Author: Neal Dikeman

Most of my friends know I’m not a huge fan of EV startups. They take massive amounts of capital, the end customer (i.e. you and I) tends to be very sophisticated, demanding, and a pain in the neck, the technology is extremely challenging and I don’t believe the startups understand their long term costs as well as they think they do. But worse than that, the competition is very, very good and well entrenched. So while I love the concept of EVs and more specifically Plug in Hybrid EVs, I’ve been a huge skeptic of EV venture deals.

But . . .

• Go Tesla! The Toyota tie up is an exciting move. Toyota gets access to the EV business as a hedge against the possibility that the Volt and Leaf cleaning its clock and take the mantle of most green car company away, plus they get a massive much needed dose of positive PR that’s worth their $50 mm investment all by its lonesome to counteract the legions of recent “Toyota’s quality just went to hell” articles and the latest “let’s grill the Toyota executives” push in Washington. This is good.

• Toyota gets a great use for the recently shut down NUMMI plant in California, making them look like the hero in that story without having to actually operate a high cost union plant again (apparently a large part of the reason they got out of it). For those that missed that story – NUMMI was a GM – Toyota JV in Fremont, the last auto plant west of the Mississippi, and apparently Toyota’s only union facility. When GM went bust (sorry when you and I decided we liked losing money in the car business), Toyota took the opportunity to back out of the JV, leaving a huge hole in the local economy (it was just about the only customer for a number of local manufacturers). California’s political bosses get a brief reprieve from their shellacking by helping with big tax breaks to ink a deal that may bring back 10% of the lost jobs (about 10 of the top legislators and administrators joined the Governator to announce it).

• The venture capitalists who backed Tesla get a new investor to pony up a chunk of the massive cash that will be required at good valuations. Even better, the backing of Toyota in my mind drastically increases the chances that a Tesla IPO can get done, despite the huge questions analysts have had on their near term revenue prospects since they filed the prospectus earlier this year.

• You and I, who are funding a big chunk of Tesla anyway with the massive $400 mm+ DOE loan guarantee, now get a foreign auto company to invest underneath us. (Of note this will be our second multi-hundred million investment into that part of the San Francisco Bay Area, since we are doing the same thing for the solar start-up Solyndra a couple of miles down the road.)

• Tesla gets much needed cash, a cheap ready to go plant without union labor requirements, and access (if they are smart enough to leverage it) to the considerable manufacturing , marketing , and distribution talents of what has been up until recently the best run auto manufacturer in history. With it comes the automotive street cred that they are sorely lacking.
Filed under the “what’s the real story” side – a couple of questions have been raised by various analysts in the press.

1) Why is Toyota not doing this as a JV or operating partner? Which would make even more perfect sense from both parties perspective. There’s been no mention of Toyota helping on marketing/distribution and service, areas that Tesla will sorely need if they get rolling. But maybe it’s just early days.

2) How many of the local jobs are actively coming back? Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla was quoted as saying 1,000 jobs were planned (there were many, many, many times that many jobs lost when NUMMI shut down), and he was apparently very ambivalent on the subject of union or non-union.
But regardless, there is a lot to like about a Tesla Toyota Tie up.

Neal Dikeman is a partner at Jane Capital Partners LLC, a cleantech merchant bank, and the editor of Cleantechblog.com

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To those you who missed it, below is the link to a web panel on the state of climate change policies and developments that I participated in for Brightalk today.

The panelists:

– Emilie Mazzacurati, Manager, Carbon Market Research North America, Point Carbon
– Chris Busch, Policy Director, Center for Resource Solutions
– Nicholas Bianco, Senior Associate, World Resources Institute
– Neal Dikeman, Jane Capital Partners

Enjoy and post any thoughts in the comments section back on this blog for the rest of us to read.

http://www.brighttalk.com/webcast/20657

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Every year since we launched Cleantech Blog this week marks a massive inflow of green press releases, phone calls, announcements and interview requests.  It always seems oddly out of place, and anything important we have to say always just seems lost in the press of Earth Day.

In reality this week is a week for remembrance, introspection, and then a pause before looking forward to an always brighter future. 

