Greentech Media

Marrone Organic Innovations is raising $7 million to develop six pesticides and herbicides, including a greener weed killer.

Two months after raising its first round of $3.5 million, the company is going back to its investors to get the funds for its first project, a plan to fertilize 100 to 200 kilometers of the ocean with iron, for which it will need permits.

San Francisco is notorious for high home prices, but Zeta Communities says it can whack those prices way down by making green homes in factories.

Panelists at the Dow Jones Environmental Ventures conference in San Mateo, Calif., say LEED-certified buildings are valued higher than regular buildings, and are far more competitive than, say, solar is with coal.

Wim Sinke, an executive committee member of the EU PV Platform's scientific working group, called the target of reaching 20 percent renewable energy "ambitious" for the country, and said major policy changes would be needed to meet the goal.

Ernst & Young says greentech saw growth in VC investment during 1Q while overall VC investments declined. Meanwhile, cellulosic-ethanol developer Mascoma pulls in $61 million, barley-to-ethanol maker Osage Bio Energy harvests $300 million, Real Goods Solar doesn't have a real good IPO and more.

Shares of the Colorado-based residential solar installer fall during its Nasdaq debut as Akeena, one of the world's largest public installers, misses earnings and lowers its full-year forecast.

After nixing its support of the $1.8 billion FutureGen project earlier this year, the U.S. government announces $126.6 million for two other carbon-storage projects.

MTI MicroFuel Cells partners with a mystery digital-camera manufacturer and says the agreement could lead to products in as little as two years. The company plans to launch its first products in other applications next year.

The thin-film company inks a deal with the Architectural Glass & Aluminum Co. to develop building-integrated solar products a week after the announcement of a similar partnership between Dow Chemical and Global Solar.

In an industry that has seen only a few exits, PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association predict more IPOs and acquisitions next year. Meanwhile, they say venture investments grew 45 percent in 2007.

Kleiner Perkins and Generation Investment Management close greentech funds, while SunRay, Sunovia, SkyFuel, Mascoma, Range Fuels and ReliOn – among others – score cash.

If you're like most office workers, some 20 percent of the pages you print end up in the recycling or waste bin the same day. Xerox researchers have invented an erasable paper that fades after a day so it can be reused again and again.

The Palo Alto Research Center plans to launch a venture-capital-backed company that can improve solar cells' efficiency with thinner electricity-conducting grid lines. The center also hopes to commercialize a low-energy water-filtration technology, reusable printing paper and energy-management software for data centers, all in the next year.

The United States has approved the use of some micro fuel cells in airplanes, removing a major market barrier. But companies still have hurdles to jump before they can make their technologies mainstream.

Startup Sungevity, founded by former Greenpeace manager Danny Kennedy, wants to make it cheap and easy for suburbanites to go solar.

Among other companies, Xunlight, Infinia, SolarOne and Hydrogen Engine Center closed deals in the last week. And the U.S. Department of Energy committed $243 million to greentech.