Industry Reports

Markets for solar energy, wind energy, and fuel cells are poised to grow from $16 billion in global revenues in 2004 to more than $100 billion by 2014, according to a report released by Clean Edge, Inc., an energy research and publishing firm. Clean Edge projects that markets for solar photovoltaics (modules, system components, and installations) will grow from $7.2 billion in 2004 to $39.2 billion by 2014; wind power installations will expand from $8 billion last year to $48.1 billion in 2014; and fuel cells and distributed hydrogen will grow from $900 million to $15.1 billion over the next decade.

Clean Edge, in collaboration with Nth Power, a leading energy-tech venture firm, also released Nth Power’s annual energy-tech venture data. This year’s findings, contained in Clean Energy Trends 2005, show that venture capital investments in U.S.-based energy-tech companies increased from $509 million in 2003 to $520 million in 2004. These investments, primarily in distributed energy sources, energy intelligence, power reliability, and related services, represented nearly three percent of total venture capital investments in the U.S. in 2004.