After decades of instability and uncertainty, the United States suddenly finds itself in a peculiar position: In the driver’s seat as a net-supplier of energy, potentially the world’s largest.

Driven entirely by the rapid progress of advanced energy technologies, oil and gas extraction is increasing; wind, solar and geothermal energy sources are booming; and energy efficiency is allowing us to do more and more with less energy.

For some, this is validation that the “old way” – oil and gas – are making a comeback; for others it’s about “clean” sources of energy reshaping our economy and protecting our environment.

The truth is that it’s not a zero sum game. Advancements in technology in all types of energy are leading to cleaner solutions, making the “clean vs. dirty” energy debate irrelevant to the opportunity that lies ahead. This technical synergy across the various energy markets is also leading to an accelerated transformation of the overall sector to advanced energy, which was a $1.1 trillion global market in 2011, making it larger than pharmaceutical manufacturing worldwide.

By focusing on making all forms of energy affordable, secure and clean, this technological revolution is succeeding because it provides an economic imperative that “clean” alone could never accomplish. Clean lacked the power of the invisible hand to align the incentives of the individual energy consumer with that of society’s energy needs. Advanced energy is different because it couples two important things: the ability to prosper and increase economic competitiveness while simultaneously improving the health and wellness of the United States.

Corporations embrace diverse energy sources

The retailer Kohl’s, the nation’s largest corporate solar panel owner, offers a good example of a large company that’s embraced advanced energy technologies for economic reasons. Kohl’s has made an effort to strategically diversify their energy mix, installing solar where there are strong renewable energy incentives on the books. Kohl’s has also implemented a range of energy efficiency programs, such as sophisticated lighting and energy management technologies, that deliver significant cost savings and emission reductions.

Intel and Google also actively deploy advanced energy technologies, including innovative energy-saving data center designs and an energy mix that features “traditional” energy sources, renewables and fuel cells.

General Electric, a long time supplier to the oil and gas industry, has similarly embraced an “all of the above” strategy in its product portfolio. In addition to its traditional offerings, GE now supplies a whole range of advanced energy products and services, including wind turbines, smart grid solutions, reciprocating engines that run on biogas, and some of the world’s largest and most efficient gas turbines, not to mention Energy Star appliances and LED light bulbs.

Advanced energy is a growth industry

It’s unlikely these successful companies would have embraced advanced energy so wholeheartedly if it offered no economic benefits.  Indeed, research indicates the United States as a whole is following suit:

• The U.S. advanced energy market reached $132 billion in 2011, representing nearly 12 percent of the global market. This market is expected to grow to an estimated $157 billion in 2012, with the U.S. share of the global market expected to rise to 15 percent.
• Patents for advanced energy related technologies granted to U.S entities in 2011 exceeded the 1,000 mark for the first time.
• Wind, solar, biomass, geothermal and hydropower projects accounted for 46.2 percent of new electrical generating capacity for the first ten months of 2012, a 47.7 percent increase over the level recorded for the same period in 2011.
• All this is occurring while oil and natural gas suppliers enjoy robust, and in some cases, record profits.

From a macroeconomic perspective, with global energy demand expected to grow 40 percent over the next few decades, the economic opportunity is so vast that the growth in new energy markets like solar, wind and geothermal doesn’t interfere with the ability of traditional oil and gas businesses to grow their markets. That is why you now see unlikely combinations – small, innovative start-ups working hand-in-hand with traditional legacy companies – because it ties together scale with science to create economic opportunity in all markets.

That’s also why you see industry leaders like Arno Harris, CEO of solar PV developer Recurrent Energy, arguing that “stability can be found in a portfolio of both renewables and gas [that offers] more predictable prices and greater energy security.”

Energy is not a zero-sum game anymore. So let’s end the polarizing focus on “clean vs. dirty” energy and focus on migrating to an advanced energy future. Let’s ensure that we continue to invest in technology to drive down the costs of using all of our domestic sources of energy and make them healthier for consumption.

With an advanced energy mindset, the United States can be both prosperous and healthy as a nation.

Hemant Taneja is a managing director at General Catalyst, a venture capital firm focusing on early stage and growth equity investments. In addition, Taneja co-founded Advanced Energy Economy, a business organization focused on catalyzing regional energy innovation clusters across America. The creation of AEE is modeled after the work he did in founding the New England Clean Energy Council, which received an award from the Department of Energy. He is also an entrepreneur in his own right; before joining General Catalyst in 2002, Taneja was founder and CEO of a mobile software company that was acquired. He is a graduate of MIT.

Rooftop solar panel photo: Shutterstock

Through his company Berkshire Hathaway, Warren Buffett has acquired two solar power plant projects from solar panel manufacturer and developer SunPower for between $2 billion and $2.5 billion.

Berkshire Hathaway’s energy subsidiary, MidAmerican Energy, has a stake in many of the largest US solar power plants, including two First Solar plants. Buffett has increasingly become an important ally for the renewable energy industry, which is struggling to survive without government financial support.

Read our analysis of Buffett’s efforts to spearhead billion-dollar clean-tech initiatives. 

The newly acquired plants are located in California, and they are the world’s largest photovoltaic solar developments, meaning they use solar panels to convert sunlight into electricity. SunPower will retain the three-year contract to build and maintain them in the counties of Los Angeles and Kern. The Antelope Valley projects will generate 579 megawatts for Southern California Edison, which is not far off the output of a large fossil fuel power plant.

SunPower, based in Silicon Valley, will operate the projects for MidAmerican Renewables, a division of MidAmerican Energy.

“We are excited about these projects because they support our core business principle of environmental respect,” Bill Fehrman, president of MidAmerican Renewables, said in a statement. “We are very proud to add SunPower technology to our portfolio of projects.”

As The Street reports, market leaders like SunPower and First Solar are winning contracts to maintain large plants with multi-decade purchase agreements over their lifespan. By acquiring the plants, MidAmerican Energy has become one of the biggest backers of such projects.

SolarReserve, a U.S.-based solar energy developer has succeeded in closing a $586 million equity and debt round of financing for two South African clean-energy projects.

To raise the funds for the projects, SolarReserve joined forces with the Kensani Group, a South African financial advisory firm, and Intikon Energy, a South African developer of renewable energy.

The projects, Letsatsi and Lesedi, are based in the Free State and the Northern Cape respectively, and were selected in first round bidding by the South Africa Department of Energy as part of the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Program (REIPPPP).

In a statement, the company revealed that the projects will kick off in mid 2014 and will provide electricity to Eskom Holdings, South Africa’s state-owned utility, for 20 years. Jointly, the projects will cost almost $600 million, making these two of the largest project finance transactions ever completed in South Africa, and among the largest renewable energy projects in Africa.

