I am pleased to announce that, as of last week, I have assumed the position of President and Chief Executive Officer of MAR Systems. MAR addresses some of the most challenging wastewater treatment needs, cost-effectively removing highly toxic contaminants (e.g., mercury, selenium, hexavalent chrome, arsenic, antimony, etc.) from discharges into the world’s water bodies that [...]
I’ve always known that Americans hold a pretty different view about the state of the energy sector than elsewhere in the world, but never really knew how to characterize those variances. Today, I write in gratitude, thanking the efforts of Sonal Patel, senior writer at Power magazine. Patel developed this helpful visual framework summarizing the [...]
Wow. This has been a really interesting few months in cleantech. First Solar announced a $0.99 cent/Wp target within 4 years for installed with trackers utility scale in its investor deck. That equates to around $4-5 henry hub gas price in a new combined cycle gas plant. The scary thing is that best utility scale [...]
For years, many observers (including myself) have argued that — from an environmental perspective — it is preferable for energy prices to be higher, so as to (1) discourage consumption of energy, mostly from fossil fuels which generates significant environmental impact, and (2) make various forms of energy efficiency and cleaner (if not zero-emission) alternative [...]
In April, the Advanced Energy Economy Institute (AEEI) released the synthesis of a survey of executives in the advanced energy sector conducted by PA Consulting to suggest priorities for U.S. energy policy. The report, Accelerating Advanced Energy in America, outlined business challenges and policy challenges thwarting the growth of the advanced energy sector, in order [...]
I had a chance to wander around the Offshore Technology Conference this week and chat about some of the technologies on display. OTC is still heavily a mechanical engineer’s conference. Despite the high tech nature of the industry, in large part vendors are not yet leading customers, and steel still rules the day in technology. [...]
Over the weekend, I attended the annual shareholder’s meeting of Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A, BRK.B) in Omaha to hear the wit and wisdom of CEO Warren Buffett and Vice Chairman Charlie Munger. For five hours on Saturday, Buffett and Munger fielded questions from panelists and investors on a wide range of topics. A good synopsis [...]
Over the weekend, ABB (NYSE: ABB) announced the $1 billion acquisition of Power-One (NASDAQ: PWER), which makes a wide spectrum of power conversion electronics equipment. Notably, Power-One is a major player in the market for inverters, which convert DC power into AC power. In turn, inverters are important for synchronizing DC-based technologies such as batteries, [...]
Simple Thoughts on Aggie Muster Written on Muster’s Eve April 20th 2013 the year of the birth of my daughter Softly call the Muster, gently call the Roll. Another year is passing, time will take her toll. My family is remembered, as I’ll be remembered too. Remember me my brethren; I am remembering you. Softly [...]
Albert Einstein once said: “Make everything as simple as possible, but no simpler.” Pundits always pursue the former, but often fail to uphold the latter. Such has been the case recently in regards to the prospects for electric vehicles. Will electric vehicles be commercially successful or won’t they? As often happens, there is superficial evidence [...]
Like most other tech sectors, the cleantech world is subject to fads that are overhyped — meteoric rises, sometimes followed by spectacular flameouts. It seems like we humans like to create heroes and then tear them down. There’s a particular tendency to sing the praises of the latest “hot company”: the one that has the [...]
When I was a young lad in college, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the early 1980s, I took a course in energy economics taught by Prof. Morris Adelman. I was an anomaly: there were probably no more than a handful of courses then being taught in energy economics in the colleges and [...]
NEW YORK, NY, March 6, 2013 – It was announced today that prominent renewable energy investor Clean Feet Investors has provided BrightFarms with a $3M project equity facility; this investment is believed to be the first institutional project finance capital for a company focused on scalable, commercial urban agriculture. Clean Feet seeks to help socially [...]
In the energy sector, there are few topics that generate more debate today than the relative merits/demerits of fracking. To see just how strongly-held yet evenly-divided opinion is, check out this online debate moderated by The Economist and sponsored by Statoil (NYSE: STO). The question is framed simply: “Do the benefits derived from shale gas [...]
I recently read an article by Chris Gasson of Global Water Intelligence which was thought-provoking and insightful. The article addressed a number of issues surrounding water technology company acquisitions and raised a question regarding what problems companies are looking to solve through these acquisitions. In my experience advising large water companies’ strategic acquisitions activity, I have identified [...]
As I posted a few years ago, so many of the best opportunities for cleantech to have immediate benefit can be found in China. Every day, evidence accumulates supporting this thesis. Of course, this winter’s air pollution crises in Beijing and other cities made global news. More gruesome was last week’s discovery of nearly 7,000 [...]
I try hard to stay on top of a wide range of developments in the cleantech world. Maybe I spread myself too thin, sacrificing depth for breadth, as I scan through a lot of journals and attend a lot of events to see what’s new and interesting. Even so, I’m continually surprised by the number [...]
With early stage capital for cleantech innovation becoming increasingly scarce, crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter, Indiegogo and a new crop of clean/green ones are beginning to emerge as significant sources of funding for selected next-gen clean technologies. Hurdles remain, particularly for investors seeking returns, but I’m more optimistic about these sites’ usefulness to cleantech entrepreneurs than I used to [...]
In the January issue of Pollution Engineering, Roy Bigham and Josh Foster have compiled their list of “10 Top Technologies for 2013″. Summarizing their summary of the new-and-nifty that the environmental industry should monitor: Self-healing plastics that rush in to repair cracks and voids. Obviously, this would have significant implications in a wide variety of [...]
