Green Tech

It's pretty difficult to find free money these days. With the economy ailing and venture capital money as scare as a Republican sighting in Silicon Valley, it's pretty remarkable that the Clean Tech Open is offering $100,000 prize packages to six clean-tech start-ups.

To be clear, the founders and CEOs of these companies had to work a bit for their money. Forty-three finalists were selected across six categories and put through a mini-business school course load on how to run a company, how to raise money, and how to get a product out of the laboratory and into the marketplace.

The 3rd annual Clean Tech Open Awards Gala held Thursday evening in San Francisco honored the six winners who showed the most promise to launch a viable, clean energy solution. And yes, that prize is pretty sweet: $50,000 in cash and an additional $50,000 worth of business tools like legal and accounting services, public relations consulting, office space and other goodies that are considered part of the "start-up in a box" package.

Here are the six categories and their respective winners:

• Air, Water & Waste Award: Over the Moon Diapers

• Energy Efficiency Award: Viridis Earth

• Green Building Award: BottleStone

• Renewables Award: Focal Point Energy

• Smart Power Award: Power Assure

• Transportation Award: ElectraDrive

The massive U.S. financial bailout plan, signed into law Friday afternoon, renews existing tax credits for renewable energy and includes rebates for plug-in hybrid drivers.

Representatives from the wind and solar industries have lobbied for months to extend the credits to ensure continued growth. Without the supports in place, they warned business would stall, resulting in thousands of lost jobs.

In addition to the renewable energy "extenders," the law boosts subsidies to invest in non-conventional fossil fuels--so-called dirty fuels, such as making liquid fuel from coal or sand and rock. Also included are breaks to develop technologies to burn coal more cleanly and to sequester carbon dioxide emissions from coal plants underground.

Important to the clean-tech industry is $800 million in available bonds for renewable energy generation facilities from renewable sources, such as biomass and geothermal.

The biggest impact in renewable energy will be in solar, for both residential customers and larger businesses. For solar, the law:

• Extends for eight years the 30 percent tax credit for solar residential and commercial solar installations.

• Eliminates the $2,000 cap on that tax credit for solar electric panels installed after the end of this year.

• Allows utilities to benefit from these tax credits.

These changes make solar a far more attractive investment, particularly for consumers in states with good sun and supportive state policies.

Research firm New Energy Finance, in a note to clients on Saturday, said that the payback time for a typical solar panel installation will go from from 10 years to 7 years in California and from 15 years to 12 years in Florida.

Wind industry subsidies, called a production tax credit, were extended for one year, a policy which doesn't disrupt ongoing wind projects but falls short of the long-term footing the industry was seeking.

New Energy Finance called the wind power extension a "good patch" but not enough to spur manufacturers to expand capacity.

The existing production tax credit for large-scale geothermal and biomass projects were extended for two years.

For small wind turbines under 100 kilowatts, the federal government will now give a tax credit of up to $4,000 for the next eight years.

Residential geothermal heat pumps have a $2,000 tax credit. And credits for marine power systems were extended eight years as well.

In a statement, Rhone Resch, the president of the Solar Energy Industry Association (SEIA), said that "this bill is a major step in our long journey toward energy independence and ensures that solar energy will be a significant part of America's energy future."

He said that by 2016, solar energy will be the least expensive source of electricity for consumers.

"By passing this bill, Congress has finally given the solar energy industry 'policy certainty' that will attract investment, expand manufacturing, and lower the cost of solar energy to consumers," Roger Efird, SEIA chairman and president of Suntech America, said in a statement.

Similarly, the American Wind Energy Association on Friday put out a statement lauding politicians for maintaining a policy in place. Previous, renewable energy tax credits have lapsed and delayed growth of the industry.

Transportation and efficiency
The law will give drivers of plug-in hybrid vehicles a tax credit between $2,500 and $7,500, depending on the capacity of the battery. Larger vehicles, such as trucks, have larger credits.

"The new tax credits for plug-in cars are higher than either presidential candidate has proposed. Now automakers and car buyers will no longer see higher up-front costs as a showstopper," Felix Kramer, founder, the California Cars Initiative, said in a statement. "And with this legislation, we'll also get more wind and solar energy that will make plug-in cars drive cleaner every year they're on the road."

Also in the fuels arena, the law extends the alternative fuels tax credits and extends for one year the existing $1 per gallon credit for biodiesel and renewable diesel production. That's good news for biodiesel producers, some of which are struggling because of rising feedstock prices.

