July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

The so-called post-PC world has made computer manufacturers more than a bit crazy. Laptops that used to just open and close now flip, fold, and bend backwards. Oh, and they all have touch screens.

Acer’s new Apsire R7 is a good example of how bad it’s gotten. Announced today, the device is a bizarre hybrid of laptop, desktop, and tablet that flips and folds its way out of and into each category. It’s essentially a portable, multi-touch all-in-one PC.

The R7, which starts at $1,000, comes with a 15.6-inch HD touchscreen display, which, along with its trademark “Ezel” hinge, pretty severely limits it in the portability category. So don’t expect this one to replace your Macbook Air when it goes on sale May 17 (exclusively at Best Buy, interestingly enough).

Of course, the real news here is how much the device looks like the Starship Enterprise, a similarity that probably explains why Acer teased the device alongside the latest Star Trek movie.

Acer has also announced the Iconia A1, its answer to the Nexus 7. The device, which will run for $200, comes with a 7.9-inch 1,024 x 768 display, which gives it a similar feel to the iPad mini. More notably, users of the A1 can turn the device on simply by pressing five fingers on its screen — a simple gesture that seems a lot more intuitive than pressing a button. The A1 will be available in June.

Chinese electronics marker Lenovo has introduced the delicious looking ThinkPad Helix laptop/tablet hybrid, with an 11.6-inch tablet that can be attached to a comfy keyboard.

Lenovo showed off the device and several others this evening at CES Unveiled, the kick-off event to the CES 2013 conference this week in Las Vegas.

One of the coolest aspects of the Helix is that it can be detached from its keyboard, can use the keyboard to give it more battery life, or can use the keyboard as a stand. (See the first photo in the slideshow below.)

The ThinkPad Helix runs Windows 8 and features a 1080p Gorilla Glass display, LTE connectivity, a 5-megapixel rear camera, 2-megapixel front camera, and NFC technology. The device will go on sale at the end of February.

Unfortunately, you have to throw down some serious scratch if you want to get your hands on the ThinkPad Helix. It starts at $1,500 and moves up in price if you want more powerful components. That’s way more than most Windows computer buyers are willing to pay, according to recent holiday sales data. Hell, that’s more than the average sales price of an Apple MacBook, which sold around $1,419 during the holiday season.

On top of the ThinkPad Helix, Lenovo also showed off an upgraded IdeaPad Yoga laptop/tablet hybrid (pictured above in an orange shell) that can flip its screen backwards to become a heavy tablet. The IdeaPad Yoga 11S starts at $800 with a Core i3 processor, 128 SSD drive, and 4GB of RAM. If you’re willing to pay more, you can bump the device up to a Core i7, 256 SSD drive, and 8GB of RAM.

While the ThinkPad Helix is a much more versatile device, the IdeaPad Yoga at $800 will be more palatable to consumers who don’t want to pay top dollar for a new Windows 8 machine.

Lenovo also announced refreshes on several of its less flashy laptops.

Check out more pictures of the ThinkPad Helix below.

Photos via Sean Ludwig/VentureBeat

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Intel chief executive is taking a break this year. But the world’s biggest chip maker will show off some cool new computers and technologies next week at its Intel Developer Conference.

Dadi Perlmutter, executive vice president and chief product officer at Intel, plans to discuss the evolution of computing technology and he will introduce the idea of “perceptual computing,” which will focus on computer controls beyond touchscreens and keyboards. Intel is pouring a lot of investment into technologies that will debut this year and next, including voice processing and the “interactive space between you and the screen,” said an Intel spokesman.

The technologies include gesture recognition, face recognition, cameras and sensors, and other ways to make your intentions known to a computer. Perlmutter will also talk about the latest trend in computer designs, such as the “hybrid” or “convertible” devices like the Lenovo Yoga, pictured above. These devices have flip screens or sliding cases that allow you to use them as touch-enabled laptops or touchscreen tablets. Those machines are “starting to act like an iPad but function like a full-fledged PC,” the Intel spokesman said. Computer makers working on the hybrids include Asus, Lenovo, Dell, Panasonic, Sony and Toshiba.

Intel will show off a number of Windows 8 tablets based on the Clover Trail chip, a new member of the Atom low-power microprocessor family. Otellini previously said that 20 such Windows 8 tablets were under design, and the Intel spokesman said that Clover Trail third-generation Core chips will be shipping to computer makers very soon.

Perlmutter will also likely give a preview on Intel’s fourth-generation Core microprocessor, code-named Haswell, which will officially ship in the second half of 2013. The Haswell chip will cut power consumption significantly, and Intel is expected to include a family of low-power chips that dissipate about 10 watts, or significantly less than most laptops in the past. The Haswell chips are the first ones designed to be part of an Ultrabook — a thin and powerful laptop similar to Apple’s MacBook Air — from the ground up.

Intel’s other speakers include Kirk Skaugen, vice president of the PC Client Group, who will show off new laptops; Diane Bryant, head of the Datacenter and Connected Systems Group; Renee James, head of software and services; Mike DeCesare, co-president of McAfee; and Justin Rattner, chief technology officer, who will talk about the future of wireless on Thursday.

IDF runs from Monday Sept. 10 to Thursday Sept. 13 at the Moscone West Convention Center in San Francisco.

Talk to any independent auto-repair mechanic, and you’ll learn that the single most important item that keeps a shop in business is brakes.

But hybrids and electric cars use their friction brakes far less aggressively than regular cars.

