The founder of Efficiency 2.0, Tom Scarmellino, sat down with TechCrunchTV this week to talk about how his company motivates consumers to curb their power-hogging behavior at home, and what kind of impact that makes from an environmental perspective.
A New York City cleantech company, Efficiency 2.0 runs loyalty rewards programs on behalf of its clients, big electric companies that are legally… → Read More
JouleX– an Atlanta tech startup promising a way to cut energy consumption and reduce costs at large data centers by about half– closed a $17 million round of financing, the company announced today. Investors included: Sigma Partners, Flybridge Capital Partners and Intel Capital, along with earlier investors Target Partners and TechOperators.
The U.S. EPA has not updated national statistics… → Read More
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Wednesday announced an upgrade to its Energy Star requirements for televisions, and cable and satellite boxes. According to a press statement from the agency: Effective in September 2011, these products must be 40 percent more efficient than conventional models in order to win the Energy Star label. Energy Star expects to update 20-some other… → Read More
A Boston startup that makes energy auditing software for the commercial buildings industry, Retroficiency, raised $800,000 in a seed round led by energy management services firm World Energy Solutions (NASDAQ: XWES), and joined by a number of angel investors including Jean Hammond and Jill Preotle (both early investors in ZipCar) the companies announced today.
Facility managers, auditors or… → Read More
Telecommunications giant AT&T announced the results of its 2010 energy efficiency efforts today. According to the company’s own report, it saw $44 million in annualized energy savings as a result of implementing 4,200 energy efficiency projects at its facilities last year. These included familiar technologies that, pervasively applied, made a big difference, like:
Swapping incandescent light… → Read More
The Dow Chemical Company (NYSE: DOW) — which makes specialty materials and chemicals for electronics, automotive, water, energy and agricultural sectors — today announced that it aims to green its own operations, in part, by investing $100 million in internally pitched projects that will reduce the company’s energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
Doug May, vice president of… → Read More
Consumer and business uptake of cloud computing, mobile internet voice, video and real-time data are increasing energy demand dramatically among data centers, telecom and IT service providers. Anticipating the trend will continue for quite some time, General Electric (GE) today announced its plan to acquire Lineage Power Holdings from Los Angeles private equity firm, Gores Group, for $520… → Read More
Today, an SEC filing revealed that Solar Power Technologies raised $6.08 million for technology that helps wirelessly measure, manage and optimize the performance of large, solar photovoltaic power systems. Investors included Austin Ventures and Oxantium Ventures, the filing said.
The company’s website claims its core technology — the Clarity optimization and monitoring system — enables… → Read More
The Arlington, Va. clean tech startup, OPower, closed a $50 million series C investment led by Accel Partners and Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers (KPCB) and joined by the company’s earlier investors New Enterprise Associates (NEA) the firms announced Monday.
OPower’s software-as-a-service helps electric and gas utilities understand who their residential energy consumers are, and how they… → Read More
Nlyte Software (formerly Global DataCenter Management) closed a $12 million series C investment led by NGEN Partners with Balderton Capital, Ruffer LLP and Montalcino Holdings participating in the round. The Menlo Park green IT company provides datacenter infrastructure management (DCIM) software and services.
Nlyte Software’s chief executive Jon Temple says, “We help data center managers with… → Read More
Green IT startup Smooth-Stone today announced a new company name, Calxeda (pronounced “cal-zeh-dah”) and the addition of three vice president-level executives to its team: Karl Freund, Bob Baughman and Steve Beatty. The talent comes from IBM, Polycom and Freescale, respectively. Calxeda also launched a new website to reflect its rebranding, and moved into a new corporate headquarters office in… → Read More
DFJ Mercury led a seed investment round of $2.4 million in Ambiq Micro, the companies announced today. Ambiq has designed and manufactures durable, highly efficient micro-controllers that can be used in everything from smoke and temperature sensors in smart buildings, to smart credit cards and smart phones.
The company was founded at the University of Michigan by Dennis Sylvester and David… → Read More
According to a new SEC filing, Coolerado— the Denver-based manufacturer of super energy-efficient air conditioning systems for residential and light commercial use— has closed a $7.2 million investment led by NewWorld Capital Group, and joined by Spring Mountain Capital.
The relationship between the clean tech investors and Coolerado was announced in October, without any dollar amounts… → Read More
Redwood Systems, a Fremont, Calif. company that makes and installs network-based LED lighting control systems for commercial facilities attained a $15 million series b round of funding, the company announced today. Index Ventures led the investment, and was joined by the company’s earlier backers Battery Ventures and U.S. Venture Partners. Neil Rimer, co-founder and partner of Index Ventures, will… → Read More
Lumenergi a Newark, Calif. business closed a $12.7 series B funding round led by Braemar Energy Ventures the company announced today.
It plans to use the capital to take its flourescent and LED lighting control systems — which are like dimmers on steroids and smart pills — from small to mid-sized commercial sites such as schools, courthouses and stores, to large scale commercial and industrial… → Read More
Power Assure, a Santa Clara green IT company, today announced that it scored $11.25 million in series B funding. The round was led by energy efficiency-focused investors Good Energies, and joined by Point Judith Capital and Draper Fisher Jurvetson.
Power Assure’s chief technology officer Clemens Pfeiffer said the company will use this capital to take its technology to a broader market. Its… → Read More
Microsoft’s new tool – Hohm – is supposed to help you save energy and money. While I signed up for the beta unfortunately I can’t try this odd named thing since I live in Europe. This is why I need your feedback on how Hohm works, so be kind and leave comments with your opinions. Or don’t. → Read More
Mitsubishi Electric today said it has produced a polycrystalline-silicon solar cell that converts light energy to electrical energy with an efficiency of 18.6%. According to the company, the previous record stood at 18.3%. The protoype is sized at 150x150mm and has a thickness of 180 microns. Mitsubishi structured the surface like a honeycomb in order to reduce reflections of sunrays. In addition… → Read More
Professor Michikazu Hara, a professor at the Tokyo Institute of Technology, has created an inexpensive substance, which can boost the efficiency of ethanol production. Reportedly, the costs of producing bio-ethanol from rice straw and other nonfood crops can be cut by more than 30%. Hara says the special catalyst he created is able to break down plant-based material and produce sugar (one… → Read More
Tom’s Hardware’s findings that SSD drives don’t actually save you any power is pretty surprising to me, especially following the experiment last week comparing an HDD Eee to a high-performance SSD Eee. Logic and reason seem to indicate that a passive drive solution with no moving parts would almost certainly have not just minor savings power-wise but possibly orders of magnitude. → Read More
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