Energy efficiency gets a nod as well with measures, such as rebates for appliances and bonds available to building operators that decrease building energy usage by 20 percent.

"Overall, the legislation's passage represents good news for clean energy projects and firms which, like the rest of the economy, rely on access to capital from banks and other financial institutions," New Energy Finance said in its note.

Updated on October 4 6:30 a.m. PDT with more details and analyst comments.

Hopes for renewable energy may not be a pipe dream after all.

After nearly a year of squabbling, the U.S. Senate voted Tuesday to extend solar tax credits for the next eight years and also remove the $2,000 cap on residential projects.

What with all the political bickering, I was betting this wouldn't ever get done before the November elections. But the hired help in Washington provided a pleasant surprise for a change. The bill, which includes an allowance for utilities to make use of the commercial credit, now goes to the House of Representatives for approval before everyone clears out of town next week. The current tax credit was set to expire at year's end.

Doubtless there will be some ready to dun the agreement as yet another handout to an interest group. On the surface, that's true. But after the government's recent series of bailouts including--drum roll, please--Bear Stearns, Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae, AIG, and the $700 billion or so the Treasury Department wants to buy illiquid mortgage-linked securities--this one should mollify the critics, according to Barry Cinnamon, CEO of Akeena Solar.

"I don't think anybody is going to look at $17 billion over 10 years going to renewable energy as a handout when you put it in the perspective of $1 trillion going to failed banks in a one-year period," said Cinnamon. He added that while he did hear the handout argument a couple of years ago, he's not encountering that line of argument, what with crude oil prices hovering north of $100 a barrel.

Cinnamon and other solar industry executives have argued that the industry is still too young and too fragile to be weaned off the investment tax credit (ITC) just yet. Solar energy lobbyists released a study by Navigant Consulting claiming that 440,000 permanent jobs and $232 billion in investment would be supported by 2016 with an eight-year extension of the ITC.

However, that argument wasn't persuading enough Senators to pledge their support to the investment tax extension. In fact, when Congress passed the 2007 energy bill, the solar industry got shut out. The ongoing debate had a lot to do with accounting. While Democrats wanted to pay for them by taking away tax credits from the oil industry, the Republicans held firm.

A couple of recent developments helped break the logjam. One was the willingness of congressional Democrats to go along with an offshore-drilling proposal. The other was a statement from the White House that it would not oppose extending the tax credits.

"The great thing about this bill is that it's going to allow people throughout the country to benefit," said Cinnamon. "It will be as much for people in Peoria as it will be for people living in Pleasanton."

The GSMA, a trade group representing more than 750 GSM mobile operators across 218 countries, has launched a plan to help mobile operators in developing markets go green.

The organization announced Thursday the Green Power for Mobile initiative, which will help the industry use renewable energy sources, such as solar, wind, and biofuels to power 118,000 new and existing mobile base stations in developing countries by 2012. The initiative is backed by 25 mobile operators and will provide expertise and guidelines for operators deploying low-energy base stations or base stations that use renewable energy.

The vast majority of mobile base stations in rural areas that are not powered by the regular electrical grid are powered by generators that use diesel fuel. If the GSMA can achieve its goal of powering 118,000 base stations with renewable fuel, the program will save up to 2.5 billion liters of diesel fuel per year and cut carbon emissions by 6.3 million tonnnes, the group said in its press release.

A comprehensive study conducted by the GSMA found that only 1,500 base stations worldwide are powered by renewable energy today. The group blames expensive equipment and lack of expertise for such low penetration. But as fuel prices rise, mobile operators will turn to greener technologies. In fact, the GSMA's research suggests that operators who go green could recoup their costs in about 24 months.

The GSMA has already been working with a few companies on renewable base station projects. For example, it's working with Digicel to use wind and solar energy to power 17 new base stations on the Pacific island of Vanuatu. It also worked with Ericsson to help Idea Cellular use waste cooking oil to help power more than 350 base stations in parts of India. The base stations run on a blend made up of 80 percent diesel fuel and 20 percent waste cooking oil.

In his speech in Constitution Hall this week, former Vice President and renewable energy investor Al Gore extolled a stretch goal challenging America to achieve 100% renewable power within 10 years.