That’s because when the driver presses the pedal, some or all of the slowing comes from engaging an electric motor that acts as a generator to turn the car’s momentum into electricity that recharges the battery pack.

So what happens as hybrids and electrics grow more popular over the years and decades to come?

Enter Joe Ferrer, owner of BS&F Auto Parts in the Bronx, New York. He’s the star of “Hard Parts: South Bronx,” a show based on the day-to-day life of his busy store.

Ferrer says that brakes are easily 35 to 40 percent of his total business. Replacing rotors, calipers, and pads keeps his shop humming.

But on hybrids, brake jobs aren’t needed every 15,000 miles as they are on conventional cars–more like 45,000 miles, he says.

“That will have a tremendous impact on my business,” he worries. “It’s an area where parts stores and shops make a lot of money.”

And he worries that the complex power electronics and computerized control systems of electric and hybrid cars mean they’ll only be serviceable by dealerships, not independent shops.

“If we go all electric,” he says, “it’ll be a catastrophe for me.”

Over the course of a long chat with Ferrer, he admitted that such a change wasn’t likely to happen overnight.

And we noted that even the most optimistic analyses project that by 2020–eight years from now–hybrids and plug-in cars will only total perhaps 10 or 15 million vehicles, out of more than 1 billion vehicles on the planet.

In other words, there’s a very long tail of older vehicles that will continue to need servicing. And because cars are better built and longer-lasting now, they may have a longer service life than those built in the Eighties, when Ferrer first got into the business.

It’s true, however, that one selling point of battery-electric cars is how little service and repair they need.

Or as one owner crisply summarizes it, “Yep, wiper blades and tires, that’s it.”

That doesn’t apply to plug-in hybrids, though. While they too use regenerative braking, they still carry engines, which will need exhaust systems, accessory-drive belts, spark plugs, and so forth.

But over time, Ferrer probably does have a point: Continuing system integration, more electronics, and improved quality mean that independent shops may have less opportunity to do the run-of-the-mill repairs that have kept them in business for a century.

What do you think? Should Ferrer worry, or is it the next generation of auto mechanics who may not be able to open their own shops?

Leave us your thoughts in the Comments below.

And if you want more of Joe Ferrer, you can watch “Hard Parts” on Speed TV (Tuesdays at 9 pm Eastern, 6 pm Pacific).

This story originally appeared on GreenCarReports.com, one of VentureBeat’s syndication partners. Photos: GreenCarReports.com.

We already know that April was a great month for Toyota Prius hybrid sales, but it turns out that the first quarter of the year produced stellar sales numbers for hybrids in general, as well as plug-in electric cars.

More than 100,000 hybrids and plug-in cars — 113,457 — were sold in January, February, and March combined, against roughly 79,000 in the same period of 2011.

The vast bulk of those sales — 106,207 — were hybrids, of course.

The hybrid sales included not only much higher sales of the Toyota Prius, now a lineup of three models plus a plug-in, but also Buicks and Chevrolets fitted with the General Motors eAssist mild-hybrid system.

All varieties of plug-in cars accounted for 7,250, according to data compiled by industry trade journal Automotive News.

Plug-in sales totaled about 17,000 units for all of 2011, the bulk of them either the Nissan Leaf battery-electric vehicle or the Chevrolet Volt range-extended electric car.

For 2012, the strong new plug-in entrant is the 2012 Toyota Prius Plug-In Hybrid, whose April sales beat those of both the Volt and the Leaf.

Analysts expect perhaps 30,000 to 40,000 plug-in cars to be sold in the U.S. during calendar 2012, against perhaps 400,000-plus conventional hybrids.

As always, the bulk of the hybrid sales will come from Toyota.

This article originally appeared on Green Car Reports, one of VentureBeat’s editorial partners. Image via Green Car Reports.

A Bloomberg story from Friday highlights a third fire involving a Chevrolet Volt range-extended electric car–only 7,500 or so of which are on the roads today.

NHTSA side-impact test

The latest case occurred in June in a Chevy Volt that had been crash-tested by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. The car was subjected to a side-impact “pole test,” which not only destroyed the car but cracked the battery pack housed in the center tunnel and under the rear seat. Then, as per the standard test procedure, the car was put on a rotisserie and rotated 90 degrees every five minutes to test for any fluid leakage. Coolant leaked out of the battery pack, though the electric components stayed put.

Fully three weeks later, the wrecked Volt caught fire in an open storage yard in Wisconsin, with the flames ultimately spreading to surrounding cars. After news of the fire, both Chevrolet and the NHTSA independently replicated the crash test and subsequent vehicle rotation procedure. In neither case could they reproduce the conditions under which the battery pack ignited.

Electric vehicles not “at greater risk” of fire

Months later, the NHTSA doesn’t appear to view the fire as terribly alarming. It has given the Volt a five-star safety rating, and the IIHS designated the Volt a Top Safety Pick as well. “Based on the available data, NHTSA does not believe the Volt or other electric vehicles are at a greater risk of fire than gasoline-powered vehicles,” the agency said in a statement today. “In fact, all vehicles — both electric and gasoline-powered — have some risk of fire in the event of a serious crash.”

Nonetheless, novelty and lack of public knowledge is likely to make any conflagration noteworthy if there’s an electric car nearby.

Salvage yards, tow-truck operators

The immediate concern, the agency noted, was to ensure that first responders, tow-truck operators, salvage yards, and even dealerships that handle wrecked electric cars understand what must be done to ensure safety. GM has been training first responders how to approach crashes involving electric cars for more than a year, since before the 2011 Volt went on sale last December.

