read more »

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“Ridiculous” is the way Kleiner Perkins VC and Fisker Automotive investor Ray Lane described the lawsuit filed against the car maker last week by competitor Tesla Automotive. Tesla is accusing Fisker of stealing design ideas and trade secrets, but Lane says Tesla’s just trying to generate […] Read more »

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Cleantech investors Kleiner Perkins and RockPort Capital Partners are thinking U.S. consumers will be interested in a mainstream electric vehicle that is cheaper than the Prius. The duo announced today that they have decided to create a joint venture with one of their investments, Norwegian company […] Read more »

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eSolar, a startup building solar thermal power plants that was one of the first cleantech startups backed by Google, has pulled in $130 million, the company says this morning; the funding comes from Google.org, Bill Gross’ Idealab, Oak Investment Partners and other investors. The company also […] Read more »

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OK, so we know where Larry Gross, former CEO of AltraBiofuels and Idealab dot-commer, has landed. AltraBiofuels has actually spun out a new startup called Edeniq, that will focus on cellulosic ethanol processing. Gross will be heading it up, Edeniq’s VP of sales and marketing, Will […] Read more »

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Update: Larry Gross is heading up an AltraBiofuels spinoff called Edeniq that will focus on cellulosic ethanol, more details here. While we were digging into a list of biofuel startups backed by Valley firms, we noticed a changing of the guard at Los Angeles, Calif.-based AltraBiofuels. […] Read more »

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Everything is going portable these days, but . . . nuclear reactors? Hyperion Power Generation, a startup based in Santa Fe, N.M., is working on a self-contained compact nuclear power reactor unit that it says is “about the size of a typical backyard hot tub” (a […] Read more »

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Tesla and Fisker Automotive, the two electric-car startups backed by Silicon Valley’s most well known cleantech VCs, are involved in a now very public feud. On Monday Tesla filed suit in Superior Court in California alleging that Fisker stole Tesla’s design ideas and trade secrets. The […] Read more »

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Ask execs at the major solar cell makers what’s kept them up at night over the past year and the answer you’ll get will undoubtedly center around the tight supply of polysilicon, the key ingredient in traditional solar panels. That could be changing even sooner than […] Read more »

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While there were a few reports out last week showing that venture investing in cleantech startups was at a record high in the first quarter of 2008, things weren’t as rosy when it came to private equity. A new report out from New Energy Finance says […] Read more »

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Our favorite oil-baron-turned-wind-power-wildcatter, T. Boone Pickens, will make the first down payment this month on 500 wind turbines for his plan to build the world’s largest wind farm in Texas, says the Guardian. Over the next four years, Pickens plans to build 2,700 wind turbines that […] Read more »

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This weekend at the MIT Energy Conference, MIT and Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute said they would create the MIT-Fraunhofer Institute for Sustainable Energy Systems to do research in renewable energy technology. Once an area like Massachusetts gets established as a hub of cleantech innovation, it becomes that […] Read more »

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What’s going to be the viral element that gets us to cut down on our collective carbon emissions? Who’s going to deliver us the iPod of cleantech? If we knew for sure, we’d be off building it, but these 10 web sites think they have the […] Read more »

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The granddaddy of California’s cleantech contests — the California Cleantech Open — launched its third annual business competition down at San Jose’s city hall last night. It kicked off to the raucous words of San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed, encouraging speeches from cleantech investor Steve Jurvetson […] Read more »

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The folks at Ted just put up a video clip of Al Gore’s new climate change talk, which he presented at the annual conference. It’s got the same tone — “we have work to do. . . . what is missing is a sense of urgency,” […] Read more »

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As the first quarter of 2008 roars by like a 747 stuffed with biofuels, our research peers are tallying up the amount of cleantech investing that went down. Between $988 million and $1.25 billion globally, according to two reports out this week, the lower figure from […] Read more »

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The owner of the most wind power in the world is now Spanish utility Iberdrola, according to Emerging Energy Research. The research firm’s report says Iberdrola now owns nearly 7 gigawatts of wind power plants, after adding over 1.55 gigawatts of new wind plant construction and […] Read more »

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Too busy to fight climate change? Just charge the problem away with one of Middlebury, Vt.-based Brighter Planet’s credit card offers. The two-year-old startup says this morning that it has raised a $3.2 million Series B round of funding led by Crow Hill Ventures to bring […] Read more »