The quote: "Today I challenge our nation to commit to producing 100 percent of our electricity from renewable energy and truly clean carbon-free sources within 10 years." And my favorite part: "When President John F. Kennedy challenged our nation to land a man on the moon and bring him back safely in 10 years, many people doubted we could accomplish that goal. But 8 years and 2 months later, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the surface of the moon."

That statement is about like challenging your 2 year old to finish college by the time she is 12. Not exactly practical, more than a little crazy, and likely to be either ignored, or if you push it, to cause lots of therapy sessions by the time she is 8. I will, however, credit him with getting almost every renewable energy platitude I've ever heard into one succinct speech.

He does raise lots of good points about the need for a new energy policy not built around shipping dollars to the MidEast for oil (a definite must), for long term support for renewables (it is critical for us to get off our fits and starts mish mash idea of renewable energy policy), and for moving faster and larger to fight climate change (a topic near and dear to my heart, and one that is only partially helped by making broad statements about how fast the sky is falling, I mean, the glaciers are melting). In fact, there is no better way to give anti renewable energy and climate change naysayers fuel and ammunition than to make statements like these. Any path we go down, I'd still rather challenge that two year old to do something they can achieve, not try and make it through college by age 12 - especially if I'm asking her to pay for it. Slow and steady wins the race.

The core of Al Gore's argument in his speech on the practicality of a 10 year all renewable energy goal boils down to this quote from his speech on fuels:

"What if we could use fuels that are not expensive, don't cause pollution and are abundantly available right here at home?

We have such fuels. Scientists have confirmed that enough solar energy falls on the surface of the earth every 40 minutes to meet 100 percent of the entire world's energy needs for a full year. Tapping just a small portion of this solar energy could provide all of the electricity America uses.

And enough wind power blows through the Midwest corridor every day to also meet 100 percent of US electricity demand. Geothermal energy, similarly, is capable of providing enormous supplies of electricity for America."

And this one on costs and technology:

"To those who argue that we do not yet have the technology to accomplish these results with renewable energy: I ask them to come with me to meet the entrepreneurs who will drive this revolution. I've seen what they are doing and I have no doubt that we can meet this challenge.

To those who say the costs are still too high: I ask them to consider whether the costs of oil and coal will ever stop increasing if we keep relying on quickly depleting energy sources to feed a rapidly growing demand all around the world. When demand for oil and coal increases, their price goes up. When demand for solar cells increases, the price often comes down."

These quotations, while partially true and very seductive, are highly misleading in this context. The effective conversion rates of that energy to usable electric power or liquid fuel is still horrendously low, and requires lots and lots of capital expenditures, and thousands of miles of new transmission lines to implement. And that's not taking into account the state of technology - as an industry we really are the two year old in my analogy.

So given those conversion rates and the current high capital expenditures per unit of energy, the cost is still 5-20x (depending on what you count) the cost of conventional electric power generation (yes I know, unless you add in the carbon price and environmental externalities, but that's still extra cost any way you slice it . . . unless you'd like to subsidize mine). Frankly no serious analyst is suggesting that within 10 years, given the state of technology and the best case forecast capacity, that solar can make up more than a small single digit fraction of even electricity needs or that wind can make up more than a meaningful minority share (let alone after doubling the global power demand by replacing liquid fuels in cars with electricity, which Al Gore also suggests), especially given lead times on power plants and transmission lines.

Most likely even if the technologies were already cost comparative, which they are not - if you need evidence, just look at our wind and solar industries in their current tizzy because their biggest subsidy programs are up for renewal this year - most analysts wouldn't project a fabled grid parity on cost for renewables for at least the next decade, and certainly not at scale. So Mr. Gore's statements on cost and technology are in part true, but imply a maturity level in these industries that just doesn't exist yet. Given manufacturing scale up issues on the technology, transmission infrastructure requirements at least as large as the new generation requirements, and long lead times on building projects of this size (industry executives point to seven year time frames just to build a single transmission line), probably reaching even significant low double digit percentages of carbon free power within ten years is a stretch (excluding large hydro and nuclear which we already have but are hesitating to expand) across the whole nation. Notwithstanding that California has managed to come close to its target 20% number over the last decade, that's one state leaning on the resources of many states, using the best available sites, federal subsidies paid for from all of our pockets, and that took a decade. When it comes to carbon capture and storage for coal fired generation, a concept with lots of legs - if it works - 10 years just isn't enough time to achieve scale. The first big pilots are scheduled over the next several years, and there are too many unknowns to bet the farm on, without the lead time and capital cost issue. Though still definitely worth trying.

