In the past 24 hours, there have been a flurry of opinions coming out on what a commanding Obama victory would mean for people’s portfolios. Alt energy investors certainly have reasons to be cautiously optimistic.

See the full post @ Alternative Energy Stocks

Related, there’s a new post on Obama and Renewable Energy at Green Chip Stocks.

In brief:

• Despite the credit crunch, cleantech is still embraced by many investors
• Both candidates support cleantech
• Bill Gates and Warren Buffet are into green energy (Algea and Wind turbines respectively)
• Clean energy is a hedge against further carbon emission limits/regulation

As most of you will probably know by now, the US Senate voted tonight to pass the 0 billion bailout package for the financial sector. As part of the this new version of the bill full of so-called “sweeteners”, or measures meant entice certain individuals to vote in favor, lawmakers included a one-year extension of the Production Tax Credit for wind and an eight-year extension of the Investment Tax Credit for solar.

There is clearly some good stuff here for renewables.  View the full text of the bill here.

See the full post @ Alternative Energy Stocks

Solar Integrators Deliver Growth

And while the business is obviously growing, solar power is not really economically viable yet at the true cost of solar photovoltaic panels. The entire solar industry is underpinned by government subsidy and incentives at the moment. That’s a place where nothing is really for certain, and seems slightly uncomfortable to me. It’s fairly clear that if Senator Obama wins the presidential election he’ll be pushing for more solar incentives which will help companies like Premier. But Senator McCain’s position is somewhat less clear.

Longer term, there are positive factors for solar integrators and installers. Firstly, silicon prices are falling. Then there are alternative solar technologies emerging like thin film which hold out the promise of much lower cost. Companies like XsunX (OTCBB:XSNX) are working to complete the assembly of their multi-megawatt thin film manufacturing operations and begin delivering thin film solar modules to a growing market that is clamouring for more supplies and lower prices solutions. In addition to thin film technologies offering lower costs today experts expect that costs may continue to go lower still making thin film solutions such as those offered by XsunX highly attractive. Thin film is generally seen as a utility scale solution because of its lower efficiency and therefore greater area needed to generate the same power. But as its cost drops and efficiency increases it will make increasing sense for small commercial and residential applications. That could easily spark new demand and at the same time improve margins for the installers and integration companies.

See the full post @ Clean Energy Stocks : News and Industry Trends in Greentech and Renewable Energy

Evergreen Solar has been in a trading range for about two
years.  Now it’s trading again at the bottom of the range, and with the
general market downturn, along with the anticipated wave of new
polysilicon supply a lot of investors will be wondering: Is Evergreen about

to turn around as it has so many times in the past, or is it going down from here?
See the full post @ Alternative Energy Stocks

The International Center for Appropriate and
Sustainable Technology (iCAST) helps communities use local resources to
solve their own problems.  I’ve been a fan of iCAST’s approach of teaching
people how to fish (or, in this case, how to apply sustainable technologies)
rather than giving away fish since I first encountered them at a conference in
2006.  Last week, they took advantage of some of their own local resources
(namely the fact that the DNC was in Denver) to organize a luncheon with a panel
of nationally recognized speakers, any one of whom would have been enough to
draw a crowd alone, and asked them to speak about how coping with Climate Change
will impact the poor.

See the full post @ Alternative Energy Stocks

At a time when many people see clouds on the horizon for US wind, one Canadian jurisdiction is moving full-swing ahead with a procurement for renewable power. British Columbia (BC), Canada’s westernmost province, announced in June the launch of its Clean Power Call, an initiative aimed at sourcing 5,000 GWh of clean power.

See the full post @ Alternative Energy Stocks