Not What It Sounds Like: Porsche has gone solar. No, not by slapping solar panels on cars, but by installing its first U.S. solar array at a California logistics facility. — Fast Company Building a Better Subsidy: For the first time, clean energy developers can choose […] Read more »
Some six months ago, the venture capital community saw 2009′s cleantech investments as having about as many storm clouds as Sand Hill Road in July — which is to say, very few. With the economic downturn, though, the outlook has changed, as a growing portion of […] Read more »
Alt-Fuel Freeway: The governors of California, Oregon and Washington are considering a plan to make Interstate 5 a “green freeway,” installing batter charging and swap stations, plus biodiesel, ethanol, hydrogen and compressed natural gas fuel pumps along the West Coast route from Canada to Mexico. — […] Read more »
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Cleantech Deep Dive: The first report in a thorough three-part series on how companies are navigating this make-or-break period for cleantech looks at why startups that look a little like Google may be the big winners. — CNET’s Green Tech Green Dreams Dashed: The 2007 climate […] Read more »
At a hearing about smart grid technology held today on Capitol Hill, the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s deputy director, Patrick Gallagher, summed up the big unknown for policymakers and potential smart grid players when he said: “The question of timing is front and center […] Read more »
Waiting…Still Waiting: The DOE has yet to disburse $25 billion under a four-year-old loan program for green cars. One complication: It can only award money to “financially viable” companies and projects, and two applicants (GM and Chrysler) must wait another month for feds to decide whether […] Read more »
Given the tone of his speech before Congress earlier this week and his support of clean energy infrastructure as a tool for economic recovery, it’s no surprise that the outline of President Obama’s 2010 budget proposal, released today, includes increased funding for the Department of Energy’s […] Read more »
Japan Mulls Feed-In Tariff : Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry is pushing for a feed-in tariff that would guarantee a price (to be paid by utilities) for surplus electricity from residential solar systems for about a decade. — Reuters Plan B: Hack the Climate: […] Read more »
Eurus Energy is no rookie in the world of renewable energy, but up until recently, wind had been its resource of choice. That’s changing — one massive solar plant at a time. The company’s Japan-based subsidiary recently completed a 1 MW photovoltaic project in South Korea, […] Read more »
High school students are Facebooking, MySpacing and Twittering on their own time, but many public high schools have yet to fully incorporate teenagers’ native tools –- digital media -– into their classrooms. To change that, teachers from the San Francisco Unified School District are slated to […] Read more »
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Get ready for the carbon capture boom. Government funding for carbon capture and storage projects has ballooned in the last three months — and not just through the economic stimulus package, which increased federal support by 70 percent to $8 billion for demonstrations and deployment, according […] Read more »
It’s official: The government haggling over how to revive the U.S. economy ended with the stroke of President Obama’s pen on the $787 billion stimulus bill this afternoon at the solar-powered Denver Museum of Nature & Science. Now begins a new round of jockeying — this […] Read more »
Not to be outdone by Google and Microsoft — both of which vaulted into the high-tech power management mix this week — IBM unveiled a new service today for cutting businesses’ emissions and energy use. Where the Googlers and ‘Softies are concentrating on home electricity use, […] Read more »
The House and Senate have made a tentative deal on the stimulus bill, and plan to vote on a compromise version of the package tomorrow. At $789 billion, the bill is some $40 billion leaner than either of the versions proposed by the two legislative bodies. […] Read more »
Updated to include quote from DOE’s David Frantz: Energy Secretary Steven Chu wanted checks cut in four weeks. Today, the director of the Department of Energy’s much-delayed loan guarantee program for clean energy technology, David Frantz, revealed what he sees as a realistic timeline: In testimony […] Read more »
Let’s Make a Deal: Spending on clean energy, energy efficiency and public transit in the latest stimulus bill is exactly halfway between the House and Senate versions — the House had approved $72 billion, the Senate $68 billion. — Gristmill Bingaman for Ethanol Boost: With corn […] Read more »
Siting is a thorny issue for any major infrastructure project — after all, who wants a freeway in their backyard? For the pending transmission grid buildout, the challenge could be even greater because of a key difference between the Interstate Highway System that President Eisenhower championed […] Read more »
With the House version of the economic stimulus bill settled weeks ago and the Senate finally agreed on its own version, we’re closing in on a showdown between the two houses of Congress. Now that Senate has ended its internal wrangling, it will meet with the […] Read more »
Tallying the True Costs of Electricity: The quickest, if not the politically easiest, way to boost clean energy is to create a national cap-and-trade scheme — not a Manhattan project for renewables. — WSJ’s Environmental Capital Energy-Tourism Smackdown: Japan’s plan to build out clean energy infrastructure […] Read more »
The current downturn is likely to be a tipping point for e-commerce, as thrifty buyers search for bargains on the web. We saw early signs of this trend recently when Amazon reported great sales performance for the holiday season — quite the opposite of its brick-and-mortar […] Read more »