And as far as paying for it, there was an article in the San Francisco Chronicle today calculating our Federal government long term liabilities at $450,000 per American already mainly for Medicare and Social Security. Actually trying to replace our entire fossil fuel infrastructure within 10 years would push that to how much? Somebody please do the math before we launch a government funded mission to the moon, or legislate that our citizens pay for it instead. On costs, Mr. Gore made the statement in his speech "Our families cannot stand 10 more years of gas price increases." I agree, but Mr. Gore, your 10 year, hell for leather, man to moon race for 100% renewable energy would guarantee just that.

So while extolling stretch goals for a two year old is probably a good idea, let's keep it within the realm of possibility, and not just make grandiose statements for media effect. Now if Al Gore's silly challenge on renewable energy was simply a trojan horse to get people talking about how to move forward on fighting climate change and addressing our long standing energy policy issues, I'm all for that and am happy to help. After all, the words Al Gore and climate change make for very searchble blog articles! But personally when I make outlandish statements, I do like to bring an modicum of practicality to the discussion.

I will leave you with one final note, and please remember, I am actually a proponent of the ideals in Al Gore's speech, I just prefer to get there in one piece. One theory on the effect of the history of the man on the moon driven space race that Mr. Gore challenges us to copy basically says that we pushed for a single high profile goal so fast and furious that we effectively skipped ahead and outran our infrastructure and capabilities to get a nonscalable shot at the moon in the target time frame. The theory goes on to suggest that's why after reaching the moon so fast we haven't progressed at the same rate in space since, and had we taken it slower, we would have gotten there a few years behind, but might be on Mars by know. Akin in a military campaign to outrunning your supply chain, and then getting your army surrounded and destroyed - or perhaps invading a country half way around the world, winning the war in weeks and forgetting to prepare for the peace. And just to show that I can deliver as many platitudes in one article as Mr. Gore, that's why you never get involved in a land war in Asia.

Energy and environment are the two pillars of everything in our lives. Mr. Gore and I want the same thing, but he thinks we can't afford not to swing for the fences - I think we can't afford to mess it up.

Neal Dikeman is a founding partner at Jane Capital Partners LLC, a boutique merchant bank advising strategic investors and startups in cleantech. He is the founding CEO of Carbonflow, founding contributor of Cleantech Blog, Chairman of Cleantech.org, and a blogger for CNET's Green Tech blog.

NEW YORK--Economic and policy problems have placed a few potholes in front of the fast-growing clean-technology business.

Forecasts for clean-technology adoption all point upward these days, buoyed by high double digits growth rates in sectors like wind and solar power over the past several years.

But a panel of financial experts here at the Renewable Energy Finance Forum on Thursday detailed several challenges to scaling clean technologies beyond their current niche status of about 2 percent of energy in the U.S.

"The fundamental drivers have never been better," said Michael Liebreich, the CEO of New Energy Finance. "But the credit markets have been a problem, and (government) policy is stop-go, and not just in the U.S."

Interest in clean tech--anchored in high energy prices, global concerns over the environment, and countries' desire for more energy security--has led to huge movements of capital into technology start-ups, renewable-energy projects and the like.

Performance on Wall Street, as a whole, has been great as well. "In 2007, almost nothing went wrong," said Liebreich.

But the credit crunch at the end of last year put a damper on some deals, particularly those that rely on debt equity, such as biofuel plants. The pace of money flows have largely returned, but ongoing credit problems still linger, Liebreich said.

A lot of money needed
As it stands, the capital demands to commercialize clean technologies are far too low to meet existing U.S. government targets, never mind greenhouse gas emission reduction or energy independence goals, said Andy Karsner, the assistant secretary of energy efficiency and renewable energy at the Department of Energy.

He estimates that between $50 billion and $100 billion annually is needed to commercialize energy technologies. Last year, there was $14.1 billion spent. To get more financiers to invest in clean energy means transitioning from an industry driven by tax credits to more traditional project finance, he argued.

"It's not a business (model) that permanently scales to handle national and global objectives," Karsner said.

More troubling is the "erratic" nature of federal renewable energy policy, which Karsner lambasted. He said many policymakers don't understand how markets work, a situation that is slowing the commercialization of federally funded clean-energy research.

