Archive for November 12th, 2008

Billionaire oilman T. Boone Pickens, who launched a high-profile campaign to reduce oil imports to the U.S., is being forced to delay a huge planned wind-farm project, according to published reports.

Over the past two days, Boone spoke at events where he said that the wind project is having …

ElectraTherm, which has developed a relatively small machine for making electricity from waste heat, has raised .6 million and plans a follow-on round next year.

The Carson City, Nev.-based company’s ElectraTherm Green Machine is designed to squeeze power from the heat thrown off at industrial facilities like …

Amyris Biotechnologies on Wednesday announced the opening of a pilot facility in Emeryville, Calif., that turns sugar cane into diesel fuel through genetically designed microbes.

The company is at the forefront of a commercial movement to use biotechnology to convert plants into fuels that resemble petroleum-based hydrocarbons.

Amyris’ technique is …

The International Energy Agency raised the alarm Wednesday with the release of its annual report, emphasizing that a revolution in the energy business is required to maintain economic growth and stabilize greenhouse gas emissions.

The IEA’s World Energy Outlook 2008 report, written for policymakers, paints a troubling picture in …

Planet Metrics on Tuesday joined the ranks of carbon-software specialists with the launch of its emissions modeling software and the announcement of .3 million in funding.

The San Francisco-based start-up said that it completed its series A round with participation from venture-capital firm Draper Fisher Jurvetson and angel investors.

    A sampling of green-tech news with quick commentary.

  • Colorado company to take algae-based fuel to the next level–NYTimes.com
    Solix Biofuels makes progress on scaling up algae photobioreactor.
  • Pacific Ethanol Q3 loss reaches .9M–Sacramento Business Journal
    More bad news for ethanol companies, which blame volatile corn and ethanol prices
  • While U.S. Republicans and Democrats were fighting it out across the pond in late October, VP19 was busy creating its own political agenda in the United Kingdom.

    Everyone agrees electric vehicles are the future — but Tesla is simultaneously proving they are also the right car right now. To show other people what we at Tesla [...]

    Tesla engineers have been keenly focused for some time on the 1.5 powertrain, which we have been testing extensively both on roads and at closed facilities. We have our own data collection kit, but we wanted to see what sort of performance figures we would get from a public track.

    The nearest venue to our [...]