It is also developing procedures for all parties on how to remove lithium-ion battery packs from wrecked Volts to alleviate any potential of long-term fire risk.

Garage fires, with Volts inside

The two previous fires with Chevy Volts involved were in Mooresville, North Carolina, just last week, and in Barkhamsted, Connecticut, last April. Both occurred in garages that happened to house Chevrolet Volts. In the Mooresville case, a Volt was charging in the garage at the time of the fire–leading local electric utility Duke Energy, in a surfeit of caution, to advise electric-car owners not to plug in their cars to charge until the cause of the blaze had been established.

No conclusion has yet been drawn by local fire officials, but GM sources–none of whom would go on record–seem confident that the Volt will not be deemed to have been a cause of the blaze.

As for the Connecticut blaze, the fire marshal’s report concluded the Volt that was parked in the garage had nothing to do with the cause of the fire. It was sitting next to a Suzukiconverted by the home’s owner to a battery electric vehicle.

Keeping an eye out

With electric cars slowing spreading into the market, manufacturers and regulators alike will be keeping a very close eye on any fires with electric cars nearby. The NHTSA’s statement concludes, “As manufacturers continue to develop vehicles of any kind — electric, gasoline, or diesel – it is critical that they take the necessary steps to ensure the safety of drivers and first responders both during and after a crash.”

Given that there are 250,000 or more fires in gasoline vehicles every year, the sample base seems too low to draw any useful conclusions about electric cars and fires thus far.

For everyone’s sake, let’s hope it stays that way.

This post by John Voelcker originally appeared in GreenCarReports, one of VentureBeat’s editorial partners.

Related articles

• 28 electric car makers that are ready to rule the streets (venturebeat.com)
• First look at the new Tesla Model S Beta electric car (venturebeat.com)
• GM slashes Volt slashes price tag (venturebeat.com)
• Volt cruises into North Carolina and South Carolina (venturebeat.com)
• GM riles electric car advocates over charger sharing (venturebeat.com)

Solyndra raises $75 million in credit facility – The solar manufacturer’s latest round of financing to shore up its capital needs come in the form of a secured credit facility underwritten by existing investors. The company makes cylindrical solar rooftop systems and is a now-controversial recipient of a $535 million loan guarantee from the Department of Energy. The company’s president and CEO Brian Harrison released a statement today that said the company’s annual revenues topped $140 million last year, and is seeing growth in U.S. and European markets. Solyndra has shipped nearly 100 megawatts of panels and expects to reach an installed system cost-of-goods sold price of about $2 per watt in the first quarter of 2013. It has also finished construction of its second factory; the company closed its first facility last year.

GlassPoint drills for oil with solar — The oil recovery company uses solar panels to generate steam (pictured), which is then pumped into wells to help extract oil. GlassPoint says prices of the system are now attractive enough that it is using the solar-powered system for economic reasons rather than environmental ones, CNET reports.

Audi to offer electric car and hybrid options — The company is reportedly working on a successor to its A2 all-aluminum hatchback, and will offer electric and plug-in hybrid options on the vehicle once released, Green Car Reports writes.

U.K. considers solar subsidy cuts — The U.K. government is looking at cutting solar incentives and project sizes over concerns that the attractive incentives in place through April 2012 may lead to an oversupply of solar projects, Bloomberg reports. Some European countries are looking to trim solar incentives to avoid the boom and crash of solar that happened in Spain, and a similar solar bust is expected to happen in the Czech Republic. The world’s largest solar market, Germany, recently decided to cut its subsidies by 15 percent starting in July.

Reno sets up turbine experiment — The Nevada city, home to strong winds, has set up nine wind turbines around the city and is measuring how they perform compared to manufacturer’s claims, the WSJ reports. Instruments will measure wind speed and energy production, and the data will be made publicly available online. The city wants to make the information on performance and cost of maintenance and repairs available publicly, which is also expected to help Reno residents figure out what wind turbines and Reno locations take the best advantage of Nevada winds.

Vinod Khosla strikes back at the WSJ — Range Fuels, a biofuels startup backed by billionaire venture capitalist Vinod Khosla, got dealt a pretty tough criticism in a WSJ editorial this month that also tackled the government’s support of Range. Khosla has fired back with two strong responses to the editorial. While the WSJ piece said Range received $76 million in DOE grants only to produce lackluster results and close down a factory, Khosla said the company only took half of that amount and argues Range is making progress. He also pointed out that the government heavily subsidizes the oil industry, and that success requires risk.

Gevo sued by BP and DuPont’s joint venture — The biofuels company is fresh off its IPO and ready to gear up to produce biobutanol, a renewable compound used in advanced biofuels. But it was sued for patent infringement by Butamax, a joint venture between BP and DuPont that also makes biobutanol. Part of Gevo’s $107 million IPO proceeds could wind up going towards legal costs.

Fisker raises $150 million ahead of hybrid launch — The electric car startup raised $150 million earlier this month at a $600 million valuation, and plans to start production March 21 for its long-awaited luxury plug-in hybrid, the Karma. This comes after several rounds of delays and price increases for the car, which is now priced at $95,900, a 20 percent increase from the original $80,000 tag. Fisker’s backers include storied venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers and New Enterprise Associates. The car will likely go on sale March or April of this year.

BMW, Rolls Royce show off electric and hybrid offerings — Watch out, Fisker and Tesla. Luxury automakers are jumping into the green car game. BMW has created a new sub-brand of vehicles under the name “i” that are eco-friendly. Products planned include all-electric commuter car i3 and a high-performance plug-in hybrid called the i8. Super-luxury carmaker, Rolls Royce, plans to show off next week a working model of a plug-in hybrid called the Phantom102EX (pictured).

