There’s no individual that exemplifies the merging of the environmental movement and the technology industry more than former Vice President Al Gore. By now everyone’s seen his Academy Award-winning plea to fight climate change, and he’s a senior adviser to Google (GOOG), an Apple (AAPL) board member, and founder of video network CurrentTV.With the news [...]
BP’s new chief executive, Tony Hayward, announced a major business restructuring this week that could result in the company’s clean energy initiatives getting pushed to the back burner. Calling it “a fundamental shift” in the way the oil giant does business, Hayward said BP’s gas power & renewables division would be folded into its [...]
Vinod Khosla, the 52-year venture capitalist and founder of Khosla Ventures and Sun Microsystems, is leading Silicon Valley’s biofuel gold rush. Controversial to some (corn ethanol critics) and put on a pedestal by others (venture investors that follow his lead), he’s made at least 10 biofuel bets in recent years. While biofuels are facing a [...]
SmartSpark Energy Raises $$$: Solar inverter technology (converts DC to AC) is the next place for investment, a VC told me recently. He looks to be right, and SmartSpark Energy said it raised an undisclosed round from Battery Ventures — release.Solar Decathlon Starts Tomorrow: Twenty college teams will bring their solar prototypes to the National [...]
The division of the U.S. government’s National Security Space Office known as “Dream Works” (no joke) has formulated a vision for a space-based solar system that would capture sunlight with satellite solar arrays and beam it down to Earth.In a report released yesterday, the NSSO recommended laying the groundwork for commercial development of the [...]
In the race to produce cheaper solar cells using new manufacturing methods and materials, solar startups have been requiring more and more money to get their products to market. Over the past few months, Konarka, Miasolé,HelioVolt, and Nanosolar have all raised funding in an effort to reach the large-scale manufacturing stage. Another company made [...]
Perhaps it’s because their conservative base is wary of the environmental issue, or maybe it’s because they don’t want to sound like tax-and-spend liberals, but the Republicans are quieter than the Democrats when it comes to exact figures for funding clean technologies.However, the major Republican candidates have come out and made statements about where greener [...]
Unless you’re as clued in as Ms. Teen South Carolina, you’ve noticed that corporations are increasingly focused on lowering energy consumption, reducing carbon emissions and touting their general eco-friendliness. Less obvious is that the startups that are in the business of enabling this green trend – consulting, selling carbon offsets, etc. — are already making [...]
Biodiesel Plant’s New Tech: Benefuel and Seymour Biofuels will build a biodiesel refinery based on solid catalyst that can convert low-grade fats and vegetable oils into biodiesel — Seattle PI.Shell Shilling for Clean Coal: Shell is looking to license its coal gasification technology — Reuters.The UnJolly Green Chemist: There’s an increasing amount of universities incorporating [...]
We don’t want to kick corn-based ethanol while it’s down, but in another sign that the ethanol boom is coming to an end, Monsanto (MON) CEO Hugh Grant is predicting a slight decline in corn plantings for 2008. This follows a 2007 crop season in which corn acreage leapt 19 percent to a record high.Monsanto, [...]