Obama Wants Energy Efficiency Rules, Pronto: President Barack Obama ordered the DOE yesterday to immediately draft overdue standards for making a variety of appliances and light bulbs more efficient. — New York Times Big Bucks for Batteries: Loan guarantees and grants worth $2 billion for advanced […] Read more »
Earlier today, Google unveiled Latitude, a nifty little application for your smartphone (as long as it’s not an iPhone) that lets your friends locate you, and you them, on a map. But Latitude is actually the result of a much bigger battle between Google and the mobile operators, of which location-based services are but one small part. Read more »
Financial Wizards Wanted: Tax equity investors, the financial specialists that convert tax credits into capital that developers can use to build new wind turbines and solar farms, have all but disappeared — just when they’re needed most. — BusinessWeek Mass Transit Squeeze: More Americans than ever […] Read more »
Apple is taking a lot of stick (even more than usual) about hanging tough with premium pricing despite the global financial meltdown, and it almost never offers discounts or sales. So how can budget-constrained Macheads economize on system upgrades? One solution is to buy a less-expensive […] Read more »
Adding hundreds of small transmission line projects and grid upgrades to the 57 GW of large-scale transmission initiatives now being developed in the western U.S. (many of them in Texas) could have a significant impact on wind power development in less than six years, according to […] Read more »
California might get all the attention for its solar resources in the Mojave desert, but it’s not the only Western state with sun-soaked lands and a growing appetite for solar power. Arizona’s largest utility, Arizona Public Service, unveiled a plan today to invest $18 billion in […] Read more »
Duke Energy’s Carolinas subsidy will renege on its proposed $50 million solar rooftop program unless North Carolina utility regulators remove restrictions on how it can pay for the project, the Charlotte Business Journal reports. The energy company, which gets 70 percent of its power from coal, […] Read more »
When it comes to energy storage, lead acid can seem so last century — especially compared with nickel-metal hydride (used in the current generation of hybrid cars) and lithium-ion (used in mobile devices today and held by many to be the future of electric cars). Automakers […] Read more »
Ausra Scales Back Solar Plans: Solar startup Ausra has abandoned plans to build massive solar-thermal power plants in favor of smaller, cheaper units because of a lack of financing. — CNET’s Green Tech More Money, More Problems?: Congress plans to put $10 billion or more in […] Read more »
Global investment in clean energy must reach $515 billion per year by 2030 — triple that of last year’s investment — in order to avoid “the catastrophic impact of climate change,” according to a report from the World Economic Forum and New Energy Finance. Released this […] Read more »
Former Vice President Al Gore urged members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee this morning to greenlight President Barack Obama’s entire $825 billion economic stimulus package, which includes $54 billion for clean energy. Presenting prepared testimony on climate change solutions leading up to the UN talks […] Read more »
If the rest of the country had followed California’s lead in supporting clean energy, improving efficiency, and creating green jobs, it might not be in the economic doldrums it’s in today. That’s the assertion made by venture capitalist F. Noel Perry, founder of the nonprofit policy […] Read more »
Lockheed Martin Corp. and Ocean Power Technologies plan to develop a utility-scale wave power project off the coast of California or Oregon, the two said this morning. Lockheed will construct the project and handle operations once it’s up and running, and New Jersey-based Ocean Power will […] Read more »
I have worked hard in my office all week but the beautiful weather today enticed me out from behind the desk and down to the neighborhood coffee shop. I’ve been here for a while but sadly the experience hasn’t been as good nor as productive as […] Read more »
Talk in Tesla Town: Tesla Motors has announced a set of town hall meetings to discuss jacked-up prices on pre-ordered Roadsters, since an email from CEO Elon Musk failed to appease angry customers. — AutoblogGreen Not-So-Super Carbon Footprint: A multimillion-dollar supercomputer designed by IBM to gauge […] Read more »
The House Ways and Means Committee yesterday approved $20 billion in incentives for wind and solar energy projects and efficiency improvements to existing homes. Part of the economic stimulus package we covered earlier in the day, the vote came late in the afternoon. House Democrats advanced […] Read more »
Chrysler-Fiat Deal Contingent on More Loans: Anonymous sources say Fiat’s agreement to take a 35-percent stake in Chrysler will not be binding unless Washington loans Chrysler an additional $3 billion. — Wall Street Journal Toyota the New Top Dog: For the first time since the Great […] Read more »
General Motors plans to invest $30 million into building a plant for assembling Chevy Volt battery packs, the automaker said today at the Automotive News World Congress in Detroit, Reuters reports. GM revealed earlier this month that it would manufacture the packs in Michigan with lithium-ion […] Read more »
Planet-Cooling Plants: New research suggests planting crops that reflect more sunlight could deliver summertime cooling of about 2 degrees Fahrenheit across central North America and a wide band of Europe and Asia. — New York Times Tesla Jacks Up Roadster Price: Tesla Motors has informed customers […] Read more »
Doing a Martin Luther King Jr. vid picks on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day — not to mention the day before America inaugurates its first black president — is somewhat obvious as choice of topics go. But don’t worry, because while of course I’m going to […] Read more »
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