“Kensani applauds the South African government’s large scale commitment to clean energy, and celebrates the exciting opportunities for empowering our rural communities,” said Kelley Starke-Dow, CEO of Kensani in an emailed statement. Kensani participated in the equity portion of the funding round.

The hope is that the project will result in 600 construction jobs and 100 permanent operational jobs for South Africans. The project leads will set aside a percentage of total project revenues for enterprise and socio-economic development, amounting to a total of approximately $59 million, which will be invested back into the local community.

According to SolarReserve, a California-based company, FirstRand Bank led the debt funding for the projects.

Top image via Shutterstock

Three years ago, Danielle Fong, a PhD student at Princeton, hit on an idea for a better way to store clean energy.

Today, her clean-tech company LightSail has earned some heavyweight support from both venture capital firms and angel investors, including Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates.

The startup pulled in $37.3 million to deliver a better system to store energy generated through the wind and the sun. Holding energy for commercial use has been tricky — makeshift solutions include electrochemical batteries, mechanical devices, and liquefied air.

“The overall problem of how to store large amounts of energy is one we’ve been working on for a century without a lot of success,” co-founder and CEO Steve Crane told the Wall Street Journal.

“Since there is little capacity to store energy, green power is sold when available, instead of at the highest price,” the company’s website explains. To simplify the problem, the founders use the example of a “hot day in Texas.” Electricity prices typically sour — but what about green power? If solar farms could store energy cheaply, they could deliver it when needed.

The method that was dreamed up by Fong, LightSail’s young co-founder (she subsequently dropped out of her PhD program, which she enrolled in at the age of 17) involves a combination of water and compressed air. The technique is known as ”isothermal compression.” To test the idea, the founders built a system that stores and releases energy by compressing and expanding air in an old warehouse in Oakland.

Competitors include General Compression and SustainX, which are working on a similar technology and have pulled in government funding.

The challenge for all these companies will be to overcome investors’ reluctance to fund clean-tech startups. Return on investment (ROI) is choppy, if not a complete disaster. Many investors will point to solar company Solyndra, which raised close to $1 billion before declaring bankruptcy, as an example of what the clean tech sector can do to good money. Tax payer losses on that investment may be as high as $849 million. Last month, high-tech battery-maker A123 Systems, which under the Obama administration received almost $250 million in federal energy grants (note: it drew down $132 million of that grant), followed Solyndra into bankruptcy.

Investors include Bill Gates and Peter Thiel, the co-founder of PayPal, as well as Khosla Ventures. The three-year-old company has raised a total of $52.3 million in funding.

Image via Shutterstock

Apple released its 2012 Facilities Report today, revealing the company’s data center in North Carolina will be powered by America’s largest end user-owned solar array.

It’s easy to peg Apple as a villain these days, given the situation with workers in China manufacturing its products under unsafe and even inhumane conditions. But Apple wants you to see its good side too — the side that recycles, constructs energy efficient buildings, and uses solar energy.

The report shows the environmental impact of Apple’s retail stores, corporate buildings, and data centers. Apple’s Maiden, North Carolina, data center (pictured right) was built to be highly energy-efficient with a “white-cool” roof, the use of outside air to cool the facility at night, and power monitoring.

And coming later this year, a solar array — a group of solar panels — will help power the plant, taking it at least partially off-the-grid. Apple writes in the report that the 100-acre, 20-megawatt facility will generate 42 million kWh of clean, renewable energy each year. The facility has also earned LEED Platinum certification, the highest award for energy-efficient buildings.

At the company’s headquarters in Cupertino, California, Apple has saved 5 million kilowatt-hours by retrofitting buildings with window and roof coverings and installing energy efficient lighting, according to the report. The company has also implemented shuttle buses to encourage greener commutes and has taken steps to reduce the amount of food waste at its headquarters.

Apple points out that only two percent of its greenhouse gas emissions comes from its corporate facilities. The other 98 percent is a result of producing, shipping, and recycling Apple products. While its great that the company is doing what it can to make its buildings more energy efficient, it’s time Apple focuses its attention on making its manufacturing and shipping processes more environmentally friendly.

Solar array photo via Shutterstock

While the implosion of solar power company Solyndra has seemingly cast a shadow on the viability of the solar industry, that hasn’t stopped Google from investing $94 million in photovoltaic (generating power through solar radiation) projects in California.

Google says it’s investing the funds in four photovoltaic projects near Sacramento, Calif. which are being built by Recurrent Energy. The investment brings Google’s total clean tech portfolio to over $915 million. At this rate, Google’s clean tech investments will likely reach $1 billion within the next year.

“We’ve already committed to providing funding this year to help more than 10,000 homeowners install solar PV panels on their rooftops,” writes assistant Google treasurer Axel Martinez. “But this investment represents our first investment in the U.S. in larger scale solar PV power plants that generate energy for the grid — instead of on individual rooftop. These projects have a total capacity of 88 MW, equivalent to the electricity consumed by more than 13,000 homes.”

Google is making the investment together with KKR, which is today forming a new venture for solar projects, SunTap Energy. This will be KKR’s first clean tech investment in the U.S.

Solyndra ended up falling apart because it couldn’t compete with the falling solar panel prices from competitors. The company received a $535 million loan from the Department of Energy, a move that has undergone quite a bit of scrutiny over the past year. The failure of Solyndra is definitely a warning sign for the clean tech community, but hopefully more high-profile investments like Google’s will serve to rekindle excitement in clean tech, and specifically solar power.

The two natural gas projects in Texas, in the towns of Sherman and Temple, will generate a total of 1950 megawatts and will be among the cleanest natural gas-fueled power plants in the U.S., according to the firm.

“The closing of our first private equity fund, in this capital market environment, is a validation of the business strategy, market knowledge and industry relationships developed by an executive team that has worked closely together for many years,”  Todd W. Carter, senior partner of Panda Power Funds, said in a release. “We are well positioned to execute our business plan and to take advantage of the significant opportunities we see in the power sector.”

Already $94 million from the fund has been spent on the 20 megawatt Pilesgrove Solar Farm in New Jersey, which is the largest in the Northeast U.S., with more than 71,000 panels and the capacity to power about 5,100 homes, according to NJ.com.

Panda Power Funds was launched in April of 2010 to invest in natural gas and solar power generation facilities and has built energy projects with more than $2.8 billion in financing since the company was started in 1982.