The company raised $150 million earlier this month at a $600 million valuation, and its backers include storied venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers and New Enterprise Associates. Production of the Karma will start March 21, so it looks like the company is on track to begin selling them in March or April of this year.

Fisker is often compared to electric car company Tesla because both are producing luxury electric vehicles and have received hefty amounts of government and venture capital backing. But Fisker focuses on plug-in hybrids and has yet to sell a car, while Tesla has gone public, focuses on all-electric cars and already has one (the Roadster) out on the market, with another, the Model S, planned for release next year.

Still, investor Scott Sandell of New Enterprise Associates thinks Fisker could copy Tesla’s success. In an interview with VentureWire, he said the company offers “potentially a huge return in a fairly short order. … Tesla is worth $3 billion. … The public markets want a few more of these. I think it could be a blockbuster IPO.”

Fisker will ramp up production of the Karma over the course of this year. The vehicle is expected to go up to 50 miles on battery before switching to gas and can go from zero to 62 miles per hour in less than six seconds. The company eventually expects to produce 15,000 Karmas a year and also has plans for a line of more affordable hybrids, termed “Project Nina”, projected to start at $47,000 and become available in 2012. The government expects 1,000 Karmas to be produced this year. The company will be closing reservations, which cost $5,000 apiece, after receiving over 3,000 orders so far, according to VentureWire.

Fisker was founded by Henri Fisker, a veteran luxury car designer. It was granted a $529 million loan guarantee from the Department of Energy and  $21.5 million in grants and loans from the state of Delaware, where it is refitting an old GM factory to produce its cars.

The Karma was supposed to launch in 2009. Then September 2010. Then last year Fisker said it was planning to sell 15,000 Karmas by the end of 2011 at a $87,500 price point, with a ramp-up to 100,000 Project Nina sedans a year by 2015. Now, the company says it will being producing 1,500 Karmas a month by October and still wants to hit 15,000 Karmas annually, it just won’t be able to do that this year. And the Karma’s price has gone up almost 20 percent since its initial price of $80,000 in 2008, which then went up to $87,900. In December, the company raised it again to $95,900.

Fisker isn’t the only electric car startup hoping to go public after releasing its first car, nor is it the only car company to experience delays with new cars. Electric sedan maker Coda has said repeatedly than an IPO is in its sights (and also delayed the debut of its sedan from last year to late 2011). Last year an executive told VentureBeat the company hoped this would be the year for an IPO.

Fisker will be up against other plug-in hybrids like the Chevrolet Volt, which is already on sale and experiencing strong demand, and Toyota has plans for a plug-in Prius in 2012.

We asked last year if the new GM would be a cleantech play. It’s looking more and more like that’s the case. Today, the company announced it would be rolling out a hybrid technology system called eAssist in the Buick Regal 2012 that will boost fuel economy by 25 percent. The system uses regenerative braking, power stored in a 115-volt lithium-ion battery and an induction motor generator unit to get 26 miles per gallon in city driving and 37 miles per gallon on the highway. The car is a four-door midsize “luxury” vehicle and is the second GM car (after the Buick LaCrosse) to use the technology, which is being called “mild hybrid“.

This marks yet another move by GM to push into environmentally friendly cars and brands.

Just a few years ago, GM was saddled with losses and on the receiving end of a much-maligned public bailout. It has since turned around, re-entering public markets with a record $20 billion IPO and is now riding high on the success of the Chevrolet Volt, a partially electric car that won several accolades last year and got kudos for its range-extending hybrid technology. GM is ramping up production and expanding the Volt’s availability to nationwide this year, ahead of schedule. Chevy also announced last year, ahead of the Volt’s release, that it would donate $40 million to programs that would offset carbon emissions of the cars Chevy plans to sell in 2011.

Still, hybrid and electric offerings are a part of every major automaker’s plans, so GM has more competition on the way. And it hasn’t committed to green cars in such a big way that it matches Nissan’s lofty goals, but it is approaching hybrid technology and greening its brand in interesting ways. Nissan is arguably the most aggressive automaker out there on this front with its all-electric Leaf and chief executive Carlos Ghosn’s push for electric and hybrid sales to make up 20 percent of Nissan’s sales by 2020 (assuming it can sort out all the production delays). Toyota has the Prius, arguably the best-known hybrid in the U.S., and plans to roll out a plug-in electric Prius in 2012. Ford, Volkswagen, Mazda, Honda and others have all announced plans for electric cars. There are also offerings from startups: Tesla, Fisker and Coda.

With Obama’s push for electric vehicle adoption (one million on the roads by 2015) and major companies reporting that electric trucks can be a good business investment, it looks like green is simply becoming good business for auto makers.

BrightSource Energy raises $1.75 million — According to an SEC filing, the solar thermal power company, which is a rumored IPO candidate this year, has raised a small round of cash. The money appears to have been raised from BrightSource’s executive officers and directors. Its technology uses mirrors to concentrate sunlight on a tower, using the heat to generate steam to turn electrical turbines. BrightSource recently broke ground on its 392-megawatt Ivanpah plant in the Mojave Desert.

Germany will keep reducing solar subsidies – The country, whose generous subsidies allowed it to make up about half of last year’s solar PV demand, has created some trepidation in the market with its plans to cut back. Reuters reports Germany will, as scheduled, reduce its solar power feed-in tariffs by up to 12 percentage points by July 1.

