Killer Amp. We heard it used last week at the MIT Innovation thing and I had to laugh. First, I thought of one of the Orange Tiny Terrors they sell downstairs from us at Nitro Tone. But no, this isn't a 15W box to give your telecaster that old-school tube tone, it's a play on the term killer app, used ad nauseam in the communications industry to represent the newest, sexiest application that will drive yet another wave of network infrastructure investment and drive wealth into a market pathologically afraid of commoditization. Killer app #1: Email. Huge, and it made the Internet a real communications medium and drove it into the mass market. Killer app #2: E-commerce. Internet bubble! But, bubble aside, the Internet went from an R&D network to a real robust, secure infrastructure for all new services to come. And generated billions in corporate and personal wealth. Killer app #3: Video. YouTube. enough said. Killer app #4: MySpace. yuck, but yeah, it's a killer app. So now the greentech industry has caught onto the idea, like this: if only there were a killer amp out there to drive investment, entrepreneurship, and success into the energy market, all things renewable, efficient and green would flourish.

We spend a lot of time here talking smack about FutureGen. And there's no shortage of bad things to say about it. Whether it's the outlandish cost, questionable technology, or true green value the "near zero emissions plant" never lacks for good comic fodder. But, just as in all things related to the U.S. economy, it turns out FutureGen faces some strong foreign competition. China's GreenGen and Australia's COAL21 are giving FutureGen a run for its money in the pipe dream-fueled race to the bottom that is "clean coal" plant development. In the interest of justice and fairness we've decided to invite the coal companies, power utilities, and governments that make up these public-private partnerships to the Greentech Media Battle Arena for an all out, no holds barred deathmatch for "clean coal" dominance. Which of these capital-intensive PR campaigns will prove their's is the worst combination of non-scaling technology and wasted resources? Which will walk away with the title of King Coal? I'm choking on anticipation and coal dust...

Consideration of the one year extension for the wind and solar investment tax credit has been dropped from Congress's economic stimulus bill. Senate Democrats fell two votes short of cloture on the Senate Finance Committee's amendment to the House's stimulus plan, achieving only 58 nods in favor. The Senate dropped the ITC late into the night, and will push through the stimulus plan without it. As it stands now, the ITC is set to expire at the end of 2008. The Solar Energy Industries Association has issued a release from Rhone Resch on the Senate's failure to pass the ITC extension. Citing support from Senators Baucus, Reid, Grassley, and Cantwell, Resch stated "[i]t is crucial for Congress to return to work to pass an 8-year investment tax credit." The SEIA wants to push through a 30 percent ITC with an eight year duration for commercial installations and a six year duration for residential applications.

Deep Throat's admonition to "follow the money" couldn't ring truer than in recent signals on climate change sent out by the big banks. The Carbon Principles, a set of guidelines addressing investment risk in electric power plants, were launched today by Citi, Morgan Stanley, and JP Morgan. While the guidelines themselves are high on fluff and low on actual guidance, they presage highly anticipated GHG regulation and provide a glimpse at what's ahead for advisers and lenders in the traditional power gen industry. The biggest development in today's announcement is the enactment of a so-called Enhanced Diligence framework, essentially a process allowing potential investors to evaluate risk factors in new plant construction. Power companies incorporating energy efficiency, carbon capture and sequestration, and/or renewables into new construction are assessed less risk than those that do not. With the Enhanced Diligence framework, the banks are sending a clear signal to power companies that business as usual construction will be penalized under any future regulatory framework. This is clearly not a cost the banks are willing to bear. What The Carbon Principles tell us is that the big banks - old pros at following the money - are ready to begin thinking critically about technologies enabling a low carbon future. Power plant construction is a multi-billion dollar business, and investors and lenders stand to lose big time if they get caught with their pants down after the initiation of GHG regulation. But The Carbon Principles are more than hedge against future regulatory uncertainty. They're also a smoke signal to Washington that the train is leaving the station. Most major American banks have already built carbon trading practice groups with eyes towards London (and Hong Kong). If the government blows this one, profits won't be the only thing we lose.

Andy Karsner, the former managing director of wind giant Enercorp and current Assistant Secretary for Energy Efficiency/Renewable Energy at the DOE, was supposed to be Our Guy inside the Bush Administration. Even I was (slightly) convinced by his sweaty, impassioned speech on his team's revolutionary approach to EE and RE at the ACORE Phase II Policy Meeting. The hallmark of that speech was his team's big budget - over which he claims they had ultimate control. But, as with all things Bush Administration-related, Andy Karsner is a fraud. The FY 2009 Budget dropped today and it's hotter than the new Vampire Weekend album. Karsner's EE/RE budget was slashed 28 percent to $1.255 billion, including big reductions in solar, vehicle, hydrogen, and facilities & infrastructure research and technologies. Not to worry, though. Another DOE department, the Fossil Energy Research and Development program, received a 25 percent boost in funding to $997 million. So much for Our Guy in Washington.

FutureGen, the much vaunted high-tech "clean coal" pilot plant slated for construction in Illinois, has been (un)officially blackballed by Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman. The plant's estimated costs jumped precipitously from an initial estimate of $800 million in 2003 to nearly $1.8 billion, causing officials in the DOE to balk at what many have already argued would be an inefficient and ineffective solution to mitigating GHG emissions. Although DOE officials have been loathe to divulge the proceedings of today's closed door meeting with federal lawmakers, it's pretty apparent from Sen. Dick Durbin's hissy fit that things are not okay in Matoon County. I hate to be That Guy but, I totally called this.