My remembrance always starts a day earlier.  Yesterday, April 21st was Aggie Muster, the day that thousands of Aggies around the world hold the roll call for the absent, where a family member answers”here” for those former students who have died in the previous year and cannot answer for themselves.  The roots of Muster date back over a hundred years, and we have formally held Muster since 1922 all around the world. 

Softly call the muster, softly call the roll.  We do remember.

And today, the day after is Earth Day, now 40 years old, the day we remember our planet, think about what we should be doing better, and recently, make our New Earth Year’s resolutions for what we will do better.

We will remember, we will do better.

And in both cases, look forward to the next year and a bright future standing on the shoulders of those who have gone before.

Here’s hoping that when we are gone, future generations will hold both their history and their planet dear, will have a reason to mark what we did with our time on Earth with reverence, and will still be working and looking forward to an even brighter, cleaner future for the generations to follow them.

Neal Dikeman is a partner at Jane Capital Partners, Chairman of Carbonflow and Cleantech.org, and a 3rd generation Texas Aggie Class of ’98.

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By Sanford J. Selman

In its majority opinion of January 21, 2010 (Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission), the US Supreme Court overturned decades-old rules prohibiting unlimited spending by corporations and unions on election advertising. This ruling is certain to have a far reaching impact as it gives complete freedom to corporate interests to use their considerable financial strength to influence voter opinions of political candidates and sets the stage for a rightward shift in US public policy.

The potential impact on the US cleantech sector is clear – the prospects for advancement of federal carbon legislation (i.e. cap-and-trade) or any other government-led clean energy initiative (e.g. renewable energy mandates) have just gotten much worse. Most negatively impacted by the passage of such rules would be energy companies and coal-fired utilities whose sheer size dwarfs that of their clean energy counterparts. With billions of dollars invested in existing fixed assets, these enormous enterprises can be expected to take an active role in future elections now that Citizens United has freed their hands to help their favored candidates win election.

But there are many potential losers.

For starters, failure to develop the US clean energy sector results in a loss of US jobs both in the manufacture of this equipment as well as construction and operation of the power plants and related systems. A 2009 report from the Pew Charitable Trusts noted that clean energy jobs in the US grew at an annual rate of 9.1 percent from 1998 to 2007 as compared to 3.7 percent annual growth for all US jobs over the same period. While many countries in Europe and Asia are looking to cleantech to drive jobs growth, comparatively weaker support for cleantech in the US could slow job growth in this historically strong sector.

Second, there is a trade balance issue. A recent front-page New York Times article (January 31, 2010) suggested that the US could trade its dependence on imported Mideast oil for dependence on imported Chinese wind turbines, solar panels and other energy-related hardware. Today, four companies out of each of the five largest wind turbine and solar cell manufacturers in the world are based outside the US. The rapid development of China’s battery and electric vehicle sectors, driven by central government policy, is impressive. Japan and Korea are likewise vying for leadership in battery technology. Citizens United will cause the US to fall further behind in key cleantech sectors where it once held dominance.
Third, consumers lose because we are less likely to have access to the fullest possible range of choices when it comes to purchasing and consuming energy.

And finally, the environment ends up losing since it will be impossible for the US to bring its considerable carbon footprint under control absent strong government leadership.

Implications for cleantech investment, which reached surpassed $5.5 billion globally even in a dismal 2009, are also significant. According to the Cleantech Group, North American venture funds accounted for almost two-thirds of global cleantech investment activity in 2009 – down about 10 percentage points from 2008. And increasingly, this money is finding its way to companies based outside the US. Chinese companies accounted for 72% of global cleantech IPOs in 2009 and Chinese cleantech M&A activity reached an historic high in 2009. Both statistics demonstrate the intense growth of the Chinese cleantech sector.

Cleantech investors’ US strategy will, by default, be forced to focus on sectors where economics are the primary driver and government support mechanisms are relatively less important. These sectors include energy efficiency and green building technologies, smart grid and distribution automation, water conservation and treatment, resource-efficient manufacturing and material technologies, and recycling and waste reduction.
Due to the “separation of powers” mandated by the US Constitution, there is no easy way to undo Citizens United although Democrats are hard at work drafting legislation to restrain its impact. Notably, President Obama took a swipe at the decision during his recent State of the Union address – a rare event by a sitting President. While the complexion of the US Congress won’t change overnight, Citizens United deals a blow to the US cleantech sector with potentially far reaching implications.
Sandy Selman is a longtime cleantech investor and the Managing Director of Asia West LLC.