KLD Energy closes on $2 million of a planned $10 million round – The company is focusing on the Chinese market and electric scooters; KLD makes an electric drive system for two and three-wheeled vehicles, Earth2Tech reports. The company’s CTO was the former science director for Tesla.

Intematix launches new LED tech, shoots for IPO – The company announced today a new line of blue-to-white-light converting phosphor composites that are separated from the blue LED energy source, marking a break from conventional LED manufacturing. Intematix says its new ChromaLit line (pictured) can simplify manufacturing for LEDs and stabilize LED performance over a lifetime. The company is also considering a public offering in the next 12 months, Greentech Media reports.

Power Assure and Packet Power team up for greener servers – The two companies have developed a wireless power monitoring system to allow data center managers to monitor and adjust power use. It’s a combination of Packet Power’s wireless monitoring devices with Power Assure’s software, and marks the latest offering in the hot green data center market that incorporates wireless sensors.

Toyota is developing an induction motor without using rare earth minerals — The move shows the automaker is developing a contingency plan should the current shortage of rare earth minerals continue. It also suggests that Toyota is bearish on the prospect of China easing its export restrictions in the future.

China overtakes U.S. as largest wind energy producer — That’s according to new figures from China, New Energy World Network writes. But shares of Chinese wind companies haven’t seen much of a boost by the news. Chinese wind company Sinovel aims to beat number-one Vestas (of Denmark) by 2015.

Valero will invest $50 million biofuels plant — The plant is operated by venture-backed Mascoma and will churn out biofuels from wood chips. Valero will also purchase 40 million gallons of cellulosic ethanol from the $350 million Michigan plant. It’s a significant investment for biofuels from a mainstream oil company, Reuters reports.

Range Fuels to close plant – On the flip side, this is bad news for biofuels player Range Fuels. The company has reportedly laid off workers and now Earth2Tech and Georgia Public Broadcasting reports it will shut down its Georgia plant after producing a limited batch of cellulosic ethanol. The company apparently ran out of money.

China will prepare 10 million parking spots for electric vehicles — The country plans to implement the spots by 2020, Reuters reports. China is focusing on heavily promoting the growth of all-electric cars rather than hybrids.

Hybrids have less emissions than coal-powered plug-ins — That’s according to a new MIT study, CNET reports. Researchers found that hybrids lower carbon emissions by 33 percent compared to gasoline engines, while plug-in electric cars charged by coal-powered electricity have slightly higher emissions than a conventional hybrid. If charged by power from renewable sources, then it would reduce emissions by 66 percent compared to gasoline engines.

Government delays decision on whether biomass is clean or dirty energy — The EPA has put off for three years deciding whether creation of electricity by burning wood should be regulated for carbon emissions, saying it will use the time to gather information, then revisit the issue in 2014. Biomass industry reps say burning biomass is “carbon neutral” because new trees get planted to absorb the carbon, while environmental groups have pushed for regulation on emissions, SolveClimate reports.

[Image via Flickr/decade_null]

Best of cleantech in 2010:

Bloom Energy — The fuel cell maker made a big splash entrance with a 60 Minutes segment in February. It said its Bloom Boxes, which cost around $800,000, can each power up to 100 American homes. The company has installed the devices — essentially big fuel cells which can both store and produce energy — at high-profile companies like Google, FedEx, Wal-Mart and eBay. In September, it made its biggest installation yet of 12 boxes at Adobe’s San Jose campus.

Tesla IPO – Silicon Valley’s electric-car wonder, the maker of the Roadster (pictured, right) and the upcoming 2012 Model S sedan had a blockbuster IPO in June. Shares started at $17 and jumped 40.5 percent in the first day of trading in the midst of a lackluster cleantech IPO season. Though Tesla has its share of skeptics and its stock dropped this week on anticipation of new shares flooding the market, its debut was undoubtedly a success story in cleantech. The company’s future now rests on whether it can successfully execute the manufacturing and delivery of the 2012 Model S, which it is assembling in its new Fremont factory — built, in another triumph, on the site of a former Toyota-GM joint venture which it bought for a song.

BrightSource Energy — The company’s 392-megawatt Ivanpah solar thermal project in California’s Mojave Desert won a $1.37 billion loan guarantee from the DOE. When finished, it is expected to generate enough energy to power 140,000 homes. The project nabbed a $300 million investment from power plant heavyweight NRG Energy and BrightSource is rumored to be pursuing an IPO in 2011. BrightSource’s technology (pictured, right) uses a field of mirrors to concentrate sunlight onto a central tower, which uses the heat to boil water to generate steam that turns electric turbines.

Abound Solar – The company closed on $510 million in funding this month to expand production of its thin-film solar modules. Thin-film operations like Abound’s are a beacon of hope for U.S. cleantech manufacturing and an answer to China’s cheap manufacturing of polysilicon solar modules, DOE loan chief Jonathan Silver predicts. Solar analyst Nathaniel Bullard of Bloomberg New Energy Finance tells me that after the ramp-up, the next test for the company will be to secure a large supply contract with “a large, traditionally conservative procurer — a Wal-Mart or American Electric Power or Tenaska Resources — to prove the commercial mettle and not just technical capabilities of the product.”

LEDs show some spark — The market for these energy-efficient lights is poised to surge next year, according to analysts, and there are a bevy of lighting systems and LED makers lining up to jump on the market opportunity there, which, like electric trucks, can pitch their wares to businesses on the basis of generating big savings. Bridgelux opened a manufacturing plant in California; Taiwan LED parts manufacturer SemiLED had a successful IPO this month, raising the question: Can American LED makers keep up?

