All the talk recently about the successes of Project Better Place in transforming the mainstream transportation market for private vehicles has understandably overshadowed other niche markets that can benefit from injections of clean technologies.

One of those niches is that for industrial machinery that is used in agriculture and agricultural transport.  Modern industrial agriculture is heavily dependent on fossil fuels, and contributes significantly to the regional carbon footprint of the U.S., the European Union, Australia, and increasingly, China.

According to the Independent Science Panel, agriculture is responsible for 25% of the world’s carbon dioxide emissions, 60% of methane gas emissions and 80% of nitrous oxide.  According to its report on agriculture and global warming,

the most energy-intensive components of modern industrial agriculture are the production of nitrogen fertiliser, farm machinery and pumped irrigation. They account for more than 90% of the total direct and indirect energy used in agriculture…It has been estimated that to produce a tonne of cereals or vegetables by means of modern agriculture requires 6 to 10 times more energy than by using sustainable agricultural methods.

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Recently, a series of reports in the Israeli media have put a renewed focus on the link between environmental contaminants and human health, making the need to immediately implement more of the environmental technologies out there more than food for thought.

One was a report on the troubling rise in the cancer incidence of IDF soldiers from the Nahal Training Base.  Israel’s Channel 2 reported that in the decade between 1994 and 2004, Nahal soldiers contracted lymphoma 2.5 times more than those serving in the Golani and Paratroop brigades. That same report noted that the training base was not far from sewage cesspools (pictured) and several chemical factories that were polluting the area. Daniel Pedersen’s article on  Greenprophet.com does a nice job summarizing the contents of the report and the IDF response about the causes and linkages.

This report brought back unpleasant memories of two other well-publicized incidents, the Kishon Affair and the Yarkon Bridge Collapse.

In the Kishon Affair, it was discovered in May of 2000 that that dozens of naval commando fighters had been afflicted with cancer after conducting regular diving training sessions in the Kishon river as part of their regular training.  The Kishon river has been transformed, over the course of several decades, into a receptacle for the pollutants of several of Israel’s most polluting industrial plants including the oil refineries, petrochemical and fertilizer plants, and the sewage treatment plant. Severe contamination has destroyed the natural ecosystem and has transformed the channel into an open sewage canal flowing into Haifa Bay. Read the rest of this entry »

“There is going to be a generation of Googles and Ciscos in the cleantech area.”

So says Alan Salzman, co-founder and chief executive of VantagePoint Venture Partners, one of the most successful and high profile venture capital firms in the U.S.  He is a man who has personally been involved in developing over 300 companies, and has raised and managed more than $5 billion in capital during the last 25 years in Silicon Valley.

Salzman witnessed from close up and contributed to several technological leaps that changed the way of doing business and pushed the economy’s growth, such as the PC and Internet, biotech, and digital data communications.  Already present in VantagePoint’s cleantech portfolio are start-ups like Shai Agassi’s Better Place, high-end electric car maker Tesla Motors, and BrightSource Energy (whose subsidiary, Luz II, is headquartered in Jerusalem).

He says the firm has “well over $1 billion” dedicated to making cleantech investments.  In particular, it is looking to three areas: Read the rest of this entry »

Great news for alternative energy start-ups and more established ones, as well as for Israeli and American academics, and “yarokists” of every persuasion.

Renewable Energy World reported recently that the official launch of the US-Israel Energy Cooperation Agreement will take place on 17-19th of February at the Eilat-Eilot International Renewable Energy Conference. According to the event organizers, the Conference “is part of an ambitious program in the southern Arava desert, to generate 100% regional energy independence within a decade. This will create a regional test bed for accelerated innovations. The program serves as a blueprint for other regions in the world. Other similar regional renewable energy programs will be presented.

The Energy Cooperation Act, introduced on March 12, 2007 by Senator Gordon Brown (R-OR), would authorize a grant program of $20 million for each of fiscal years 2008 through 2014 to fund joint ventures between U.S. and Israeli businesses and academics for research, development, or commercialization of alternative energy, improved energy efficiency, or renewable energy sources.

More specifically, the Act authorizes:

• grants to promote (1) solar energy; (2) biomass energy; (3) energy efficiency; (4) wind energy; (5) geothermal energy; (6) wave and tidal energy; and (7) advanced battery technology.

• Makes eligible for a grant projects that address improved energy efficiency or renewable energy sources, or joint ventures between either: (1) a for-profit business entity, academic institution, National Laboratory, or nonprofit entity in the United States, and one in Israel; or (3) the federal government and the government of Israel.

The Act would also establish the International Energy Advisory Board.

With this long-term supplement to existing VC funds for cleantech and with the large potential of securing grants in the near future, the Israel Cleantech field will become open to many more would be participants. (Currently, there are about 600 companies in Israeli Cleantech overall.)

This is good because it allows new ideas that were previously held back by funding issues to develop and take hold, and will sharpen the focus of existing companies hoping to stay ahead of the pack. Israeli companies have touched on nearly every field mentioned for grant eligibility, above all, (1) solar energy, (2) biomass, and (7) advanced battery technology.

Entrepreneurs can be heard revving their non-emitting engines just about now.