Global relevance

What is it going to take to get consumers and businesses to engage in their utility bills and pay attention to saving energy? And why isn’t it happening yet on a broad basis in the United States?

The average consumer doesn't know what they pay per watt, only how big their bill is every month.

Other countries, especially in Europe, are leaps and bounds ahead of America when it comes to energy management and smart metering, and being more aggressive at trying to understand the future impact of electric vehicles, for example, on the grid.

The market drivers for investing in recycling and waste management technologies have been getting stronger over the years. Yet data shows venture capital investors have been shying away from the sector.

Source: Cleantech Group Venture Capital Database

Despite that it accounts for 3 percent of global emissions, shipping has largely been exempt from emission reductions requirements to date.

The lack of interest in reducing emissions from shipping has also been expressed in the venture capital community. Germany-based SkySails – a maker of towing kite propulsion systems for today’s modern maritime shipping industry – received $10.3 million of venture capital funding way back in 2006. California's KiteShip, pursuing a similar idea, won an award at the California Cleantech Open, also in 2006. Since then SkySails, in particular, has been making gradual commercial progress.

M.R. Ragaswami, founder of the Corporate Eco Forum, has an intriguing new blog post titled New vs. Now: Grasping the Real Green Opportunity. He argues there is a significant market opportunity for solutions that retrofit existing buildings, vehicles, and equipment vs. requiring a replacement path: