Schott Solar’s announcement that it plans to halve its factory capacity for solar thermal equipment and will lay off 30 workers is a sobering reminder of some of the hurdles ahead for this emerging industry (or re-emerging, depending on your perspective). Read more »
Here are some interesting posts from around the ‘Net to catch up with over the weekend: Seth Godin: “16 questions for free agents” WorkAwesome: “The Benefits of Working from Home” WorkAwesome: “How to Ask Your Boss to Work From Home” A List Apart: “Habit Fields” jkOnTheRun: […] Read more »
BrightSource Energy, a developer of utility-scale solar thermal power plants, has raised $150 million in a fourth-round of equity financing. The massive new investment announced this morning puts it in a growing group of greentech startups that have raised more than $300 million. Read more »
{"source":"http:\/\/gigaom.com\/tag\/solar-thermal\/page\/2\/wijax\/b959f4af7e82222223ac4cb50ea2d81d","varname":"wijax_df4853f32abb2b06d7dcd01d325e9638","title_element":"h2","title_class":"widget-title","title_before":"%3Ch2%20class%3D%22widget-title%22%3E","title_after":"%3C%2Fh2%3E"}
The Clean Tech Open, a nonprofit business plan competition for early-stage startups focused on renewable energy, green building and other cleantech markets, announced today the three winners in the Rocky Mountain region. New Sky Energy, Rivertop Renewables and SunTrac Solar will each receive $50,000 in cash […] Read more »
Think of rooftop solar and you likely envision photovoltaic panels. But a group of solar startups are working to put concentrating solar-thermal systems – more commonly seen in large solar projects in the desert – on roofs too. One such startup, San Jose, Calif.-based Chromasun, unveiled […] Read more »
Solar thermal power company Solel Solar Systems has found an exit. Less than a year after Solel raised a gigantic $105 million investment from London-based firm Ecofin to help finance a plant in California’s Mojave Desert, Siemens has announced today that it is buying the Israeli […] Read more »
Introduced by none other than Steve Jobs at the Apple Music Event last month, the iTunes LP adds content like lyrics, liner notes, animation, and video interviews to the traditional album for a little more money, at least for the consumer. It turns out Apple is […] Read more »
Solar thermal developer eSolar is continuing its rush of deal-making, saying today that it’s inked a partnership with a South African-based energy firm to expand sales operations across the sub-Saharan region of the continent. Under terms of the deal, Johannesburg-based Clean Energy Solutions will exclusively represent […] Read more »
It looks like Ausra’s plan to sell components, instead of building large solar-power plants on its own, has started rolling. Ausra on Wednesday announced it has been selected to supply a critical component, a solar steam boiler, for a 100MW concentrated solar thermal power project being […] Read more »
I am constantly analyzing the way I use mobile technology, and as a result, I often change the way I do things. I am in the fortunate position where I get exposed to lots of technology and that exposure keeps me looking at how I use […] Read more »
{"source":"http:\/\/pro.gigaom.com\/wijax\/a206c64880c8215b985ab24ebe90eafd","varname":"wijax_d269eebc26af5b39ec3c65bb7948e7ce","title_element":"h2","title_class":"widget-title","title_before":"%3Ch2%20class%3D%22widget-title%22%3E","title_after":"%3C%2Fh2%3E"}
Pour enough cash into greentech startups and environmental efforts, and sooner or later a couple of your investments might cross paths — especially in a time when large-scale solar projects planned for the Mojave Desert are coming under fire from environmental groups concerned about desert species […] Read more »
Last year’s oil spike feels like a distant memory, but to remind you, oil prices surpassed $147 per barrel last July, with gasoline prices above $4 per gallon. But if you think that was bad, feel lucky you weren’t living in the Caribbean at the time. […] Read more »
If anyone doubts the ability of renewable portfolio standards to spur the adoption of clean energy projects, they should look to California. The state is requiring that electric utilities need to get 20 percent of their power from solar, wind and other renewables by 2010, prompting […] Read more »
Concentrating solar-thermal company eSolar hasn’t been shy about taking on new projects. The Pasadena, Calif.-based company on Thursday announced another one: an agreement to develop a 92-megawatt plant in southern New Mexico with Princeton, N.J.-based energy company NRG Energy. The companies say they are ready to […] Read more »
Some 60,000 solar insiders from around the world have gathered in Munich this week for the annual Intersolar conference. As prices for solar panels fall and solar developers face financing challenges in the economic downturn, Markus Elsässer, CEO of Solar Promotion, one of the two organizers […] Read more »
eSolar, a startup that claims to leverage algorithms and software to bring down the cost of solar power thermal plants, has signed its second licensing and investment deal in as many weeks. These deals prove promising for the startup as the company has been pretty quiet […] Read more »
On the day I give up on my iPhone and trade it in for the iPod Touch, AdMob, a mobile advertising startup released its report that shows a big uptick in mobile Internet usage via Wi-Fi in the month of January 2009. According to AdMob, Apple […] Read more »
Update: It’s a massive 1.3 GW deal with solar startup BrightSource — read about it in our updated post. Southern California Edison plans to announce what it’s calling “the world’s largest solar deal” tomorrow morning, but details are scarce. There are a couple of ways this […] 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 »
China’s Qaidam Basin could become the equivalent of the Mojave Desert in terms of solar power projects, if new plans to build a 1-gigawatt solar power photovoltaic farm in China come to fruition. While utilities and startups have sited the Southern California desert for some of […] Read more »