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Believing in cleantech should mean walking the walk.  Believing that technology can change the world, but that consumers have to play their part.  Not just believing that technology will fix everything at the same price or that we can offload our problems to policy makers who can’t stumble out of their own way.  Not slamming oil and power companies for providing us with exactly as much energy as we choose to consume.  The title says it all, how’s your score on the checklist?

Checklist:

If you own a house – get an energy audit. It will tell you to a) buy CFLs, b) blow in more insulation, c) seal your ducts, d) programmable thermostat, e) swap out the older appliances.  If you don’t own one (and in California you’re probably better off it you don’t), still buy the CFLs.  As a side note, I tried to get my wife to let me buy LED lights instead of CFLs.  $60 for 30,000 hour life and 12 watts (equivalent to a 65 watt incandescent).  And very cool looking. CFL was 6,000 hour life for 15 watts same equivalency.  Price $10.  Oh, but the CFL had a 5 year warranty vs. 2 year for the LED.  For some reason after seeing the warranty she didn’t believe the 30,000 hours were real.  That last part may well be a cleantech problem.  So get cracking folks, I am not permitted to buy LEDs until the warranty matches the rated life.

Turn off your lights – my Dad has been telling me this since I was 10.  Amazingly enough, it still works, and it still needs to be said.  And if you are too eye-hand coordination challenged, we’ve just invented these amazing things called motion sensors and timers.  Walmart has them by the dozens. 

Water your lawn anytime but the middle of the day.  Your Dad told you to do this growing up, and you still forget.  And can we say timer and drip system?

Learn to use, in this order – windows, curtains and fans before you use air conditioning.  And when you buy it, buy the most advanced and efficient window, thickest curtain, best fan, AC, heater, appliance whatever gadget is available.  It will be more expensive.  Cleantech usually is.  But it’s the right thing to do.

Buy as little processed foods as possible – everything from your carbon to water to energy footprint will thank you.  As well as your budget.  And your waistline.  Except for cakes and Girl Scout cookies.  You’re forgiven for those.  Box cakes and Thin Mints are still the greatest things ever.

Keep your car another year.  Don’t be fooled.  Going hybrid does NOT equate to doing the right thing (though it does make you feel better, and it is a way cool status symbol).  Driving your car longer does do the right thing.  And next time, just buy one car size smaller.  That combo can cut your transport costs in half AND save the world.  (Of course, if you work in cleantech PR, I might recommend the hybrid anyway.)  My car was built when Netscape went public.  I think I can get 5 more years out of it.  I may be able to get away with only one or at most two more cars in my entire life.  Which is good, because I’m going to need the savings to pay for rising health insurance costs and my share of the new, new national debt.  But seriously, if I could get a 25 year Corolla with 35 mpg for <$17K, do you really think the planet wants me to buy two $25K 50 mpg Priuses instead?  Keep in mind the average car in the US is half of that 25 years, and the average consumer keeps a car for only half of that, and your average hybrid payback is longer than either your average hold period, the car’s warranty, or the manufacturer’s rated life.  But that’s ok, just tell your neighbors that compared to your option ARM home loan, the hybrid is a very, very good deal.

Stop b*%^hing about smart meters.  Heaven forbid we should drag our power company into the 21st century.  Heaven forbid the power company that supplies you electricity should actually know how much you used.  And bill you for it.  I think they have term for the anti-smart meter movement – luddite.  Or the super highly technical term “whiner head case”.  I’ll paraphrase a favorite quote of mine from the Duke Energy CTO from sometime back – “why is it again that our power meters aren’t just software in our PCs”?  Hmmmh, it couldn’t be because, gasp, we’re regulated?  Or maybe because we like little round spinning dials.  Kind of like bringing 50s retro style back?

