RENEWABLOG

Green Public Affairs: $3.4 Billion in Stimulus Funds Coming to Smart Grid Tomorrow

News today, that the Department of Energy will dole out $3.4 billion in Smart Grid stimulus money tomorrow, in what was already shaping up to be a noisy public affairs and public relations week at Solar Power International. The first speculation that something was coming soon was posted by Matt Marshall of VentureBeat this morning.

With much of the US utility market and solar industry gathered in Anaheim for the SPI conference, this will no doubt give the cleantech industry as a whole a major boost. Venture Capitalists made cleantech the top funding market for Q3, but were having trouble raising new funds. With government dollars flowing, policy driving cleantech adoption and a slowly improving economy, it is only a matter of time before we start seeing the health of VC and private equity fund raises improve as LPs jump back on the cleantech bandwagon.

The news will also inject even more life into the GreenBeat 2009 event in November, where leaders in smart grid policy, technology and adoption will get together to discuss the market environment for 2010. Al Gore and others will be keynoting the event and Schwartz is a Silver Sponsor.

For updates at Solar Power, follow @jasonmorris and I'll try to report back on major happenings at the show.

Posted by Jason Morris on October 26, 2009 at 6:49 PM
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