BrightSource Energy has contracted Siemens to build a 123-megawatt solar-powered turbine generator for its massive Mojave Desert solar-thermal projects, the Oakland, Calif.-based startup announced today. Having raised more than $160 million (including$115 million from Google.org, BP, and other big investors in Series C financing last May) […] Read more »
The Sunshine State this week moved one step closer toward capitalizing on its namesake and becoming one of the largest producers of solar energy in the country. Florida utility Florida Power & Light Co. (FPL) said yesterday that it has broken ground on a 75-megawatt solar […] Read more »
Electric Power Research Institute is heading up research that will examine whether taking steam from solar thermal projects and adding them to conventional fossil fuel power plants can help reduce fuel costs and plant emissions. Read more »
SkyFuel officially launched its low cost trough-shaped solar concentrators, dubbed SkyTrough, at an event in Colorado today. Parabolic troughs are an older solar technology, and while most are made out of glass, SkyFuel’s are made from the company’s own ReflecTech film material — sort of like […] Read more »
We were pretty sure that the news that solar thermal startup Ausra had raised $25 million back in August, wasn’t the full story — Ausra Executive VP Robert Morgan had said that the company was looking to raise a round closer to $50 million for its […] Read more »
SkyFuel’s VP of business development, Christopher Huntington, compares his solar startup’s strategy to the tortoise, in the old tortoise and the hare story. He says while many young solar thermal startups are racing to rush next-generation, unproven technologies to market, SkyFuel is working on dramatically lowering […] Read more »
Although the sun could be setting on the renewable tax credits, private equity is shining down on solar thermal startup SolarReserve. The Santa Monica, Calif.-based company says it has raised a hefty $140 million in a second round of funding for its utility-scale solar thermal power […] Read more »
There are more than 30 utility-scale solar power plants, one megawatt or larger, under various stages of development in the U.S., and we decided to start mapping them out. These are solar plants that have either signed a power purchase agreement with a utility, are included […] Read more »
The small-scale solar thermal startup Sopogy, which we reported just raised $9 million from investors including the investment vehicle of eBay founder Pierre Omidyar, Ohana Holdings, says that it started construction on one of its solar power farms on Hawaii’s Big Island at the Natural Energy […] Read more »
The most recent quarterly cleantech investing numbers are out from the Cleantech Group, and they contain some upbeat news: Investing in saving the Earth doesn’t stop when the economy drops — at least it hasn’t so far. According to the Cleantech Group, the second quarter of […] Read more »
When most of us web workers choose to adopt new software applications, they’re often big, robust programs. However, if you pay attention to small, mission-critical applications too, you can find a lot of really useful gems. One of my favorite sites for trolling for these is […] Read more »
Tesla wasn’t the only cleantech startup with big news about manufacturing on Monday; solar thermal startup Ausra said yesterday that it had turned on the reflector line at its Las Vegas solar equipment manufacturing facility. And like at Tesla’s media event, which was attended by California’s […] Read more »
For freelancing web workers, we sometimes get caught in the contract work aspect of our careers. Clients require your services, you provide, they pay. This cycle can get too comfortable that sometimes, you can’t imagine making money any other way. After all, you’re mobile and you […] Read more »
The Sunshine State could soon capitalize on its namesake and become one of the largest producers of solar energy in the country, if Florida utility FPL follows through on its plan to build three new solar power plants. FPL announced yesterday that it plans to generate […] Read more »
Utilities plan to use solar power from both the massive solar plants that are being built in the California Mojave desert, as well as large scale distributed rooftop solar projects, like the one Southern California Edison is planning. So which technology is better? Centralized solar systems […] Read more »
While solar thermal companies eSolar and Stirling both announced funding in the 9-digits last week, another startup using the sun’s heat to create energy disclosed a more modest round this week. SkyFuel, an Albuquerque, N.M.-based company that has created a cheap, light material called “ReflecTech” for […] Read more »
RescueTime, the ridiculously easy time management and analysis application, recently added some great features to its already impressive Web-based service to make it just that much more useful and indispensable in my work routine. The addition of autotagging, group tracking, and improved privacy are the highlights […] Read more »
This Friday marks the beginning of South by Southwest in Austin, starting with the Interactive Festival. Every year, geeks galore descend on my hometown, only to be replaced by filmmakers and then musicians. The geeks are my favorites, but you knew I’d say that. As a […] Read more »
After seeing this hub on Gizmodo, we realized that our manufacturer really goofed. I’m not sure what happened because they got most of our order right: OnTheRun logo man, check. Two USB and two mini-USB ports, check. Weight of only 71-grams, check. Low price of $12, […] Read more »
After watching Merlin’s great presentation on taking control of your own work time I started thinking about a lot of the little things I do each day to prevent losing focus on the current task at hand. The more I thought about it the more I […] Read more »
Follow @gigaom for more stories like this.
You're subscribed to our newsletter. If you'd like, you can update your settings