Clean Power Finance connects solar panel providers and installers with investors looking to drop money into residential solar providers. Those investors provide financing to home owners, who are then able to purchase or lease out solar panels at a more reasonable cost. There are some major companies that provide financing options, but Clean Power Finance could be more attractive for smaller installers that don’t have a large market share and can’t price their systems as competitively as companies like SolarCity and SunRun.

It’s a web-based interface that streamlines the connection process between installers and investors. The installer builds the photovoltaic panel system, the investor owns that system, and homeowners make monthly payments to the investor until they completely own it.

Google made the announcement at the Renewable Energy Finance Forum in San Francisco, Calif., today. This is the company’s second investment in a residential solar provider. The search giant recently created a $280 million fund for residential solar power projects run by SolarCity. The fund gives SolarCity the capital it needs to create more reasonable financing options for homeowners who are interested in installing solar panels on their roofs but don’t have the cash to buy panels outright.

So far, Google has skirted around tying up with SunRun, another large provider of residential solar panels. SunRun has a market share of around 28 percent, though it fluctuates between 26 and 28 percent depending on the month, SunRun founder Ed Fenster told VentureBeat. That means that 28 of every 100 homes installing solar panels on their roofs are leasing panels from SunRun.

“We certainly think residential solar financing is compelling and are interested in good investments — in residential solar, or elsewhere in renewable energy,” Google clean energy spokesperson Parag Chokshi told VentureBeat.

A study done by the University of California at Berkeley found that home values increase when solar panels are installed. The study found that homes with solar panels sold for an extra $5.50 per watt of solar power installed, for an average of $17,000 more per house.

Google’s $75 million investment today brings its total residential solar investment to $355 million and its total clean energy investments — which includes investments in wind power — to $850 million.

Emerging solar markets like those in New Jersey, and third-party residential solar installers such as SolarCity and SunRun, have put the U.S. on track to double its solar capacity growth this year when compared to 2010. New Jersey overtook California as the largest commercial solar market last year. More than half of all residential solar panel installations are now done by those third-party leasers and installers, as well.

The solar industry experienced a black eye when solar panel provider Solyndra, the now-controversial recipient of a $535 million loan guarantee from the U.S. Department of Energy, filed for bankruptcy earlier this month. That company was one of the first to receive a federal stimulus grant. But after raising $1 billion the company was forced to slash costs, close a factory and cancel an initial public offering as photovoltaic panel prices collapsed amid the economic recession that began in 2008.

Solyndra specialized in cylindrical solar panels that are not made out of polysilicon, a key component in crystalline solar panels. Solyndra was safe in the solar market when polysilicon prices were at their peak, but they fell rapidly as the U.S. entered a recession. That, along with a collapsing solar panel market in Spain, left Solyndra unable to compete with other manufacturers like SunPower, SEIA chief executive Rhone Resch told VentureBeat.

“What we saw occurring over the last several years was a decline in module prices much more rapid than anybody anticipated,” he said. “Solyndra couldn’t compete, Solyndra’s investors and officials assumed the price of polysilicon would continue to rise or maintain the high levels we experienced in 2008.”

Many governments are offering incentives for solar panel manufacturers, but the market is shifting in favor of higher-efficiency photovoltaic manufacturers because the incentives favor rooftop solar installations with smaller surface areas, senior director of global product marketing Jim Cushing of Applied Materials, a company that sells solar panel manufacturing equipment, told us. But even that market isn’t insulated from a glut of solar panels on the market.

Those incentives could expire by the end of the year, driving solar installation expansion down in 2012, GTM Research managing director Shayle Kann said in an interview. While the U.S. solar market is expected to double this year, it might only grow by around 50 percent next year, thanks to a lack of federal funding he said.

Despite pricing woes, solar panel manufacturing in the United States has some advantages over international manufacturers, Kann said. The U.S. solar panel market expanded by 314 megawatts worth of installations, up 69 percent from the same period last year. The U.S. solar market typically sees most of its growth in the fourth quarter of the year as well, Kann said. There are 7 gigawatts worth of installations already planned for construction in the United States.

“What’s happening, Solyndra is the exception to the rule rather than what’s happening across the board,” Kann said. “The US market remains a rare bright spot, I would say and I don’t think this is an exaggeration, every global solar player is currently developing or has developed a strategy to invest in the U.S. market.”

The company makes cylindrical solar rooftop systems and is a now-controversial recipient of a $535 million loan guarantee from the Department of Energy — one of the first of its kind as part of the U.S. government’s federal stimulus program. After raising $1 billion, the company was forced to slash costs, close a factory and cancel an initial public offering as photovoltaic panel prices collapsed amid the economic recession that began in 2008.

“The price drops outpaced market growth and put pressure on solar panel manufacturer revenues,” Lux Research analyst Matt Feinstein told VentureBeat. “Eventually, the market growth begins to then outpace the price decline, but that hasn’t happened yet.”

As a result, the company has closed its factory in Fremont, Calif. The company grew from $6 million in revenue in its first year of operations to $140 million in revenue. Its solar panels cost an average of around $2 per watt to produce — which is high compared to many manufacturers in China and First Solar, which can produce solar panels for less than $1.20 per watt.

“I wish we would target more U.S. companies, but the solar manufacturing market is in Asia,” senior director of global product marketing Jim Cushing of Applied Materials, a company that sells solar panel manufacturing equipment, told VentureBeat. “China in particular has been extremely aggressive investing in building up a photovoltaic infrastructure and a photovoltaic capacity, and they’ve been able to drive their costs down.”

Dropping demand for solar panels that capture between 16 and 17 percent of the sunlight shining on them has also taken its toll on solar cell manufacturers. Many governments are offering incentives for solar panel manufacturers, but the market is shifting in favor of higher-efficiency photovoltaic manufacturers because the incentives favor rooftop solar installations with smaller surface areas, Cushing said.

The loan guarantees are one of the financial engines powering many cleantech investments in Silicon Valley. But concerns about burgeoning debt in the United States have raised questions about whether the program will continue to exist. The program will likely continue to exist in its current form for electric car manufacturers, but other cleantech sectors could be in jeopardy, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers partner Ray Lane told VentureBeat. Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers has a large presence in the cleantech space with investments in Fisker Automotive and electric bus manufacturer Proterra.

The U.S. government has allotted an enormous amount of money to companies like solar panel manufacturer First Solar. The program has issued conditional guarantees valued at around $16 billion to solar power projects and $38 billion to clean technology projects. Other countries stimulate cleantech expansion by other means, like feed-in tariffs.

“I don’t think (cutting the loan program) will ever not be on the table,” Feinstein said. “Newer technologies, unproven technologies are the ones that would suffer most because they rely on those loan guarantee programs.