Buy your power green.  In real states like Texas, you can choose from different vendors what mix of power you want.  Real grid, 8.4 cents/kwh.  All wind? 12 cents/kwh.  All natural gas? 20% wind?  Take your pick.  Can we say, everywhere else in world can figure out how to do energy deregulation, why can’t California?  Jerry? Meg? How about taking a run at doing it right this time?  Or we could just do it California style and try and replace an IOU monopoly with a municipal monopoly.

And possibly of most importance, just because you drive a hybrid and put solar on your roof does NOT mean you’re doing your part.  Especially if you tell your friends it’s cheaper while you neglected the other items.  What’s the technical term, “it ain’t”.  It may be, however, better.  This is cleantech.  Go for better.  Make a difference.

Neal Dikeman is a partner at cleantech merchant bank Jane Capital Partners, and has cofounded several cleantech startups from carbon to superconductors.  He is a Texas Aggie.

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An open letter to Ban Ki Moon in support of an extraordinary friend

Dear Mr. Secretary General,

I am sure that in your position, the volume of unsolicited outreach you receive must be truly breathtaking. I will not add to your never ending inbox, but rather will simply post this note on a friendly blog, with the hope that some of the messages within find their way to you via the osmosis of modern communication.

The climate crisis is no longer confined to the geophysical state of our planet – it has now metastasized into an even more virulent form of crisis involving our collective political and sociological ability to manage this complex issue. The UN has done tremendous work in defining the climate issue for more than 20 years and the accomplishments it has achieved are inspiring. However, there is little doubt that the Copenhagen conference broadly underperformed against the needs we face today.

Copenhagen’s underperformance is having an insidious effect on perceptions of UN effectiveness among even many supporters. It is increasingly considered conventional wisdom that the UNFCCC’s day has passed – that the climate issue must now center on a series of bilateral or regional negotiations and perhaps be centered in more focused organizations like the WTO.

I, for one, do not believe those arguments. I began my accidental career in climate finance in 1993. I was fortunate enough to bear witness to the euphoria of Kyoto, the despair of the Hague and the last second save of Bali. And, of course, Copenhagen – where the sheer enormity and heterogeneity of the issue finally truly stared one and all in the face. Yes, humanity collectively blinked and deferred.

But throughout, the UN process that has tried to manage and coordinate the world’s response has been honorable, dedicated,. You specifically should be commended for making climate the pre-eminent issue of your tenure as the Secretary General. And, it must be recognized that what the UN has been able to accomplish is strictly reflective of the mandates it has been handed by the community of nations. Those mandates have often been halting or ambiguous. However, let us also recognize it’s a two way street – the strength of those mandates is also partially reflective of and the confidence that nations have in the UN, its processes, its leaders and its managers in being a key player at the table in the climate issue.
In this light, you have a major decision to make – one that will set the tone for the crucial coming decade of the climate crisis. You have to hire somebody. As you know, Yvo de Boer announced his resignation from the UNFCCC Secretariat earlier this year. And, as might be expected, there is an emerging horse race among several candidates and I am sure all would serve the post honorably and with energy and enthusiasm.
But to be very frank, at this moment in time, we don’t need adequate, we need extraordinary. We need charisma, we need inspirational leadership. We need somebody who can think outside of the box, – but also somebody with a deep experience of the inner workings of the climate negotiating and regulatory process . And there is only one candidate, in my estimation, who remotely meets that elevated criteria – my good friend, Christiana Figueres of Costa Rica.
Yes, indeed, she is my friend – we have known each other for more than ten years as I built a business around emissions mitigation and she built a formidable reputation as a thinker, advisor, negotiator and regulator across the climate space. Even on paper, I cannot see how any other candidate can match her personal experience in all aspects of the climate conundrum – government, civil society, regulator, private sector, negotiator.
But it is off the sheet of paper where Christiana truly shines – she inspires all who meet her through her intelligence, her humanity, her strength. Most of all, she has a great senses of humor and perspective – which one could argue might be the most important job description components of all, in this hour of need.
To achieve transition to a global, low carbon trajectory, people and governments will need to go the extra mile. With all due respect to the accomplished and dedicated individuals who have run the UNFCCC since its inception, vision, inspiration and leadership rarely seemed part of their portfolio. If it’s really a war on climate, more than anything we need a general who will inspire the troops to do the extraordinary. Those of us who have been in the trenches on this issue for a decade or more are tired and dispirited – in our minds, we have moved mountains, but we step back and it looks more like molehills. I have never seen the climate community as downtrodden as in these few months since Copenhagen. And – again to be honest – you need us fired up and moving mountains.
To the contrary stands the promise of Christiana Figueres – a rallying general from a country without an army (and a country that aspires to full carbon neutrality by 2020). All you need to do is go the the Facebook group that supporters of hers created and that has grown up very quickly over the last few days and scroll through the wealth of testimonials that Christiana has inspired throughout a huge cross section of the climate and development community. Thousands of people from all walks of the climate world know in their hearts that she is the one who can make a difference at this crucial moment. And their voices are raising to be heard by you.
There is only one choice that can deliver that promise. Please make the right one and appoint Christiana Figueres as the next Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC
Marc Stuart was the founder of EcoSecurities, where he worked for 13 years prior to its integration into JP Morgan in early 2010. He is currently engaged in early stage private equity in the carbon and alternative energy space.