"Where would we have been without erratic policy? We must end the yo-yo...and hold Congress to account," he said.

An important tax credit that is set to expire at the end of this year. Attempts to renew the investment tax credit--which affects both residential renewable energy and large-scale projects--have been defeated several times.

The prospect of the tax credit not being renewed is already stalling business, and it could cost the clean-energy industry thousands of jobs, according to estimates.

Scott Sklar, a renewable energy policy expert and president of consulting firm The Stella Group, predicted that the potential loss of jobs from an expiring tax credit will force Congress to extend the policy for one year. He gives it a 50 percent chance of getting a two-year extension.

Also required for consistent clean-energy investment is a price on carbon dioxide emissions in the form of climate change regulations, said Liebreich.

Standardization
Apart from policy and financial issues, the clean-technology business needs to mature in a number of ways, speakers said.

The wind industry, for example, is suffering from supply chain problems that have pushed up prices about 40 percent in less than two years and stretched product delivery time out from 5 months to 13 months, said Liebreich.

Renewable energy products also don't have the same maintenance and service infrastructure that other industries have, said Sklar. Things like solar and wind installations need to have remote monitoring so operators know if there are performance problems in real time.

"I am stunned that we don't have modularity and standardization. We cannot scale this industry without standardization, Sklar said. "We need better data on wind and solar resources...We still have a long way to go."

Still, demand for clean technologies remains strong, and adoption will continue. For example, the electricity transmission grid needs modernizing to provide more reliable energy, said Sklar.

Wind is expected to be the fastest growing form of renewable energy around the world, said Eric Martinot, a senior researcher at the Institute for Sustainable Energy Policies. Solar power adoption could skyrocket in many places in the world once solar panels become cost-competitive with retail electricity prices within five years, said Liebreich.

But the business conditions for companies in the field have gotten harder, said Michael Eckhart, president of the American Council on Renewable Energy, which put on the conference.

"The difference is that in the past year, everyone would make money. Now we have a competitive marketplace, and half of you will win and the other half won't," he said.

Aggressive plans to expand renewable energy in San Francisco moved ahead Tuesday as the city's lawmakers approved grants to help homeowners, businesses, and nonprofits add solar panels to their buildings. Solar power companies are gearing up to meet an anticipated jump in demand in the city.

Over the next decade, between $3,000 to $6,000 will be available to each homeowner to cover the installation of solar panels, as well as $10,000 for businesses and nonprofits, and $30,000 for nonprofit affordable housing.

"This rebate program further establishes San Francisco as America's solar energy leader and symbolizes the commitment of the city to make affordable solar power available to those who want it," Mayor Gavin Newsom said in a statement.

He hopes the incentives will launch in July with some $3 million in annual funding, and touts their potential for attracting more businesses and green jobs.

However, the city has a long way to go before becoming a solar capital, regionally or nationally. The San Francisco Solar Task Force ranked the city last in the Bay Area for the number of solar installations, with panels on only 744 of 195,000 rooftops.

The subsidies would support some 50 megawatts of solar power across 10,000 buildings within a decade, if the mayor has his way. Political wrangling had delayed his planned April launch for solar incentives.

Lyndon Rive, CEO of installer SolarCity, joined others in the solar industry in praising the city's program.

"It's simple, easy to understand, and easy to implement," said Rive, who anticipates the number of solar panels to triple in San Francisco, where SolarCity is the largest solar installer, with 40 employees. It's also developing a "green" job training academy in a low-income neighborhood.

Rive noted that until now, his company's solar panel-leasing program was too pricey for the majority of San Francisco residents.

With the city incentives added to federal tax credits and state rebates, costs for a homeowner who might otherwise spend $30,000 to install solar panels would drop to near $6,000.

"This is just gonna spur the industry," said Kevin Gage, sales director for San Diego-based installer Borrego Solar. "The market was essentially shut down in San Francisco. Now a lot of companies like ours are gonna move into San Francisco."

Solar installers and equipment makers are increasingly pitching their services to people seeking to escape or offset rising energy costs. San Francisco utility Pacific Gas & Electric on Tuesday announced a proposed 6.5 percent electricity price hike.

The city incentives are bright news to San Franciscan Sylvia Ventura, whose condominium has 2.5 kilowatts of rooftop photovoltaics. However, she foresees a "feeding frenzy" among solar installers and start-ups that could confuse consumers.