Solyndra’s annual revenues topped $140 million last year amid growth in U.S. and European markets. Solyndra had shipped nearly 100 megawatts of panels and expected to reach an installed system cost-of-goods-sold price of about $2 per watt in the first quarter of 2013 as of February.

The Baccini Pegaso solar panel printer reduces overall manufacturing costs for solar panels screen printing — a part of the process of manufacturing a cell — by around 5 percent. But the machines can produce solar panels that capture more sunlight and convert it to electricity than typical photovoltaic solar panels, Applied Materials senior director of global product marketing Jim Cushing told VentureBeat. Improving solar panel efficiency ends up reducing the cost of generating a watt of electricity from solar power.

“If you look at our customers, they’ve spent the last two years doing two things: scaling by building a lot more factories and trying to lower the cost,” he said. “The scaling part is slowing down right now, they’re lowering the price right now, so the focus right now is how we get our efficiencies up.”

There is a glut of solar panels on the market right now, which has driven the price of photovoltaic solar panels down. Most of the solar panels on the market that capture between 16 and 17 percent of the sunlight shining on the panel, Lux Research analyst Matt Feinstein told VentureBeat. That’s compared to higher-efficiency panels that capture around 17.5 to 18 percent of sunlight, where there is a lot of demand, Cushing said.

“There is significant overcapacity in solar,” he said. “Falling prices are good for making solar power more competitive with other sources, but we have the (average selling price) declines outpacing market growth — meaning industry revenues will actually dip short-term and remain flat through 2016.”

Most government incentives for solar power are available geared toward home owners and manufacturers that build solar panels for home rooftops. There’s a smaller surface area available for the panels, which typically need to face a certain direction. Efficiency is more important to take full advantage of solar power in that situation, Cushing said.

“From end customer demand all the way down there, there’s demand for higher-efficient solar panels, and that’s working its way all the way through the supply chain,” Cushing said. “Cell manufacturers are finally able to get a premium on their high-efficiency solar cells.”

Applied Materials sells its manufacturing technology primarily to solar panel manufacturers in Asia and China. That region rose from an upstart to the top solar panel manufacturer in the world in around 3 years. But the region only accounts for around 3 percent of solar power produced globally.

Infinia’s PowerDish is a parabolic disk covered with mirrors that concentrate sunlight. That light hits a small point on something called a Stirling engine, which uses the heat generated from the sunlight to create a temperature differential across the engine. That causes helium gas in the engine to expand and contract, which pushes a piston and generates electricity.

Stirling engines are a variation of a class of energy projects that use the heat generated from sunlight to produce electricity. Other methods include using a large array of mirrors to heat a point on a tower, which heats up molten salt that boils water and powers a steam engine. Solar thermal power projects have attracted $2 billion in federal funding this year alone.

Infinia raised $50 million in its most recent funding round in 2008. GLG Partners led the $50 million round, with Wexford Capital and previous investors Vulcan Capital, Khosla Ventures, EQUUS Total Returns, Idealab and Power Play Energy also participating. The company also raised $9.5 million in 2007 and $3.5 million in early 2005.

The company snagged a $30 million loan from Ex-Im Bank to build solar dishes that generate 10 megawatts worth of electricity for customers in India earlier this year. The company hired a new chief executive, Mike Ward, in April.

VentureBeat has contacted the Infinia for additional details.

Via Earth2Tech

Khosla Ventures partners Jim Kim and Alex Kinnier have followed former partner Gideon Yu in leaving the cleantech investing firm. The turnover has clouded the future of clean technology investment firms, which are exposed to higher risk and lower returns now that the initial excitement has died down.

“Not unlike most sectors, there’s a period of exuberance that tends to kick off a particular sector and then it settles down into the hard work necessary to build real value,” Mohr Davidow Ventures general partner Josh Green told VentureBeat. “We’re into that real value building element of clean technology, so a little bit of the excitement has slowed down.”

Cleantech investing is particularly sensitive to investor sentiment because the sector typically requires massive upfront capital costs and, as a result, is a little more risky. A recent broad market sell-off that scattered public investors hasn’t helped much either, leaving less liquidity on the table for venture capital firms looking to cash in on high-priced initial public offerings.

That’s made investors turn to safer investments like treasuries and bonds as well as less capital-intensive startups, like business social network LinkedIn and those in the Web 2.0 space. The sell-off has also raised questions about whether the window for companies looking to file for an initial public offering has closed.

The Khosla Way

When Vinod Khosla (pictured above) left Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers in 2004 to invest in clean technology startups, he swung for the fences. Khosla was known for taking a “portfolio” approach to cleantech investing by dropping money in just about every potential part of the budding sector, from biofuels to smart grid companies. The company has invested in some information tech companies like group texting service GroupMe, but it has traditionally been known as a clean technology investment firm.

But the excitement during clean technology’s honeymoon period has started to die down. That’s left venture capital firms that are heavily exposed to clean technology investments at a disadvantage compared to the likes of Andreessen-Horowitz and Accel Partners, which are investing in the newest and sexiest startups in Silicon Valley.

VantagePoint Venture Partners was able to ride the existing excitement by investing in companies like electric car maker Tesla Motors, which successfully went public, and solar power provider Brightsource Energy, which has filed for an initial public offering. It also invested in biofuels maker Solazyme, which also went public. But right now, it seems Fisker Automotive and Bloom Energy are the “aha” moments in clean technology right now, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers partner Ray Lane told VentureBeat.

Yu, an investor in transaction provider Square, left Khosla Ventures in earlier this year to become the chief strategy officer of the San Francisco 49ers — an established sports franchise with five Superbowl victories. Kinnier planned to start his own company after joining Khosla Ventures from search giant Google. Kim has not said what his plans are after leaving the firm.

Slower investing, lighter IPOs

Investments in clean technology companies slowed in the second quarter this year. The amount of money invested clean technology projects fell 10 percent to $1.83 billion when compared to $2.03 billion in the second quarter of 2010.

Algae-based biofuel maker Solazyme raised $227 million from its initial public offering in June, while biofuel maker KiOR raised $150 million in its initial public offering in May. (Both companies’ share prices were crushed in the market sell-off on Monday, with each company losing more than 16 percent of its share’s value by the end of trading.) Smart grid developer Silver Spring Networks only plans to raise $150 million in its upcoming initial public offering.