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In the midst of the debate over exactly what commitments will come out of the Copenhagen Accord follow-up discussions, and how a cap and trade system to incorporate those might work, we asked long time carbon trader Olivia Fussell, the CEO of Carbon Credit Capital in New York, to opine a bit on myths on cap and trade v carbon tax for the layman.  Cleantech Blog has written lots on this topic, but it always needs more. 

Myth 1: A Carbon tax provides much greater price stability than emission trading under a cap and trade system.

This argument is valid only when an emission trading system is designed without banking and borrowing options which allow firms to smooth emissions over time. This in turn contributes to leveling of the price of allowances and creates certainty in the market and thus spurs investment.

Moreover, tax regimes can easily be changed by legislative bodies which in turn can also introduce instability.

Myth 2: A carbon tax is a preferable option because the revenues from taxation can be used to invest in low carbon technology and/or used to offset potential regressive effects of carbon taxes on poorer households.

This argument is valid only with the assumption that allowances are grandfathered in an emission trading scheme. One solution to this potential problem is the auctioning of allowances which can potentially generate the same revenues as a tax.

In addition, governmental funding tends to “pick a winning” technology, whereas technological innovation is needed in many areas (renewable energy, energy efficiency, energy storage, etc). A cap and trade system provides an important incentive for the development of these technologies by providing a price signal that enables firms to capture the value of new technologies. Because cap and trade is not technology specific, it can encourage and accommodate any emerging GHG control technologies or practices.

Myth 3: The introduction of a carbon tax is simpler than an emission trading scheme under cap and trade.

True, an emission trading scheme is much more complicated than taxation. The introduction of a new tax does not require setting up a new system with additional administrative costs attached to it. However, having an international agreement on a global tax is highly unlikely if not impossible. This statement is supported by an example of the unsuccessful attempt to impose carbon tax in the 1990s within its multi-national European Union’s structure. Also the Clinton administration unsuccessfully tried to introduce an energy tax in the mid 1990s but encountered strong opposition in Congress.

Myth 4: A Cap and trade system creates market and environmental uncertainty.

Not true, a tax does not set a quantitative, legally enforceable limit on emissions. On the other hand, a cap and trade system measures, monitors, and achieves a specific environmental objective.

Myth 5: Cap and trade doesn’t work because the European Union Emissions Trading (EU ETS) Scheme did not prove that significant emissions reductions were achieved.

The fact that Phase I of the EU ETS achieved only small reductions in emissions was not due to the embedded flaw in the cap and trade but because the emission cap was set too high. In addition, the EU over allocated allowances. This was mainly due to many countries lacking reliable data monitoring and information standards of GHG emissions when the scheme was first introduced. Since then the EU has solved the problem of monitoring and reporting and tightened the cap for Phase II.

Myth 6: A Cap and trade system allows for ‘windfall profits’ for regulated firms.

