When industry giants such as GE, Toyota, and Sharp and investment firms such as Goldman Sachs are making multibillion-dollar investments in clean technology, the message is clear. Developing clean technologies is no longer a social issue championed by environmentalists; it's a moneymaking enterprise moving solidly into the business mainstream. In fact, as the economy faces unprecedented challenges from high energy prices, resource shortages, and global environmental and security threats, clean tech—technologies designed to provide superior performance at a lower cost while creating significantly less waste than conventional offerings—promises to be the next engine of economic growth.
In The Clean Tech Revolution, authors Ron Pernick and Clint Wilder identify the major forces that have pushed clean tech from back-to-the-earth utopian dream to its current revolution among the inner circles of corporate boardrooms, on Wall Street trading floors, and in government offices around the globe. By highlighting eight major clean-tech sectors—solar energy, wind power, biofuels and biomaterials, green buildings, personal transportation, the smart grid, mobile applications, and water filtration—they uncover how investors, entrepreneurs, and individuals can profit from this next wave of technological innovation. Pernick and Wilder shine the spotlight on the winners among technologies, companies, and regions that are likely to reap the greatest benefits from clean tech—and they show you why the time to act is now.
Groundbreaking and authoritative, The Clean Tech Revolution is the must-read book to understand and profit from the clean technologies that are reshaping our fast-changing world.
Alternative energy, once the domain of hippies and off-the-grid fringe enthusiasts, has gone mainstream. Although technologies such as solar and wind power, plant-based fuels such as ethanol and biodiesel, and "green" buildings have become hip because of environmental awareness and global climate change, the real reason behind their increasing profile is economics. When clean energy sources begin to rival more traditional ones on a cost basis, which is beginning to happen now owing to advances related to the microchip and economies of scale, corporations will quickly begin to take notice. Although Pernick and Wilder state that they are not financial advisors, they profile the leading companies involved in the most promising of these alternative energies, which gives the reader a place to begin doing further research into investment opportunities. The book is an excellent update on the current state of the industry and a who's who of the companies poised to profit from this exciting array of technologies. Pernick and Wilder are involved with Clean Edge http://www.cleanedge.com, a leading research firm helping companies and investors understand and profit from clean technologies. Siegfried, David