That’s compared to business social network LinkedIn, which raised more than $350 million without flinching. That company also picked up a market cap of nearly $10 billion before the sell-off wiped out more than $3 billion in value. Two other Web 2.0 companies, Groupon and Zynga, already filed to go public. Groupon wants to raise up to $750 million, while Zynga wants to raise up to $1 billion.

Meanwhile, mergers and acquisitions activity in the tech space — particularly companies that use cloud computing technology, which uses powerful remote servers to execute computationally-intensive tasks — is exploding. The amount of money spent on mergers and acquisitions in those spaces nearly doubled to $52 billion in the second quarter this year, up from $30 billion in the same quarter a year earlier.

The lack of excitement could lead to a cash crunch for clean technology companies that need to raise large later rounds of funding to continue working through their larger capital costs. It’s a vicious cycle that threatens to dismantle the cleantech investing ethos if it were left to run rampant.

“There would be very greatly reduced interest on the part of venture capital firms to fund anything,” Claremont Creek Ventures partner Nat Goldhaber told VentureBeat. “That means that follow-on capital could be more difficult than it has been historically to pick up.”

There’s also concern over whether government grants that have helped clean technology companies with their large capital costs will persist, which could also take the wind out of the sails for cleantech companies.

“Many of those investments were made possible by TARP and other extra ordinary grants,” Goldhaber said. “Brightsource, Tesla and many others were recipients of very large investments by the Fed, who knows what’s going to happen with that.”

Focus Electric car buyers will have the option to buy a rooftop solar charging system that costs around $10,000 after federal tax credits. The panels generate around 2.5 kilowatts of power, which is enough to charge an electric car to the point that it can drive around 1,000 miles with typical driving habits. The panels will generated 3,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity each year on average.

“If you’re selling electric vehicles, your potential buyers want people to know they’re driving electric cars,” Kachan & Co. managing partner Dallas Kachan told VentureBeat. “So attaching big, visible solar chargers make merchandising sense, even if they don’t charge vehicles a meaningful amount.”

The electricity generated by the panels powers the cars directly, taking some load off the power grid. When owners aren’t charging cars, the panels divert the electricity to the home. It’s part of what’s called “distributed solar,” which is designed to help reduce some of the strain on power grids during peak usage hours when homes are drawing more electricity for air conditioning or, in the future, electric car charging.

Distributed solar is viewed as one way of relieving strain on a power grid that faces the risk of excessive demand if electric cars become popular in the mainstream. It’s spawned a number of companies that lease and sell solar panels on homes and generated a lot of interest from investors. Search giant Google recently created a $280 million fund for residential solar power projects run by residential solar panel provider SolarCity.

A study done by the University of California at Berkeley found that home values increase when solar panels are installed. The study found that homes with solar panels sold for an extra $5.50 per watt of solar power installed, for an average of $17,000 more per house.

The United States manufactured only 7 percent of the world’s solar panels last year, according to the Energy Department. That’s down from 27 percent in 2000 and 43 percent in 1995. Most solar panels are now manufactured in China, where more lax labor laws make it cheaper to manufacture and deliver solar panels.

“This certainly helps, but just to put it in perspective, the chinese government is dealing in billions when they support these areas, not millions” Craig Lund, vice president of business development at 1366 Technologies, told VentureBeat. “U.S. market share has dropped precipitously in the past decade while China has done a lot to subsidize manufacturing.”

The new investments, which will come over the course of two years, are geared toward companies that reduce the cost of manufacturing solar panels and scaling up solar-panel production. But reducing the cost of manufacturing solar panels won’t necessarily give the U.S. a competitive edge in producing them, Kachan & Co. managing partner Dallas Kachan told VentureBeat.

“The biggest challenge in solar-cost reduction is not module price, but balance-of-system costs,” he said. “It takes time and money to fasten panels in place, run cabling and install inverters.”

But there is renewed interest in manufacturing in the United States thanks to favorable exchange rates. That’s prompted companies like silicon wafer producing company 1366 Technologies, which recently filed for a conditional Department of Energy loan, to reconsider manufacturing stateside. The investment from the Department of Energy is a small step in that direction, Lund said.

“Generally, the exchange rate is moving in our favor,” Lund said. “The time is right. It’s as good as it’s been in a while.”

The investment is part of the U.S. Department of Energy’s SUNSHOT initiative, which is attempting to bring the cost of electricity for solar panels down to around 6 cents per kilowatt-hour. That would make it more competitive with other kinds of power like fossil fuels, which enjoy much lower costs per kilowatt-hour of electricity and do not carry the same upfront capital costs solar panels have.

Sunlogics specializes in developing and installing rooftop solar panels that generate small amounts of electricity — enough to charge an electric car, for example. That’s useful to electric car manufacturing companies because it helps emphasize the clean-energy benefits of driving an electric car or hybrid electric car, like GM’s Chevy Volt.

“The auto companies are exploring this not only because it emphasizes the environmental benefits of driving an electric vehicle, but also because in some instances it can make business sense in reducing the cost of electricity,” Pike Research senior analyst John Gartner told VentureBeat.

General Motors has contracted with Sunlogics before to install solar panels at its facilities. Sunlogics will continue to install solar panels on top of GM facilities and Chevrolet dealerships as part of the deal, company officials told VentureBeat. Sunlogics will use the funding to create a solar panel manufacturing facility in Detroit, Mich., and a facility in Ontario, Canada.

“We have a trust factor with Sunlogics, we have a history with them, they have the right technology and the right cost point,” General Motors Ventures deputy director Tim Brumbaugh told VentureBeat. “As a result of our investment, they’ll be able to not only manufacture their own (photovoltaic) panels, but focus on their real bread and butter: developing, engineering, constructing and installing the solar panels.”

General Motors is not the only car company investing in solar panel providers for dealerships. Nissan, Honda and Mitsubishi are installing rooftop solar panels on their factories and at dealerships to charge electric cars. It has the double effect of promoting the clean technology as well as reducing electricity costs.

“The trend of solar at car dealerships is very likely to grow over time, especially if combined with an energy storage system such as lithium-ion batteries that can maximize the value of the solar power by avoiding paying for electricity when it is most costly,” Gartner said.

General Motors has installed around 30 megawatts worth of solar panels at dealerships and facilities, Brumbaugh said. The company expects to expand that to 60 megawatts next year. And GM isn’t the only company that is introducing solar panels to manufacturing facilities — many manufacturers outside of car manufacturers are recognizing the cost benefits of installing solar panels, he said.

The “Level 2″ 240-volt chargers can charge an electric car like the Nissan Leaf to an 80-percent charge in around 3 hours. SolarCity sells the chargers outright, but gives their solar leasing customers a discount. So residents who lease solar panels are essentially getting subsidized electric car chargers that are priced below market value.