It is true that implementation of the trading scheme in the EU led to the increase in retail electricity prices. However, this situation can occur under any type of regulation and it’s not cap and trade specific. The determining factor is not the type of regulation but the ability of a company to pass through the costs to consumers. Based on the EU ETS example, electricity generators were able to make profits because they were able to reflect the value of allowances in prices of electricity, even though they received the allowances for free (‘grandfathering’). This problem can be addressed through the mechanism of allocating allowances and more specifically through auctioning. Regulators would require companies to purchase allowances, and this could ensure that the companies incur direct costs, thus reducing their profit margin. However, this does not solve the problem of passing costs onto consumers. One can solve this by passing the revenues from the auctioning of allowances back to the consumers.

You can reach Olivia for comment at http://www.carboncreditcapital.com/

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Just on the eve of the industry headliner San Francisco Cleantech Forum, Bloom Energy finally blooms?

Solid Oxide Fuel Cells (SOFC) like the Bloom Box have been under development for a couple of decades, and many of the major firms both in the US and abroad are still at it. The issues, questions and performance/cost/longevity triangle constraints are well known. So far Bloom Energy has answered none of them. Though we congratulate them on getting into what looks like significant first field trials. That puts them in small company with the maybe twenty or so other companies out of 1,000 plus who have tried. All of those handful took well over $100 mm plus to do it (though $400 mm is rather a lot of money, I must say, that’s taking one for the team). All of them took 5-10 years plus. At one point as an industry we were spending $1.5 Billion per year in annual R&D on fuel cells. Perhaps two companies, Fuel Cell Energy and Smart Fuel Cell, are arguably shipping commercial product today, with UTC, Plug Power and ClearEdge Power other possible contenders for “commercial”.

Of course, none of them have shown as little evidence of what progress has actually been achieved as Bloom. And while it’s a great list of customers, I’m not certain that eBay or Google are necessarily seasoned fuel cell buyers whose judgment I’d trust (especially after reading the rather suspect financial cost effectiveness analysis Google subjected their original solar PV pilot to).  Where’s the Department of Defense and Department of Energy who has bought and/or validated virtually every fuel cell in existence?  But view the quality of the information provided for yourself:

Bloom Energy;
http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=6228923n

The major SOFC SECA players’ peer reviewed reports:
http://www.netl.doe.gov/publications/proceedings/09/seca/index.html#core

I’ve been asked numerous times this week what I think of the Bloom unveiling. My answer was simple, I’m excited at the promise, but since they haven’t actually shown anything yet, the skeptic in me says beware the devil who asks for the check before showing the details.

I have sent an inquiry to the “press” button on Bloom’s website. We shall see if I’m one of the privileged reporters who gets a call back. I won’t hold my breath. Because I’m just a blogger who once helped found a fuel cell company, right? Not exactly Lesley Stahl.

And I hope the $800,000 price quoted in this week’s media was for something larger than the 25kW unit the Kanellos reporting machine was crediting as the Bloom Box size last year. I imagine it must be. Somebody check me on my math, but that would be ugly. Perhaps it’s for a 100 kW size (one of the 400 kW total 4 unit installation Google reportedly has), which is a more manageable but still ugly $8,000/kW a bit better (as it should be) than ClearEdge’s 5 kW residential unit of 1/20th the size, or maybe it’s $800,000 for the full 400 kW and then would be close Fuel Cell Energy’s $2,000-$3,000 /kW larger MCFC units (for which they lose 30 cents on every dollar and have stated they need to double to c $150 mm in revenues before the gross margin will be positive)? Have to be careful here, the fuel cell /DG industry makes the solar and hybrid car industries look like choir boys when it comes to economic analysis statistics.

So on the technology itself, any one who has been around fuel cells for long, before answering any question like, “what do you think, is it exciting?”, would hope you’d get the basic questions people ask of all serious fuel cell technologies answered. Questions like these:

On the technology:

What’s the basic design of the cell and stack?

What are the cell/stack/system performance and efficiency curves?

How many cells/stack, stacks/unit, cell and stack size/performance?

How many of the current generation of cells, stacks, systems have they built and when?

What’s the production yield of the cells/stacks? Is it automated?

What’s the metal alloy they use?