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Credo Mobile, the green phone division of Working Assets, has two new accessories it started touting on Tuesday. The San Francisco-based company that gives a portion of its phone plan revenues to charities has started offering its subscribers a solar-powered Bluetooth headset from Iqua, and a […] Read more »

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Clear Skies in India: Clear Skies Solar says it’s signed a $20 million letter of agreement with Indian company Power Cube to develop solar systems in India — release, Cleantech Media. Congress in Crucial Period of Energy Talks: “This is one of the most crucial periods […] Read more »

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Two sectors that could provide some concrete and immediate reductions in energy use — more efficient lighting and a smarter power grid — saw investment this week. LED startups Bridgelux and Illumitex, and smart meter software firm eMeter all brought in some fresh funding for their […] Read more »

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Google’s been tracking its plug-in electric vehicle project for a couple months now, and has started compiling some of that data on its website. While they don’t have any conclusions yet as to whether or not plug-in Priuses are substantially better than Priuses (patience folks), they […] Read more »

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There’s nothing like breathless morning show radio reports declaring “what the kids are up to these days.” NPR says young people are “flocking” to the carbon markets, both to make money and to feel like they’re doing some good in the world. After listening in on […] Read more »

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The venture firm Foundation Capital might not generate as much press coverage as the Kleiner Perkins’ Gore/Doerr duo, or the oft-mentioned biofuel advocate Khosla, but with demand response firm EnerNOC, which went public in May 2007, they had one of the cleantech industry’s first exits. Apparently […] Read more »

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Whether you believe that the world’s oil production has peaked yet or not, Big Oil is certainly looking for ways to extend the life of its current reserves. And a report out this morning from the folks at Lux Research says nanotechnology startups will be crucial […] Read more »

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If you’ve ever tried to use one of those carbon footprint calculator web sites, then you’ll likely understand why mobile entrepreneur Andreas Zachariah would try to build a better way. Most online carbon calculators aren’t too user-friendly and rely on the user to input a significant […] Read more »

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We’re such big fans of Google’s mapping services that we’ve been been racking up a list of our own creations: 101 Cleantech Startups, Coal Plant Deathwatch and E2T’s Eco Tour. Turns out Greenpeace is a bit of a Google Earth groupie too, and this week the […] Read more »

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Startups that are taking a holistic approach to making homes greener are coming out of the woodwork this week. We profiled Sustainable Spaces on Monday, and a Houston, Texas-based startup called Standard Renewable Energy, which sells green building solutions like solar PV for homes and businesses, […] Read more »

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Waves, tides, rivers, canals…if it flows, chances are someone’s figuring out a way to harness it to produce clean energy. And a Massachusetts-based startup called Free Flow Power is even working on tapping the mighty Mississippi. The company has a $3 billion plan to place thousands […] Read more »

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Scotland was referred to as “the Saudi Arabia of Wave Power” in the headline of a recent Fortune article. And while that might be a bit of a stretch, the Scottish government said today it will offer a $20 million prize for innovation in marine power. […] Read more »

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Nanosolar, one of the first startups to begin producing next-generation thin-film solar cells has raised yet another $50 million in funding; this time from French power company EDF Energies Nouvelles. EDF’s investment also came with an agreement to be able to buy Nanosolar’s panels at a […] Read more »

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As if biofuels needed any more negative press, along comes this doozy. A Brazilian ethanol firm backed by hundreds of millions of dollars from a who’s who list of investors — among them former President Bill Clinton, cleantech VC Vinod Khosla, supermarket bigwig Ron Burkle, AOL […] Read more »

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Next-gen ethanol producer Range Fuels this morning officially confirmed, as we reported last month, that it has raised one of the more sizable funding rounds this year of over $100 million (the WSJ puts the size at $130M). But the company’s release also slips in the […] Read more »

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When we gathered together our post, 15 Algae Startups Bringing Pond Scum to Fuel Tanks, last week, we realized a lot of the companies are making some significant inroads on the microscopic green fuel. Inventure Chemical’s CEO Mark Tegen tells us his firm, based in Seattle, […] Read more »

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Lotsa little funding announcements popped up on my radar today, kicking the week off with a feeling that the cleantech investing train won’t be slowing down anytime soon. Plus, it’s helping us ignore that whole recession thing. Following is more than $50 million in green-tinged deal […] Read more »

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The fight against climate change in the U.S. is getting billions of VC dollars for tech innovation, the attention of presidential candidates, and game-changing legislation. So what else could it possibly need? Better advertising, at least according to Nobel Peace Prize winner and former U.S. Vice […] Read more »

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