"This business was done for a long time in the shadows and some installers took advantage of people being intimidated by the data, not understanding metering, wattage, and what to pay," she said.

Ventura wants communities to harness collective bargaining power to further lower residential solar setup costs. She and husband, Dan Barahona, launched One Block Off the Grid, a grassroots effort aiming to coordinate additional, privately funded subsidies for enough homeowners to make up the equivalent of a city block.

They plan to secure free solar installation for the first 50 San Francisco homeowners who sign up. The list is more than half full.

Ventura and Barahona hope that high-tech companies will volunteer to provide the funds, and they're talking with banks about setting up unique financing plans. However, the fledgling effort hasn't at this point secured corporate partners.

Rising materials costs, engineering challenges, and installation snags threaten European goals to dramatically expand wind power, according to a report by Cambridge Energy Research Associates.

The European Union aims to get 20 percent of its energy from renewables by 2020. But wind power won't meet a significant portion of that unless more government subsidies help companies offset increased costs, the firm warned Wednesday.

The world market for wind power will grow by 155 percent by 2012, according to a March report by the Global Wind Energy Council.

But a global backlog of turbines has sent wind park builders scrambling to keep projects on track. Expanding prices for steel and copper are a culprit. Engineers are also finding it tricky to build more powerful turbines.

Installation hold-ups loom in addition to rising costs, according to the Cambridge Energy Research report. Modified barges are used to set up offshore turbines, but only one such vessel is available that can install a five-megawatt turbine, and it can take a year to prepare more of them.

In addition, capital costs could rise by 20 percent from $3,555 to $4,342 per kilowatt in the next several years, based on current exchange rates from the Euro.

Prices spiked by 74 percent for land-bound wind turbines and by 48 percent for offshore turbines in the last three years, according to research by BTM Consult APS of Denmark, as reported by Treehugger. That amounts to $3.5 million per megawatt for turbines on land and $2 million per megawatt for offshore turbines.

Sweden approved Tuesday what would become its largest wind farm and one of Europe's largest, capable of producing 860 megawatts.

Norway's Oil and Energy Minister told Reuters Monday that the nation could become "Europe's battery" by pumping $44 billion into oceanic wind farms by 2025.

Cambridge Energy Research recommends that offshore wind developers secure long-term contracts with turbine makers and charter vessels to install turbines at sea far in advance.

And it called for more government help. Subsidies in Europe vary by nation and take the form of either clean-energy certificate trading programs or feed-in tariffs, through which utilities can buy renewables in advance at a set price.

Clean energy companies in the United States often cite stronger government support in Europe for hastening progress there. U.S. renewable energy tax credits are set to expire at the end of this year, sending some start-ups here to look abroad to build wind and solar farms.

Solar power businesses, meanwhile, anticipate relief in the coming year. Prices for polysilicon needed for photovoltaics are expected to drop as more suppliers come on board.

Okay, that's kind of a specious lead in, but seriously, both the investment tax credit (ITC) for solar and the production tax credit (PTC) for wind are up for expiration in barely 6 months in the US. And that seems to be much higher on industry workers minds than actually doing business.

I have had conversation after conversation over the past weeks indicating that the policy renewal is increasingly the biggest topic of concern.

M&A deals are getting held up waiting to see the impact on valuations

Sales teams have added the "fear factor" of a renewal failure to their pitch

Analysts and executives are trying to figure out whether the expiration is pulling revenues forward, or delaying them, and forecasting next year's revenues accordingly

This attention to policy makes sense, of course, since a large portion of project cashflows, in many cases up to one third for wind and well north of half for solar, can be driven by the subsidies. Of course, the flip side of the coin is that the half of the industry that is NOT in a wait and see mode is hurrying to get business in before the year end uncertainty arrives.

There is an excellent article from the AWEA discussing what happened in the wind industry with previous lapses in the PTC. "At previous times when the credit has lapsed (1999, 2001 and 2003), installations have dropped by as much as 93% in the following year".

These are only US subsidies, the global industry is certainly less affected. But the impact is fascinating to follow.

Neal Dikeman is a founding partner at Jane Capital Partners LLC, a boutique merchant bank advising strategic investors and startups in cleantech. He is founding contributor of Cleantech Blog, a Contributing Editor to Alt Energy Stocks, Chairman of Cleantech.org, and a blogger for CNET's Green Tech blog.