How do they do the sealing?

How do they handle the metal to ceramic junction?

What’s the history of cracking?

What do the cell degradation curves look like (in the lab and the field)?

How many hours do they have on cell/stack/system/field trials?

How many thermal cycles?

What are the results of the 1,000 and 5,000 hour tests in the lab, and how do the field trials stack up against the lab results? How many of each is the sample size/distribution of results?

On the system:

What is the operating temperature, normal operating condition specs, fuel/air flow rates, electrical and thermal output?

What are charging, and what’s the installation cost? Is it turnkey?

How long to start up/cool down the system?

Are all the stacks in the field trials the same? Have any of them been replaced?

How does the system move the gas/air/exhaust? What’s the history with that BOP system?

What’s the actual system level field performance across the fleet in the field?

And how much of this is externally validated?

Then we’ll get to the real questions.  First, just the basics please.  The same questions I’ve personally asked executives at dozens of fuel cell companies over the years.

And then let’s hope this week’s launch is because the technology is actually ready, not because the company’s last round came in short and Kleiner Perkins has been after them to try and float it. Fuel cell companies have a long history of doing that, too.

Neal Dikeman is a partner at cleantech merchant bank Jane Capital Partners, LLC, and a long time entrepreneur in cleantech.  And yes, I did my time in fuel cells, too.

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by Tom Rooney

Something’s gotten into those Gators.

First, they won back to back championships in college basketball. Then they added a national football title to the mix, along with a Heisman trophy.

Now the city surrounding the University of Florida is doing something of even greater national import. Something that just might be remembered in 100 years as the place where America began its march to world energy leadership:

The Gainseville city leaders became the first in the country to set a competitive price for people who create renewable energy with their solar panels or wind farms or whatever, and who sell it back to the local utility.

They call it a feed-in tariff, if you must know the technical term. But it is simply the price you receive for generating your own power then selling it back to the utility.

Many solar leaders regard it as the key to the next step in the growth of solar in America — both the use and manufacture.

Which is also the key to creating energy independence and reducing carbon.

Which of course we are not doing enough of.

On a recent trip to China, I visited several large factories where they make solar panels.

I wish everyone who wishes America to be an energy super power could have seen what I saw. These factories are world-class models of efficiency and skill. Their managers, many of whom are trained in the United States are very good and getting better.

Many of the panels they make are going to places where local utilities pay premium prices for solar power generated on rooftops; there is no doubt that wherever solar owners receive higher prices, more solar power exists.

In Germany and Spain and France and Italy, the feed-in tariff is as high as 72 cents per kilowatt hour. In German it is the highest, that is why they have more solar than anyone anywhere.

And most of this they did ten years ago.

In Gainseville, they recently set their price at 32 cents per kilowatt hour. Interest in solar in this college town is exploding far beyond what an economist might expect from the financial incentives alone.

Which tells us that people have important economic and non-economic reasons for using renewable energy.

If only they get the chance.

A competitive feed in tariff is just the beginning. The bigger the local market for solar, the greater the chance for local manufacturers to compete.

And that is what is missing in America so far. Missing from the plans of those who hope for tens of thousands of green jobs; Missing from the folks who crave energy independence. Missing from those who say solar is the cure for carbon.

But not missing in Gainseville — where their 32 cent per kilowatt hour is a message to the rest of the country that this is what people do who are serious about energy independence and carbon reduction.

Compare that with California, the most solar friendly place in America, where solar power owners are lucky to get 1/3 of that.

There’s always a reason why we are not going whole hog on solar. The grid is not ready. The price is too high. We have more and better energy in — fill in the blank — that all we have to do to get it is — fill in the blank.

But the blanks are always years and and years and trilions of dollars away. Meanwhile, Asian suppliers and European competitors are racing ahead.

Today our national leaders correctly say that America can and should be a world power in renewable energy. But business leaders in Asia feel America will not get there.

If we are going to compete — let alone win – for this world energy championship, we are going to have to acting like winners. And we can begin by acting the way they do in the hometown of the national championship Gators.

Tom Rooney is the President and CEO of SPG Solar. He can be reached at http://www.spgsolar.com/

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