“We’ll install an electric vehicle charging station whether they’re a solar customer or not,” SolarCity spokesperson Johnathan Bass told VentureBeat. “But if you’re a solar customer it delivers a lot of additional economic benefit.”

The electric car chargers can pull electricity from solar panels installed on homes during the day. They pull electricity from a typical power grid at night, but owners are credited for that electricity when their rooftop solar panels produce it during the day, Bass said.

There are two other types of electric car chargers — a low-volt Level 1 charger and a super-fast 480-volt charging station that can charge an electric car much more quickly.

“We’re doing level 2 today, this is our announcement, but we’ll be open to using additional chargers in the future,” Bass said.

SolarCity leases residential solar panels for a 15-year period, handling all the maintenance during the life of the lease. The electricity generated by the panels powers homes directly, taking some load off the electric grid. The company works in the “distributed solar” space, which is designed to help reduce some of the strain on power grids during peak usage hours when homes are drawing more electricity for air conditioning or, in the future, electric car charging.

The company also works with home owners to introduce a number of other energy efficiency tweaks as part of a program it started in 2009. For example, homeowners can hire SolarCity to install more efficient lighting and cooling services and seal up air ducts for better insulation.

Google recently created a $280 million fund for residential solar power projects run by SolarCity. The fund gives SolarCity the capital it needs to create more reasonable financing options for homeowners who are interested in installing solar panels on their roofs but don’t necessarily have the cash to buy panels outright. SolarCity is also raising $42 million in its most recent funding round.

The next victim of the United States debt crisis could be conditional loan guarantees, says a prominent venture capitalist.

The loan guarantees are one of the financial engines powering many cleantech investments in Silicon Valley.

“I think the loan guarantee programs could go away,” Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers partner Ray Lane told VentureBeat. “I think everybody is concerned about the loan guarantee program, fewer are concerned about (the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program) ATVM.”

A loan guarantee from the Department of Energy helps companies attract buyers and investors for new renewable energy projects. It means the government will foot the bill if the project does not take off or is unable to produce some kind of return for investors. It’s one of the ways the U.S. government is promoting renewable energy.

The loan program comes in three flavors: the 1703, 1705 and ATVM programs. The ATVM program is specifically designed for electric car manufacturers. That program probably won’t go anywhere because of rising gas prices and because of a desire to make the United States as “clean” as other countries with very high gas prices.

The U.S. government has allotted an enormous amount of money to companies like solar panel manufacturer First Solar. The program has issued conditional guarantees valued at around $16 billion to solar power projects and $38 billion to clean technology projects. Other countries stimulate cleantech expansion by other means, like feed-in tariffs. While the loan program is important, Lane said it might not be the right way to approach cleantech funding.

“The role of the government isn’t necessarily to give out loans but to stimulate innovation, and I think we are dangerously close to the government getting out of that role,” he said. “If you look at the amount of greentech R&D this country did over the past couple of years, it’s really tiny; we basically had a $1 billion R&D budget.”

One of the U.S. Department of Energy’s most stellar programs is the Advanced Research Projects Association – Energy, he said. That program allots between $3 million and $5 million for highly disruptive clean technology projects and will likely endure the debt crisis because it is popular, low-cost and has a high potential to create innovative technology, he said.

The company is finalizing its term sheets for the remaining $10 million of the round, which should be closed sometime later this week, Aquion Energy’s vice president of business and market development Ted Wiley told VentureBeat. He confirmed that Foundation Capital and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers participated in the round.

“Everybody is just going through term sheets,” he said. “It’s not a question of if, just when it clears all the legal hurdles.”

The company creates batteries that can operate at a wide range of temperatures (between -10° C and 60° C) and use sodium ions rather than lithium ions to carry a current. The batteries cost less than $300 per kilowatt-hour of electricity stored, compared to between $500 and $1,000 per kilowatt-hour of electricity found in most modern lithium-ion batteries. The batteries are designed to last for more than 5,000 cycles — running from a full charge to a full discharge.

Aquion Energy strings the batteries together into arrays of 8 or more batteries that carry 15 volts. The company can also stack those arrays together in a circuit in series or parallel configurations to create a battery fixture that carries 100 volts. Aquion Energy plans to introduce strings that can carry 1,000 volts by the fall.

Batteries like those produced by Aquion Energy are useful because they can store electricity generated by non-conventional sources — such as wind turbines or solar panels — and release the electricity gradually. That helps alleviate strain on a power grid that might be overloaded if too many sources of energy feed electricity into the grid all at once. The batteries can also release additional electricity in peak-demand times, such as hot days or in the future when there are thousands of electric car chargers on the grid.

“We are electron source agnostic, these are batteries for any kind of grid, any stationary energy storage,” Wiley said. “We would be interested in telecom backup markets, off-grid renewables, all the way up to peak shaving and grid-level services.”

The company has raised $5 million from a mix of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and a loan from the Department of Energy. It has a production plant in Pittsburgh, Pa., that is producing demonstration models of the batteries. The company plans to create a high-volume production facility sometime next year that will produce enough batteries to store 500 kilowatt-hours of electricity.

“It’s not dependent on budget cycle tax payer funding, it’s a natural gas-fired market and you expect power to get more expensive and it’s in the same wholesale market as New Jersey,” Fenster told VentureBeat. “The market is large, no reason to think the adoption rates in Maryland would be materially different from New Jersey.”

The decision to enter a new state is never taken lightly, he said. There are a lot of stars that have to align — both in terms of consumer demand and the regulatory environment — for it to be worthwhile when opening in a new state, he said. New Jersey was the last state SunRun expanded to, where it now has a 0.2 percent market penetration in terms of electricity generation.

“When we’re looking at what states to operate in, we look at first cut — where can we legally operate, which is not everywhere,” Fenster said.

SunRun installs and maintains panels for the duration of a lease and gives customers the option to buy the panels at the end of the lease. The electricity generated by the panels powers homes directly, taking some load off the electric grid. The company works in the “distributed solar” space, which is designed to help reduce some of the strain on power grids during peak usage hours when homes are drawing more electricity for air conditioning or, in the future, electric car charging.

SunRun has a market share of around 28 percent, though it fluctuates between 26 and 28 percent depending on the month, Fenster said. That means that 28 of every 100 homes installing solar panels on their roofs are leasing panels from SunRun. SolarCity is currently the second-largest provider of residential solar panels behind SunRun with a 14 percent share of the leasable solar panel market.

