Monthly Archives: January 2011

David Gold Invest in a solar, biofuels, or LED lighting company, and nobody will question the company’s cleantech pedigree.  Invest in a manufacturer of network switch upgrades for telephone companies, then call it “cleantech” and you’ll see a lot of raised eyebrows.  I know, because we did just that. We are investors in Aztek Networks, a company that makes replacements for the TDM switches that handle much of the phone traffic from standard landline phones.  Telecom companies are excited about Aztek’s product because it enables them, for the first time, to incrementally switch out their old...

John Petersen The hardest part of blogging on subjects like energy storage and vehicle electrification is synthesizing the mass of data that's generated every year. While I'm not an engineer and don't have any special technical expertise beyond the lessons I learned as a director and officer of a small battery technology developer, my training as a lawyer and accountant stand me in pretty good stead when it comes to reviewing statistical forecasts and comparing the current version of a forecast with earlier versions of the same forecast. Every year the US Energy Information Administration, a unit...

Eamon Keane Following the worst traffic jam in history this past August, Beijing has introduced significant curbs on cars. New car registrations will be slashed 70% to 240,000. Non-registered cars must have a permit and cannot travel at peak hours (7-9am and 5-8pm). With 4.7m cars and a population of 22m, Beijing only has approximately 200 cars per 1,000 people. This is just half the level of cars in Mexico city with which Beijing is tied in IBM's "Commuter Pain Index". If you think LA is bad, Beijing is 4 times worse: When rumours...

John Petersen Over the last few months I've had a running debate with some die-hard EVangelicals who insist that plug-in cars will be cleaner than simple, reliable and relatively inexpensive Prius class HEVs. Since most of my readers have enough to do without slogging through the comments section, it's high time we lay the cards on the table and show why the myth of zero emissions vehicles is one of the most outrageous lies ever foisted on the American public. The following graph comparing the life-cycle CO2 emissions of conventional, hybrid and plug-in vehicles comes from a...

Dana Blankenhorn When people first get excited about solar energy, one of the first things they think of doing is to invest in it. And the first place they think to throw their money is thin-film solar manufacturer First Solar Inc. (FSLR) of Tempe, Arizona.  First Solar is what I might call the  “big iron” play in solar. That is, it mainly produces large, flat panels that are installed by utilities and connected to the grid. It's a good business. The company regularly earns 25% on assets, 30% on equity, and it's managed conservatively. So why is it that...

Tom Konrad, CFA My annual mini-portfolio of clean energy stocks which I expect to outperform in 2011. This is my fourth annual list of renewable energy and energy efficiency stocks since I began the series in January 2008.  The Purpose of this List For myself, these lists serve as a record of my thinking on the market which I can look back on and learn from over the following year.  When I publish the list, I state my reasons for selecting each stock, and then track the portfolio's performance over the following year in...

John Petersen In November 2008 I wrote an article titled "Alternative Energy Storage: Cheap Will Beat Cool" where I created a short list of 13 pure play energy storage companies that I divided into two classes; companies with cheap chemistries and companies with cool chemistries. My premise was simple, the best affordable technology always wins out over best available technology and companies that cater to the masses have greater profit potential than companies that cater to the elite. The following graph compares the performance of my original groups and the Dow since the date of that article. ...