Electric cars roll out en masse — The all-electric Nissan Leaf and partially electric Chevrolet Volt (pictured, left) are on the roads as of December 2010, marking the official start of the wave of electric cars for the mass market. And more on the way: Electric sedan made by startup Coda and the Ford Focus Electric are slated for limited release next year. Public charging station projects are racing to meet them, but some skeptics of electric cars say sales will be stunted in the near term due to lack of widespread charging infrastructure. (The flip side, advocates say, is that the vast majority of charging will be done in car owners’ homes.)

Smith Electric/electric trucks catch on — The likes of Frito Lay, UPS, Coca-Cola and FedEx have adopted electric and hybrid trucks, putting the all-electric vehicles on the roads ahead of mass market EVs. One company grabbing those sales and buzz is Smith Electric, whose CEO Brian Hansel told me the company’s trucks are back-ordered until the second quarter of next year. The trucks demonstrate the potential money-saving benefits of electrified vehicles for commercial entities, using cold, hard cash to allure versus the you’ll-save-the-polar-bears pitch of mass market consumer cars.

Opower — Energy efficiency company Opower just raised $50 million in a round led by Kleiner Perkins and Accel. The company has managed to sign on utilities to energy efficiency and engage customers with the innovative use of behavioral science.

Hara — Energy efficiency software company Hara has done well lately — the company has nabbed high profile customers out the gate (Hasbro, Coca-Cola, News Corp.) and recently introduced its biggest software product to date, a module that helps search out energy-saving opportunities along companies’ supply chains.

Honorable mention — For next year, keep an eye on the promising building controls and demand response sectors as well.

Worst of cleantech in 2010:

Applied Materials – The semiconductor company shut down its thin-film solar business in July and laid off 500 workers, an event that signalled tough times for thin-film solar makers. Fast Company recently chronicled the crash, saying the company bungled $1.5 billion in product orders, continually missed production deadlines, then saw two of its biggest customers go bankrupt.

Tessera Solar — One almost hates to kick a company when it’s down, but there’s no doubt NTR’s Tessera has suffered a rough bout of setbacks as of late. Today, power developer K Road announced it has bought Tessera’s Calico solar project in California, once planned to be the proving ground and showcase for  Tessera’s Suncatcher solar technology (pictured, right). Just a few days ago, Southern California Edison cancelled its power purchase agreement for Calico. Overall, a disappointing end for a solar project that has been several years in the making. The company has also reportedly laid of half its staff, lost executives at its sister company Stirling Energy and suffered a court-ordered delay on construction for its Imperial Valley solar project.

Solyndra – The company yanked its IPO in June, then closed its first factory. Not exactly a dream scenario for a startup that has reportedly raised around $1 billion, got a visit from President Obama and won the DOE’s flagship loan guarantee of $535 million. On the other hand, at least one venture capitalist thinks Solyndra could make a turnaround and re-pitch its IPO hopes in 2011, and DOE loan chief Jonathan Silver argues that the first factory was always intended to close because it wasn’t as efficient as the second factory will be. For the sake of U.S. solar startups, keep your fingers crossed.

A123 -- The battery maker and MIT spinoff IPO’d in September 2009, rising 50 percent to $20.29 from an offering price of $13.50 on its first day of trading. But the price has since come down, now trading at $9.80. It has struggled since the IPO. In August, the company posted lackluster earnings and lost out on two high-profile bids for Chrysler and to build battery packs for the Chevrolet Volt — deals that would have positioned the company as a formidable presence in the industry.

PetroAlgae — This biofuels company is pitching a massive $200 million IPO despite having no history of revenues, ever. Analysts expect it to withdraw or flop, and which could potentially harm the burgeoning sector of algae fuels.

Proposition 23 — Voters said no to the measure, so technically this was a good thing for green energy — but we’re naming it as a “worst” for being on the ballot at all. This was a failed measure was backed by oil companies like Valero and Tesero and aimed to suspend California’s AB 32 law, which requires the state to roll back greenhouse emissions to its 1990 levels by 2020. Had it passed, there almost certainly would have been ugly aftereffects for the country’s clean energy innovation stronghold, California.

[Top image via Flickr/ Eustaquio Santimano]

That’s the market that Austin, Tex.-based startup ActaCell is jumping on, citing market drivers like EPA regulators cracking down on emissions requirements and the difficulty of predicting the price of diesel. The company makes high-power lithium-ion batteries for use in medium to heavy-duty hybrid trucks, and today it announced over $3 million in grants.

One of the grants is a $3 million award over a three-year period — provided it hits certain benchmarks — from the Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology. The money will provide for the company to create a strategy to show it can scale up by 1,000 times the production of a nano material for high-energy batteries for use in electrified vehicles.

“We have a nano material that can enable a high-energy battery to be made,” Kohler said. “We can make the alloy material five grams at a time. A cell may need 100 grams of material. Right now, it’s not practical to make batteries using this material,” so the company will demonstrate it can scale up production of the material to five kilograms at time, which would then put it in contention for being a commercially viable material for hybrid batteries.

The other is a $179,000 grant from the U.S. Advanced Battery Consortium (made up of Ford, GM and Chrysler) to conduct a 16-month assessment of ActaCell’s high-power battery cells to see if they meet requirements specified by the consortium for power-assist hybrid-electric vehicle applications. It’s essentially a slew of tests to pinpoint the battery’s overall performance, how it works under different temperature situations and what it’s overall lifecycle looks like.

