21st Century Regenerative Technology

1. Plug-In Car Conversion Startups Brace for New Rules
2. Green Building Startup Serious Materials Scoops Up Window Plant

Plug-In Car Conversion Startups Brace for New Rules

2009-01-20 16:42

Josie Garthwaite - Automotive

PHEV conversion companies — part of the nascent aftermarket industry that takes hybrid vehicles and turns them into plug-ins — may soon be required to run emissions tests and offer warranties competitive with big automakers in California. The state Air Resources Board, or ARB, will issue new rules for hybrid and plug-in emissions testing and aftermarket parts certification later this week.

While new rules would be designed to regulate smog emissions, plug-in advocates worry that an emerging technology for limiting greenhouse gas emissions could be squelched in the process, as the East Bay Express reports. We’re not sure aftermarket conversions would disappear entirely, although a shakeout seems likely.

Smog tests could cost startups like EDrive Systems, OEMTek, and Plug-In Conversions Corp. — which we’ve written about before — $20,000 to $125,000, depending on the number of cars ARB requires them to run through the paces. (Startups would have to pay for testing of at least one, and possibly several converted vehicles to have their technology examined and approved by regulators.) The proposed warranty mandate would be for up to a decade or 150,000 miles. We’ll follow news from ARB throughout the week.

Concentric Hosted IT Solutions and Web Hosting
Click here to save cost on your IT demands

Top

Green Building Startup Serious Materials Scoops Up Window Plant

2009-01-20 14:00

Katie Fehrenbacher - Startups

seriousmaterialswindow When the economy tanks, the stronger startups often take the opportunity to get stronger, while the weak get weaker. That’s the case for green construction startup Serious Materials. The company said this morning it has acquired the assets of Kensington Windows, which stopped producing vinyl windows in October after its parent Jancor Cos. filed for bankruptcy.

Serious Materials says that it will start up the closed plant, which had about 150 jobs and produced 13,000 windows per month, within the next 30 days. The company also says beyond this acquisition it will ramp up production “10 fold” of its windows and glass products in just the first quarter of this year. Serious Materials is reportedly also looking at a Republic Windows and Doors factory in the Chicago area that recently shut down, leaving 300 workers out of jobs.

That’s a quick scale-up. Serious Materials only officially announced the availability of its energy-efficient windows in October 2008. The company says the windows can save significant energy in buildings and reduce heating and cooling costs by 40 percent, saving a homeowner more than $100,000 over the life of the windows for a standard home. The windows are made using insulated glass units with a high R-value, a solid seal between the glass and the frame, and an insulated frame. The company also claims that if existing windows in U.S. buildings were replaced with its ThermaProof windows, U.S. carbon emissions could be reduced by 5 percent.

This isn’t Serious Materials’ first aqcuisition. The 7-year-old company got into the efficient windows business by buying up glass company Alpen Windows. Serious Materials also sells environmentally preferable drywall, and it raised $50 million from New Enterprise Associates (NEA), Foundation Capital and Rustic Canyon Partners to get its drywall factories up and running.