SiliconBeat

Global investment in clean-energy projects in the year’s first quarter fell 44% from the fourth quarter of 2008 and 53% below 1Q 2008, according to New Energy Finance.

The London-based researcher said investment into solar, wind and biofuel plants fell to $13.3 billion in January-March of this year. The blame falls mainly on the credit crunch, the recession and the perilous stock markets worldwide.

New Energy Finance described the drop as unprecedented, and even the stimulus efforts worldwide aren’t helping — yet.

“Green stimulus plans may represent the light at the end of the tunnel for clean-energy companies, but meanwhile the sector has been hit by an oncoming train,” Michael Liebreich, CEO/chairman of New Energy Finance, said in a statement.

Some report highlights:

* VC and private equity spending fell 22% in 1Q 2009 vs. 4Q 2008.

* Stock-market investors contributed a measly $100 million to pure-play clean-energy companies.

* Merger, acquisition and refi activity fell to $8.8 billion the 4th quarter, down from $17.3B in the Q4 2008 and $18.8B in Q1 2008.

The report notes that $148 billion was invested into clean energy in 2007 and $155 billion in 2008. As the report says in a pithy note, “It will take a very sharp acceleration in investment in the remaing three quarters for this year to match 2008 levels.”

The Cleantech Group also has reported on the segment, saying VC investment into cleantech fell to $1 billion in the first quarter, down 48 percent from the same period a year ago. Its report covers venture investments in North America, Europe, China and India.

New Orleans has not been a repository of good news this decade, but perhaps the post-Katrina environment is starting to show results.

Jackson Square in New Orleans

Sustainlane.com, a Web green-living guide, evaluated how green the fleets were in America’s big cities, and handed Nawlins the crown. That’s because 100% of its public vehicles are propelled by alternative fuels. That list includes biodiesel, hydrogen, ethanol, CNG, electricity or gas-electric hybrids.

Here is the top 10 list, as well as the percentage of the fleet in each that’s green:

1. New Orleans, 100%

2. Las Vegas, 90%

3. Omaha, 74%

4. Fort Worth, 70%

5. Portland, 60%

6. Colorado Springs, 58%

7. Kansas City, 50%

8. Dallas, 49%

9. Albuquerque, 47%

10. San Francisco, 47%

The national median for green fleet % inthe  50 largest cities is 19.5%. San Jose’s fleet is 34.3% green, according to a SustainLane.com spokeswoman.

Tesla's Model S goes on sale in 2011.

Lost in the hoopla of yesterdays’ unveiling of the Tesla Model S — who expected a 7-seater electric? — was what sounded like pretty final news about the location of the factory that will assemble the car.

In the LA Times, reporter Ken Bensinger said Tesla CEO Elon Musk said the company would build its all-electric sedan in Southern California.

Musk declined to name the city, but said, “We have a term sheet on a location, but we can’t divulge it until the contract is finalized.”

In an AP story that ran on the Mercury News Web site, Tesla said it would start building the car in the 4th quarter of 2011 “in a yet-to-be determined Southern California location.”

I took a spin recently in Tesla’s first model, the Roadster. Click here for that report.

A year ago, Tesla Motors CEO, Chairman and Product Architect Elon Musk fairly bristled when critics noting production delays and some CEO turnover at his Silicon Valley electric car company compared it to two of the most well-documented failures of U.S. car-making history, Tucker and DeLorean.

It’s now safe to say that Tesla has easily passed Tucker, and seems headed on a path to leave comparisons to DeLorean behind, too.

Tucker was the dream of Preston Tucker. But only 51 of his 1948 Tucker Torpedo models were built before the company folded.

DeLorean was the name of another eponymous dreamer, John DeLorean. The ex-Pontiac chief saw about 9,000 of his DMC-12s built in Northern Ireland before production ended in 1982.

Tesla’s production of its Roadster has reached 250 deliveries, and later this week, it’ll unveil its second car, the Model S sedan. The company hopes to produce 20,000 of these vehicles a year once assembly starts in 2011.

It’s worth noting that Tucker, DeLorean and Tesla do share something: screen time.

Both Tucker and DeLorean are probably more famous with movie buffs than car fans. Jeff Bridges starred in Francis Ford Coppola’s 1988 “Tucker: The Man and His Dream.” It gets 6.8 stars (out of 10) on imdb.com.