Google recently created a $280 million fund for residential solar power projects run by SolarCity. The fund gives SolarCity the capital it needs to create more reasonable financing options for homeowners who are interested in installing solar panels on their roofs but don’t necessarily have the cash to buy panels outright.

A study done by the University of California at Berkeley found that home values increase when solar panels are installed. The study found that homes with solar panels sold for an extra $5.50 per watt of solar power installed, for an average of $17,000 more per house. That goes against a lot of not-in-my-backyard arguments that have been plaguing clean energy providers because some homeowners see solar panels and wind turbines as an eyesore.

Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers led venture capital firms in the number of fundraising rounds. The venture capital firm participated in a total of 12 rounds, including those of electric bus manufacturer Proterra and iControl Networks. Draper Fisher Jurveston had the next highest number of investments at six fundraising rounds.

Companies that produce technology that helps increase energy efficiency through the use of more advanced computer algorithms that plug into the “smart grid” led the clean technology sector in the second quarter. Those companies brought in $428 million in investments, including efficient lighting systems Bridgelux’s $80 million round led by Chrysalix Energy Venture Capital.

Most firms invested in North American-based companies. Those companies raised $1.42 billion in the second quarter this year, down 10 percent from the same quarter a year earlier. Californian companies led the region by bringing in $611 million in venture capital investments.

Nearly a dozen companies made their debut in public trading in the second quarter this year, bringing in about $2 billion in funding. Algae-based biofuel maker Solazyme made the biggest splash in U.S.-based markets after making its debut on the NASDAQ stock market. That company raised $227 million in its initial public offering.

Here’s a breakdown of the clean technology sectors that received funding:

Energy Efficiency: $428 million across 38 deals, led by Bridgelux’s $80 million funding round.

Solar Power: $363 million across 27 deals, led by solar panel manufacturer Suniva’s $94.7 million funding round.

Biofuels: $237 million across 12 deals, led by trash-to-fuel company Enerkem’s $60 million funding round.

Transportation: $176 million across 9 deals, led by luxury hybrid electric car maker Fisker Automotive’s $100 million funding round.

Typical wells extract oil by flooding the well with water to increase pressure and push the oil out of the well. Glori Energy is able to extract an extra 30 to 45 percent of oil left over in existing oil wells by flooding the wells with nutrients that encourage microbes to grow in the wells. Those microbes alter the flow of the oil temporarily, making it easier to extract oil from the wells.

That removes the risk of having to drill additional wells to capture more oil. Oil drilling — particularly offshore drilling — came under fire last year after an explosion destroyed an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, causing the well to spew millions of barrels worth of oil into the Gulf.

Energy Technology Ventures is a financial venture-backed by General Electric, NRG Energy and ConocoPhillips. All three companies are known for investing in clean technology projects and providing the technology for renewable energy sources like wind and solar power projects. For example, GE is the top supplier of wind turbines for some of the nation’s largest wind power farms. But the three companies are still also investing in traditional energy sources like oil and natural gas.

There are subsidies that bring the cost of electricity produced from renewable energy sources closer to that produced by fossil fuels. But energy generated by fossil-fuel burning methods is still cheaper than energy from renewable sources like solar and wind power.

SolarCity leases residential solar panels for a 15-year period, handling all the maintenance during the life of the lease. The electricity generated by the panels powers homes directly, taking some load off the electric grid. The company works in the “distributed solar” space, which is designed to help reduce some of the strain on power grids during peak usage hours when homes are drawing more electricity for air conditioning or, in the future, electric car charging.

Google recently created a $280 million fund for residential solar power projects run by SolarCity. The fund gives SolarCity the capital it needs to create more reasonable financing options for homeowners who are interested in installing solar panels on their roofs but don’t necessarily have the cash to buy panels outright.

SolarCity is currently the second-largest provider of residential solar panels behind SunRun. SolarCity has a market share of around 14 percent of the leasable solar panel market, while SunRun has a market share of around 28 percent.

A study done by the University of California at Berkeley found that home values increase when solar panels are installed. The study found that homes with solar panels sold for an extra $5.50 per watt of solar power installed, for an average of $17,000 more per house. That goes against a lot of not-in-my-backyard arguments that have been plaguing clean energy providers because some homeowners see solar panels and wind turbines as an eyesore.

The Department of Energy has awarded First Solar a $680 million conditional loan guarantee for its Antelope Valley Solar Ranch 1 project. The government has also awarded the company partial loan guarantees for First Solar’s Topaz Solar and Desert Sunlight projects. First Solar is shooting for $1.93 billion and $1.88 billion loans for those projects, respectively. The three California projects will generate around 1,330 megawatts of power altogether.

This is the U.S. Department of Energy’s largest single commitment to a solar power company to date. The program has allotted around $16 billion to solar power projects and $38 billion to clean technology projects.

A loan guarantee from the Department of Energy helps companies like First Solar attract buyers and investors for new renewable energy projects. Basically it means the government will foot the bill if the project does not take off or is unable to produce some kind of return for investors. It’s one of the ways the U.S. government is promoting renewable energy.

First Solar was the first company to bring the cost of solar power down below $1 per watt. The company manufactures thin-film solar panels from a Cadmium-Telluride (CdTe) compound. Those solar panels have a lower efficiency rating than crystalline silicon panels, but can operate in a wider range of environments. For example, CdTe solar panels perform better and generate more power in days with more cloud cover than crystalline silicon panels.

First Solar became the last major U.S.-based independent solar panel manufacturer after French oil company Total bought a majority stake in SunPower. But it also struggled to grow in its most recent operating quarter, and the company had a lukewarm outlook for the remainder of the year. It’s essentially the last major player on the solar panel manufacturing stage.

SoloPower manufactures photovoltaic cells, which capture sunlight and convert it to electricity on a flexible surface that can be bent and placed just about anywhere. They’re called thin-film solar panels, but they are typically less efficient at capturing sunlight and converting it to electricity than hard wafer-style photovoltaic cells. Thin-film solar panels are usually able to convert about 15 to 20 percent of the light shining on the panel into energy.

The company filed a form with the SEC that indicated it has raised $13.5 million but only planned to raise around $20 million in March. The new filing indicates a much higher target for fundraising in its fifth round of funding.

SoloPower recently snagged a $197 million loan from the U.S. Department of Energy to build a thin-film solar panel factory in Wilsonville, Ore. It also raised $51 million in its fourth round of funding and a $20 million loan from Oregon’s state government.

Crosslink Capital and Hudson Clean Energy Partner participated in this round of funding, according to the filing.

