The GreenTech startups at the AlwaysOn Conference are really cool.  They all seem to be founded by startup veterans who attack this space with the same tools they have use to start other successful companies.

Cool Planet Biofuels is actually developing negative carbon fuels, and is going to promote the idea of negative carbon fuels throughout the industry in a kind of open source architecture way. A negative carbon fuel is one that not only doesn’t produce carbon, but takes it out of the atmosphere at the same time. A coal-fired plant could

The technology is out of the incubator lab and in its own free-standing lab. Looking for an A round. Team is very experienced. No web site yet.

BioFuelBox founded by a team of startup veterans also. There’s a huge opportunity in the petroleum diesel fuel area for alternatives. Most biofuel producers are now mothballed because they use feedstocks for their biodiesel and it’s no longer economically feasible to produce.

THis company extracts fats, oils, and resources from the wastewater stream. Their raw materials are practically free: low cost waste, distributed production network, advanced proprietary tehnology. They own the plans, co-located with the waste stream provider. Self-funded to produce the prototype,then got $9m and used it to do a field trial with Tyson. Now doing another plant with potato processors. They lock up the waste stream with a ten-year contact.

Production of biofuels involves a full systems approach. Their plants are self-contained.
They are trying to build a company without the necessity for tax advantages.

Renewable Fuel Products addresses the problem of runaway feedstock costs. Renewable diesel is a second generation product, without hydrogen or methanol needed and thus without the manufacturing complexity..Renewable Fuel Products is commercializing renewable fuels from both low-cost, high Free Fatty Acid (FFA) commodities available today as well as next-generation organic feedstock’s such as algae.( The founder started BioWillie.)They are in test phase to meet the specifications of real diesel.

Ausra is a potentially large provider of solar equipment that is cost effective in comparison to photovoltaics and solar thermal. Their costs come down as their power goes up. They store energy much more effectively and emulate the characteristics of a gas-fired plant, producing 200 megawatts per square mile. They have built a plant in Bakersfield and have a contract with PG&E to sell electricity and a plant in Australia that feeds steam into a coal plant.

Transmission is still an issue. The existing transmission system was built for coal-fired plants. For renewables to make the national impact that they should, significant changes to the transmission system have to be made.  But that could be part of Obama’s green jobs initiative:-)

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