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1. Oil Giant Total Takes Stake in Solar Startup Konarka
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2. Daily Sprout
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3. Conergy, GE to Pour $250M Into Asia-Pacific Clean Power
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4. Solar Financier SunRun Steps into Roof-Integrated Solar Market
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5. 8 Great Green Ideas From the New York Times Best of 2008
Oil Giant Total Takes Stake in Solar Startup Konarka
Katie Fehrenbacher - Startups
Thin-film solar startup Konarka said this morning that the massive French oil and gas company Total has become its largest shareholder, investing $45 million for a stake of slightly less than 20 percent. Total says it aims to boost its crystalline silicon-based solar cell production, and particularly its thin-film solar products, through Konarka. The deal will also see Konarka develop components for products made by some of Total’s chemical subsidiaries, among them Atotech, Bostik, Hutchinson, Sartomer and Total Petrochemicals USA.
This is far from Total’s first foray into solar; its previous investments include a 47.8 percent interest in photovoltaic startup Photovoltech, a 50 percent stake in solar equipment maker Tenesol and a 25 percent interest in thin-film solar R&D company Novacis. But given Total’s massive footprint — the company is the fourth-largest publicly trade oil and gas company in the world and has close to 100,000 employees — its solar investments only account for a small part of its business.
For Konarka, however, Total’s latest investment is significant. The New Bedford, Mass.-based thin-film organic solar startup was founded seven years ago, has now raised close to $150 million and is just starting to produce its organic photovoltaic solar film, branded "Power Plastic.” The company is already backed by Mackenzie Financial, Good Energies, Pegasus Capital, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Asenqua Ventures, New Enterprise Associates, 3i, Vanguard Ventures, Chevron, Massachusetts Green Energy Fund, NGEN Partners, Angeleno Group and Asenqua Ventures.
Total’s funding comes just as Konarka is moving into production. The company turned on a 1-GW solar printing press in October, production on which it plans to ramp up in “early 2009.” The company says its organic solar panels are able to absorb a much wider spectrum of light than other thin films, allowing for higher efficiencies and even indoor applications.
Image courtesy of Konarka.
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Daily Sprout
Josie Garthwaite - Misc
Bill, T. Boone Push for Efficiency: Former President Bill Clinton’s foundation plans to partner with the Arkansas state government to retrofit buildings and improve efficiency, and T. Boone Pickens has just launched a new campaign for energy efficiency. — NYT’s Green Inc.
Australian Emissions-Reduction Target Draws Fire: Environmental groups say Australia’s new plan for reducing greenhouse-gas emissions 5 to 15 percent by 2020 is so unambitious and business-friendly that it “could herald a new era of pollution protectionism.” — Sydney Morning Herald
Hemlock Semiconductor to Invest $3B to Expand Polysilicon Production: Hemlock Semiconductor and its joint-venture partner Dow Corning plan to invest $3 billion to build new polysilicon production facilities in Michigan and Tennessee. — EETimes
Elon Musk Talks About Going Green: The Tesla CEO said he’s not “too hardcore about being green” because it leads to a constrained life. But once the elusive Model S sedan comes out, he promises to hand in his Porsche Turbo. — Popular Science
Greek Power Plant to Use SolFocus Concentrated PV: SolFocus will help Greek renewable-energy developer Samaras Group build a 1.6-megawatt power plant in Greece using concentrated photovoltaics. — Wall Street Journal
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Conergy, GE to Pour $250M Into Asia-Pacific Clean Power
David Ehrlich - Big Green
General Electric and Germany’s Conergy have formed what they claim is the first renewable energy private trust in the Asia-Pacific region, with an investment target of $250 million.
Conergy’s Epuron unit is teaming up with GE Energy Financial Services on the trust, which will invest in wind, solar, small hydro, biogas and biomass power generation. Called the Renewable Energy Trust Asia, the companies said they expect to build a portfolio of about 200 megawatts within the next five years.
GE is one of the biggest manufacturers of wind turbines in the world and a player in pretty much every other cleantech sector as well. Conergy makes photovoltaic solar modules and other solar components; it also offers installation and monitoring services. Its Epuron subsidiary develops renewable energy projects including large-scale photovoltaic solar, solar thermal, and biomass plants.
Last week, Conergy announced a contract to develop Saudi Arabia’s first large-scale solar power plant, a 2-MW facility for the country’s King Abdullah University of Science and Technology. Earlier this year, GE Energy Financial Services said its investments in renewable energy passed the $4 billion-mark with an investment of $100 million into three New York wind farms.
With this new trust, Conergy and GE are aiming at what they estimate is a renewable energy market in India, the ASEAN countries and South Korea worth some $7 billion a year. ASEAN stands for the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and includes Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
GE Energy Financial Services will hold the lion’s share of the new trust, with an 80 percent stake, and act as the trust’s anchor investor. Epuron, with a 20 percent stake, will handle project development, debt financing, acquisition of hardware, and supervision of the construction of renewable energy projects. Epuron will also manage the projects once they’ve been completed.
The companies said they expect to make their first investment through the trust within a year. They added that once a sufficient investment volume is achieved, they may seek a listing for the Renewable Energy Trust Asia on the Singapore Exchange.
This could be the beginning of a long collaboration between the two companies. Conergy and GE said the trust serves as a potential model for developing commercial-scale renewable energy projects in other regions as well.
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Solar Financier SunRun Steps into Roof-Integrated Solar Market
Josie Garthwaite - Startups
OCR Solar & Roofing is the fourth company in SunRun’s network of approved contractors; the firm specializes in installing integrated systems (as opposed to rack-mounted panels) for existing homes. While both SunRun and OCR currently operate only in California, if their plans to expand in the first half of next year go through, they could help open the retrofit market to roof-integrated systems. Roof-integrated solar increasingly represents the default solar option for new construction and a key focus for solar panel makers. More obtrusive rack-mounted solar panels remain the convention for retrofits largely because they cost about 10 percent less and require less gutting of the existing roof, according to OCR solar division chief Aaron Nitzkin.
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8 Great Green Ideas From the New York Times Best of 2008
Katie Fehrenbacher - Energy
The New York Times put out its annual Year In Ideas issue, looking back at the best ideas of 2008. Changing the energy landscape and fighting climate change inspired at least eight interesting of the innovations from scientists, inventors, artists and researchers. The list is strong on theoretical ideas and weaker on good ways to actually implement, but hey, it’s the ideas list — not the best business models of the year list.
The Biomechanical Energy Harvester: The blogosphere dubbed Canadian professor Max Donelan’s biomechanical energy harvester “knee-brace power” earlier this year. While it’s an interesting idea, we think more compact devices that harvest smaller mechanical movement — everyday motion and vibrations — will have a chance of being adopted on a larger scale. For example, M2E Power could soon be selling a device that, when tossed in a backpack or purse, can provide an hour of talk time for some six hours of normal movement (about two days), and will cost somewhere between $25 to $40.
Brickley’s Internal Combustion Engine: Mike Brickley tossed out some parts of the internal combustion engine to cut down on friction by 35 percent and his tweaking could potentially deliver an engine that gets 20 percent better mileage than a standard car.
Carbon Emissions Are a Pain: Swiss inventor Annina Rüst developed a translucent leg band that detects your daily energy usage wirelessly (I don’t really get how, and slowly pokes out stainless steel thorns in your leg — ouch! The point is to remind you that you’re over-consuming and potentially relieve some global warming guilt.
Necessity Defense for Global Warming?: Some Greenpeace activists painted England Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s name on an E.ON power plant smoke stack, and a British jury declared the activists justified in the name of global warming. Pretty unusual, and it likely won’t hold up in other courts.
A Kangaroo A Day Keeps Global Warming Away?: If 11 percent of Australia's total greenhouse gas emissions come from methane produced by cattle and sheep, then Australian Wildlife Service’s George Wilson contends that boosting the kangaroo-as-food population and reducing the cattle and sheep population would do a lot. For the international community that doesn’t regularly eat ‘roos, it sounds weird, but hey, whatever works.
An Alternative to Gallons Per Mile: Instead of gallons per mile, a couple of Duke professors are arguing for gallons consumed per 10,000 miles, which they say would help car owners better realize the gains in efficiency and clear up some of the confusion in the counterintuitive MPG system.
Fight for the Rights of Plants: Ecuador recently declared that nature should have constitutional rights, and the result, as the Times puts it, could be “a raft of new lawsuits against oil and gas companies.”
Smart Idea in Boulder: Boulder, Colo., is getting a city-sized smart grid dubbed SmartGridCity courtesy of Xcel Energy; it’ll cost around $100 million.
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