The tests will pinpoint the strengths of ActaCell’s batteries, Kohler said, and if all goes well, could lead to one of the automakers in the consortium seeking out ActaCell for additional research on its batteries.

The company seems to reflect some of the latest trends in venture capital-backed cleantech startups. For one, capital efficiency. ActaCell has raised $7 million and lived off that for three years. In fact, Kohler said the company has been able to buy second-hand equipment from startups that burned through their funding too fast. For another, it’s focusing on a market — hybrid trucks — that sells to commercial entities on the basis of being able to prove return on investment, a trend Peter Wagner of Accel told VentureBeat would strengthen in 2011.

ActaCell licenses research from the University of Texas at Austin and has used it to make battery cells that use a traditional approach to making lithium ion batteries but without blending in nickel or cobalt, which companies typically add to compensate for the short life cycle of these batteries (particularly under too-hot, too-cold conditions). Not having to add those materials and creating a more efficient battery could result in lowered cooling requirements for car makers and a cheaper battery overall. If the company can demonstrate the technology works and can scale up, it could eventually grow to service the market for mass consumer electric and hybrid cars.

“We feel we have a technology that is well understood and can be scaled up without having to reinvent everything. We feel we’ve solved the technical problem without having to blend anything. We’ve been able to bring in a high power cell with safety to match,” said Marc Kohler, the company’s director of product management.

Smart grid communications company Trilliant announced it has inked a deal with British Gas to roll out one million smart meters by 2012. The deal could open up the door for more contracts with British Gas, which has 16 million customers. Earth2Tech points out that the British government has said it wants smart meters in every home by 2020.

NRG Energy has launched the country’s first privately funded electric vehicle charging infrastructure in Houston, called eVgo (pictured). The company plans to invest $10 million in the city’s charging infrastructure and will offer flat-rate monthly packages for access to the fast-charge stations that it will build out along major highways and shopping centers.

GM’s shares climbed 7.5 percent this morning to $35.46 after its $20 billion return to public trading, Bloomberg reports. But the U.S. government will have to sell its remaining shares at $53 apiece in order to earn back the $49.5 billion it invested in the company after bailing it out in the midst of the financial crisis. The Treasury looks to make about $13.6 billion from the shares it has sold so far.

Toyota unveiled its electric Rav4 at the Los Angeles Auto Show, a car that will be produced with technology that is part of a $60 million agreement with electric car maker Tesla. Tesla chief executive Elon Musk told the Los Angeles Times he’d like to see the Rav4 built in Tesla’s new $42 million Fremont, Calif. factory.

Toyota also plans to launch 11 new hybrid models by the end of 2012, Grist/AFP reports.

Honda has unveiled its electrified Fit at the Los Angeles Auto Show. Like Toyota’s Rav4, the Fit will have a 100-mile range, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Neste Oil has opened the largest biodiesel plant in the world in Singapore, the New York Times reports.

The Electrification Coalition predicts there will be 200,000 electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids on the roads by 2015.

Coda CEO Kevin Czinger has stepped down by “mutual consent,” according to a company statement. Co-chairman Steve Heller will serve as interim CEO until a replacement has been found. It looks like bad timing for the electric car company, which is about to release its first and heftily-priced sedan.

Hybrid startup Fisker plans to raise $75 – $150 million ahead of a planned IPO, Autoblog Green reports. The company is currently marketing its sporty plug-in hybrid Karma (pictured) and says it will begin producing the Nina plug-in sedan out of an old GM factory in Delaware.

In the U.S., GM may be focusing all its hype on its electric hybrid Chevy Volt, but it’s also busy building electric cars for the rest of the world. The company is currently working on a prototype for the end of this year of an electric minicar in Shanghai called the New Sail EV, Green Car Reports writes. GM also recently announced plans to move forth with its $13 billion IPO.

Siemens is close to signing a contract to supply a Chinese city with electric-vehicle charging infrastructure, Bloomberg reports.

Clean energy consulting company Nexant completed a $50 million financing round, netting an additional $7 million from previously disclosed sums. Its investors include Symphony Technology Group, TeleSoft, Oak Investment Partners, Intel Capital and Beacon.

Honda is currently testing out an African grass called miscanthus for fueling a power station at one of the company’s car factories in England, the WSJ writes. Add that to the list of weird feedstocks that can be turned into fuel.

Smartphone apps connected to electric vehicles will let us track charging levels and control certain vehicle functions. And when it comes to the in-car experience, our cars will be able to communicate with our mobile devices effectively thanks to built-in software and apps.

VentureBeat will be discussing electric cars and consumer energy efficiency products this week at GreenBeat 2010, Nov. 3-4 at Stanford University.

What follows are just a few ways that apps will soon be inseparable from our cars:

Nissan’s Leaf iPhone App: Nissan is gearing up to unleash the Leaf — the first mass-produced, all-electric car — in a handful of states in the US this December, and the company is also releasing an iPhone application alongside it. The application will let Leaf owners remotely view the battery life left on their car, as well as the time required and approximate cost to recharge it.

Owners will also be able to remotely detect the internal temperature of their Leaf, as well as turn on heat or air-conditioning. The functionality is no different from a typical remote starter, but the added temperature reading information could help you decide if it’s worth spending the extra juice to pre-heat, or pre-cool, your Leaf.

We’ll likely see an Android version of the Leaf app eventually. And since the car is running Microsoft’s Windows Embedded Automotive 7 — the company’s terribly named integrated operating system for cars — I wouldn’t be surprised to see the Leaf’s in-car app ecosystem open up.

