About this time last year, I put together a few predictions and readers chimed in with theirs.  How did we all do?

Question 1:  How far will U.S. cleantech venture dollars drop from 1H08 to 1H09? 

I wrote it could be as high as 40%.  I argued that what was going to go completely missing were the mega-deals, and that on a dollar basis at least those made up a significant chunk, around 40% of quarterly tallies. Readers voted for a drop, but totaling less than a third on a dollar basis.

Well, according to the Cleantech Group's tallies, in 1H08 the total North American disclosed venture capital tally was $2.9B, and for 1H09 it was down around $1.6B.  Which is a 45% drop... 

Question...

As we near the end of the year, it's time to take stock of 2009 and look ahead to 2010.  We'll look back at the past year and what we learned in another post, but for what it's worth (and remember what you're paying to read this, and value accordingly) here are five predictions for the coming year in cleantech investing:

1.  In terms of U.S. climate change legislation, something will be passed, but it will be more symbolic than impactful

The health care reform kerfuffle has demonstrated that it won't be easy for the Democrats to pass major legislation through the Senate without it being majorly watered down if it happens at all.  For something like climate change legislation in...

1.  PWC has come out with a pretty useful report on cleantech in general, but what's interesting is that they've made it a very car- and meter-centric perspective.  Are cars and meters really the center of the cleantech universe?  It's an interesting way of looking at things, and it has some merit, as they are key segments in the electricity and transportation value chains.  However, it really ignores the commercial and industrial aspects of cleantech, in favor of residential.  But it's quite interesting to see the implicit shift away from electricity generation and fuel production as the centers of the universe.

2.  Eric Wesoff has a good column with a lot of venture investors'...

I've spent the week in Israel -- my first time ever visiting the country -- as the guest of Israel Cleantech Ventures (I'm a bit biased toward these guys, I admit), visiting a bunch of cleantech startups and getting a first-hand view of the market.  And it's been fascinating.

Israel is among the most innovative countries, especially on a per capita basis.  Israel was recently ranked 4th in terms of scientific activity, and ICV claims to be tracking 800 cleantech venture investment opportunities here.  And all this activity is taking place in a country with only 7 million people -- just a bit more than the total population of Arizona.  As was recently written about elsewhere at...

Advanced lighting is a subsector of cleantech that particularly intrigues me, because it so epitomizes many of the opportunities and challenges across the cleantech spectrum.

First of all, it is a huge opportunity.  Most light sources out there are better heaters than they are light sources, and lighting accounts for around 30% of electricity consumption according to some tallies.  There's a lot of efficiency to be gained with no sacrifice (and increasingly, with added benefits) for end users.  You can find compelling payback periods for some advanced lighting opportunities already, and LEDs (my leading candidate for nextgen lighting technology) are just getting brighter and cheaper...

You're a DC politician.  You want to do something to promote jobs growth.  You want to do something to make a reduction in carbon emissions more feasible and rapidly implementable.  And you'd love the idea of being able to give some kind of tangible value to your constituents.

Thus, Home Star is born.  The idea would be that homeowners would (either directly in the form of a voucher, or via overseeing programs, or via tax credits) get significant financial credit toward the cost of accredited home energy efficiency retrofits.  Stopping up air loss, improving insulation, upgrading appliances, etc.  It's not rocket science, but it takes someone pretty knowledgeable to do it right.  And...

Long-time readers will know that in my spare time (ha) I've been serving as President of the Renewable Energy Business Network, a non-profit I and Andrew Friendly of ATV officially co-founded last year (although read below for more backstory)...

Yesterday we were extremely pleased to announce that REBN and the Clean Economy Network have joined forces, with the REBN network of chapters and leaders being integrated into the Clean Economy Network Foundation. 

It's an exciting move that will mean bringing a lot more professional leadership to the combined effort, with the existing REBN leadership team (both organizational and chapter-level) joining forces with the very strong CENF team. ...