Aggressive spending and expansion in clean technology would generate 1.1 million new jobs by 2030 and reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 13 percent, according to a new report by Google. If the U.S. employs more federal mandates and provides funding for clean technology projects, those projects will generate 1.9 million jobs and reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 21 percent, the report states.

By 2050, U.S. greenhouse gas emissions would be cut by 55 percent without federal mandates and funding for clean technology projects. The U.S. will cut its greenhouse gas emissions by 63 percent if the government introduces aggressive clean technology policies.

Google’s report focuses on two ways to increase the funding for clean technology projects. The first is a model in which the U.S. government aggressively expands its clean technology policies and increases the amount of nuclear power deployed. That model also assumes that there are additional carbon-capture projects deployed in the U.S.

The second model, which would have less of an impact than government intervention, involves taxing carbon emissions at $30 per ton. That would bring up the cost of power produced by plants that use coal, natural gas and other types of fossil fuels. It would bring the cost of electricity and power from those plants to something comparable with renewable energy sources like wind power and solar power.

With government intervention, clean technology spending would increase the United States’ GDP by around $244 billion per year and reduce household costs by $995 annually. With carbon taxes, the United States’ GDP would increase by $155 billion per year and U.S. consumers would save $942 annually.

Google has thus far invested $780 million in clean energy projects, $700 million this year alone. Google’s clean energy investments don’t come out of the company’s traditional investment arm, Google Ventures. Instead, the money comes from the company’s main treasury and is invested by the company’s Green Business Operations team. Google typically makes financial investments in clean energy projects that will generate some kind of return, but it has also made investments that have resulted in power purchase agreements — meaning Google uses the renewable energy to power its own data centers.

France will also commit €1.3 billion to renewable energy projects. Sarkozy said that the moratorium on nuclear power did not make any sense and that there were no alternatives to nuclear power that were cleaner than fossil fuels available today.

Germany recently announced that it would shut down all of its nuclear power plants by 2022. But that country is also one of the countries most advanced in deploying solar and wind power. Germany was the largest investor in clean technology projects in Europe in 2010, investing $41.2 billion in clean technology startups, double what it invested in 2009. Switzerland, too, has said it does not plan to replace its nuclear power plants when they are no longer functional, according to The Guardian.

Concerns about nuclear power hit a crisis point when a 9.0-magnitude earthquake struck off the northeast coast of Japan in March. The quake cut off power to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, and a tsunami that followed took out diesel generators designed to keep power going to the plant. That meant clean water was no longer pumped into the reactor, causing the whole system to overheat.

The crisis in Japan also did not change the investing thesis about clean technology, according to a number of leading venture capitalists and researchers. Fears of a meltdown at the Fukushima nuclear power plant in Japan sparked a rally in clean-energy stocks — particularly solar power stocks. But that brief surge quickly waned and never touched the private investment community, because venture capitalists typically focus on longer-term plays.

Despite the Fukushima situation, the US government plans to continue funding nuclear power projects as part of a push to promote energy that is cleaner than that produced by fossil-fuel-burning plants. President Barack Obama and U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu have also lobbied hard to bring nuclear power to the forefront as a potential alternative to fossil fuels like coal and natural gas.

[Photo: Guillaume Paumier]

Astrum, one of the largest residential solar panel providers on the East Coast, will install systems on around 2,000 homes this year. The average price for a home solar system is around $30,000 for an array that generates 10 kilowatts of power, based on a dozen or so quotes made through the site’s price calculator.

Solar panels on homes can help reduce some of the strain on power grids during peak usage hours, as when homes draw more electricity for air conditioning or electric car charging. It’s part of a “distributed solar” power strategy designed to reduce electricity demands on local power grids.

Interest has also been growing in companies that lease out and maintain home solar panels. Google recently invested $280 million in SolarCity, a provider of residential solar panels. SunRun, the largest provider of home solar panels, also won General Electric’s Ecomagination Challenge. That award came with an investment, though the company wouldn’t specify how much funding it received from GE.

A study done by the University of California at Berkeley found that home values increase an average of $17,000 more per house when solar panels are installed.

Solar panel micro-inverters transform a direct current generated by the photovoltaic cell on the panel into an alternating current. The alternating current is fed into a power grid, which can’t accept a direct current. Micro-inverters are built into a single solar panel rather than an array of solar panels. As a result, the total electrical output of a solar array does not suffer when a single solar panel is damaged or in the shade.

Enphase Energy’s micro-inverters are compatible with about 80 percent of solar modules currently on the market.

Enphase Energy filed to go public and raise up to $100 million earlier this month. Like a number of other companies filing to go public this year, Enphase has not been profitable for several years. The company lost $21.8 million in 2010 and $16.7 million in 2009. It also lost $9.3 million in the first quarter this year, up from a loss of $3.7 million in the first quarter of 2010.

The company brought in $18.1 million in revenue in the first quarter this year, up 56 percent from $11.6 million in the first quarter of 2010. It brought in $61.7 million in revenue in 2010, up 205 percent from $20.2 million in revenue in 2009.

Enphase raised $63 million in its last funding round in July last year led by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. The company raised $22.6 million in a funding round in May 2009 and $6.5 million in January 2008. The company has raised a total of around $113 million to date.

Competitor SolarBridge also recently closed a $19 million funding round led by Rho Ventures and Battery Ventures. SolarBridge’s micro-inverters last around 25 years, compared to typical centralized power inverters that usually last around a decade. SolarBridge also includes a 25-year warranty on its micro-inverters. SolarBridge has raised round $46 million total after launching in 2004.

Petaluma, Calif.-based Enphase Energy was founded in 2006. Its investors include Third Point Ventures, RockPort Capital Partners, Madrone Capital Partners, PCG Asset Management and Applied Ventures, and Bay Partners.

The AMP Project will install around 733 megawatts worth of solar panels on the rooftops of warehouses owned by Prologis. The electricity generated by the solar panels will then be sold to utility companies and distributed across the grid. It’s one of the U.S. Department of Energy’s largest loan guarantee commitments, though the department didn’t specify how much of the loan it would guarantee for the project.

NRG Energy will fund the first phase of the project, which will create a 15.4 megawatt array of solar panels in southern California. The company will create a power purchase agreement with Southern California Edison. When completed, Project Amp should generate enough electricity to power 88,000 homes, the Department of Energy said.

The Department of Energy offers loan guarantees to help companies attract buyers and investors for renewable energy projects. Under the guarantee, the federal government will foot the bill if the project does not take off or is unable to get some kind of return for investors.

The U.S. Department of Energy has committed a total of $33 billion in conditional loan guarantees to clean technology projects across the country. The department has committed $12 billion of that money to solar power projects.