General Motors’ OnStar Mobile App: GM was likely inspired by Nissan’s mobile app idea for the upcoming Chevrolet Volt. GM’s app, which will be available for iPhone, Android and BlackBerry, also lets you track battery levels and remotely control climate. In addition, it can send you alerts if you forget to recharge your Volt and will you choose to charge during cheaper off-peak hours. The app will also provide OnStar functionality like remotely opening door locks.

GM teamed up with Google to bring its Android mobile operating system to the Volt earlier this year, so we can expect even further integration between the Volt and Android phones in the future.

Ford’s Sync AppLink: Over the summer, Ford announced that Android and BlackBerry users will be able to use voice commands on mobile apps with Ford’s AppLink upgrade for Sync — the car manufacturer’s in-car software system developed together with Microsoft.

So not only will Sync users be able to use voice commands to do things like play music on their device, or make calls, but they’ll also be able to take advantage of third-party apps like Pandora as well. The company also announced a developer network that will make it easy to implement Sync support in mobile apps.

Ford’s Sync software has never really gotten the recognition it deserves for its surprisingly good voice recognition technology. But the release of the much-anticipated Ford Fiesta — a traditional car with great gas mileage and a low price — may turn on more drivers to the technology. Sync is also based on Windows Embedded Automotive, so there’s the potential for even more app integration down the line.

Coloumb’s ChargePoint app: This nifty iPhone application (available free on the App Store) lets you easily find the nearest electric vehicle charging station and tells you if it’s available or in use. Once at a station, the app also lets you start, stop, and monitor a charging session.

Nokia’s mysterious app plans: Earlier this year, Nokia, along with a consortium of five major car companies, announced a technology specification for integrating mobile apps into cars. The consortium consisted of Audi, BMW, Daimler, Porsche, and Volkswagen, so the platform will likely take off first in Europe. There’s no further information on Nokia’s plans yet, but it looks like the plan is to push its specification as a standard for all cars.

What’s to come?

By this time next year, we’ll surely see even more innovation when it comes to car apps. And hopefully by then, electric cars will seem like more of a reality, instead of a pie in the sky ideal. It’ll be interesting to see what some of the other major car manufacturers, specifically Toyota and Honda, have up their sleeves as well.

Are you a green executive or entrepreneur? If so, sign up now for GreenBeat 2010 — the year’s seminal conference on the smart grid — November 3-4 at Stanford University. World leaders in smart grid initiatives will debate how the new “Super Grid” is creating huge opportunities in cars, energy storage, and renewables. GreenBeat 2010 is hosted by VentureBeat and SSE Labs of Stanford University. Go here for full conference details.

Tesla has completed the $42 million purchase of a factory in Fremont previously owned by a Toyota and GM joint venture, the Wall Street Journal reports. CEO Elon Musk says the factory is key to Tesla’s future, but revamping the factory will be a big task — the company still needs to recruit and train 500 people, sign up suppliers and refit the facility with new equipment.

High-performance photovoltaics company SiOnyx announced they have raised $12.5 million in second-round financing. It uses a laser implant method called “black silicon” that increases performance of light-sensing devices.

Smart grid communications company Silver Springs  announced new products that mark a move into demand response, a hot (and getting hotter) segment of the smart grid.  Greentech Media notes this will allow Silver Springs to compete with power management companies like EnerNOC, Comverge and Opower, though the product is limited to customers that already use Silver Springs’ networked meters.

Energy management company Tendril and Lockheed Martin announced they have teamed up to integrate Lockheed’s demand response solution with Tendril’s platform.

Electric vehicles will have a four to five percent adoption rate by 2020, plug-in hybrid electric vehicles will be at five to six percent and hybrid electric vehicles will be at 20 percent, according to consulting company PRTM (via Greentech Media).

Are you a green executive or entrepreneur? If so, sign up now for GreenBeat 2010 — the year’s seminal conference on the smart grid — November 3-4 at Stanford University. World leaders in smart grid initiatives will debate how the new “Super Grid” is creating huge opportunities in cars, energy storage, and renewables. GreenBeat 2010 is hosted by VentureBeat and SSE Labs of Stanford University. Go here for full conference details and to apply for the 2010 Innovation Competition. Register by October 22nd and save 30%.

Toyota will launch six new hybrids by 2012, the company announced via Twitter. One of them will be a plug-in Prius. The other will be a Rav4-EV, set to debut in November at the Los Angeles auto show – the automaker partnered with electric car startup Tesla to develop the SUV. The collaboration could bode well for Toyota’s foothold in the electric vehicle market, All Cars Electric predicted: “With Toyota’s ability to mass produce vehicles and Tesla’s engineering excellence in battery pack design, this strange love-child will be a must-drive car.”

Biofuel start-up Joule has earned a patent for its cyanobacteria – a type of blue-green algae – that can convert sunlight and carbon dioxide into liquid hydrocarbons, which in turn can replace diesel fuel. The company claims to be the only biofuel player to produce biofuel with a single-step process (instead of intermediaries like sugar or algal mass). It will begin pilot production of diesel in its Texas facilities this year.

The GE ecomagination challenge, a contest in which GE and venture capital firms have offered $200 million to winning cleantech business ideas, has attracted 2,400 entries since July. The renewable energy generation category has garnered the most entries of startup hopefuls. The contest is backed with funds from GE, RockPort Capital, KPCB, Foundation Capital and Emerald Technology.