And the DeLorean was Doc Brown’s time-traveling machine in the “Back to the Future” triology (8.3, 7.4 and 7.0 on imdb.com) that ran from 1985 to 1990.

And it was his 2006 documentary “Who Killed the Electric Car?” (7.7 stars on imdb.com) that led film-maker Chris Paine to Tesla. There’s a glimpse of the first Tesla at the end of his documentary.  He now owns one of the electric rides, and has been seen at various Tesla events with a film crew as he puts together a sequel called “Revenge of the Electric Car.”

You can read Paine’s blog item on his first week driving a Tesla here.

(Photo of the 2009 Tesla Roadster Sport courtesy of Tesla Motors.)

Paul Holland, a partner with Foundation Capital and a board member of Serious Materials, a maker of green construction materials, got a rare honor this morning. He introduced President Obama to a gathering of 120 cleantech leaders in Washington.

(Yes, I know, Obama needs no introduction, especially to the green crowd who fully expect to capitalize on his commitment to renewable energy and energy efficiency.)

Still, Holland chose his words carefully.

He first spoke of Serious Materials’ highly insulated windows and Ecorock, its green drywall product. He then mentioned the company recently purchased and re-opened a shuttered window company in Pennsylvania.

He also spoke about the role of venture capitalists — and the federal government.

“Over the last 30 years, venture capital-funded companies as diverse as Amazon and Cisco, Google and Microsoft, and Intel and Netflix have employed tens of millions of Americans in high paying, rewarding jobs,” he said. “Simply put, many of these companies would not be where they are today—beginning the reinvention and reinvigoration of American business and American manufacturing—were it not for progressive federal policies such as the Federal R&D Tax Credit and the Stimulus Package.”

Then, after saying U.S. businesses would be at a major disadvantage globally without the Federal R&D tax credit, he welcomed President Obama to the stage.

OptiSolar, a once-promising builder of solar power plants, continued its recent spate of bad news.

The company, which had an agreement with PG&E to build a solar power plant in San Luis Obispo County, had a first-round of layoffs and then said it had sold its entire portfolio of planned power plants to First Solar in a deal worth $400 million in stock. It has trouble raising funds and getting financing to see its plans through.

This week, according to spokesman Alan Bernheimer, another 200 employees lost their jobs; now, fewer than 100 remain.

“The remaining employees (in Hayward and Sacramento) are securing the production lines, continuing some R&D activities, supporting the completion of the First Solar transacation, and continuing to seek a buyer,” Berhheimer said via an e-mail.

National Semiconductor, the Santa Clara chip-maker that sees growth potential in quality-of-life products that improve health care and encourage greener energy, said Thursday it had acquired Act Solar.

National Semi has a technology it calls Solar Magic. It improves the efficiency of solar panels that lose power when they’re shaded, covered with debris or get old. It goes into production later this year.

Act Solar, also based in Santa Clara, sells something called PowerString, which also improves solar efficiency by 6 to 11 percent by re-circulating small amounts of energy. Cumulatively, the company said, its technology will result in solar panels that produce 40-80% more energy over their 20-40 year lifespan.

In February, it announced a deal to sell 8 megawatts worth of PowerString to Pacific Power Management, a solar company that engineers and installs solar arrays.

“With Act Solar we can further improve the performance and efficiency of solar systems, at the same time providing monitoring capabilities not available before,” Mike Polacek, National Semi’s senior VP of key market segments, said in a statement.

No financial terms of the all-cash deal were announced. Act Solar is privately held. National Semiconductor had sales of $1.9 billion in its most recent fiscal year. A spokeswoman for National Semi says all of Act Solar’s employees will move to the company.

Another year, another CleanTech Open. Except the prizes keep getting larger, and isn’t there a saying about money motivating creativity?

To be announced this morning by San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed and Clean Tech Open co-founder Mike Santullo, the 4^th event will include $1 million in prizes. It also expands from California into two more regions, the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Northwest.

The business-proposal competition awards winners in six green categories, including renewable energy, transportation and green building. Winning proposals get $50,000 in cash, and another $50,000 in services including office space, PR and legal help and mentoring.

Past winners have raised more than $125 million from investors. The list includes Adura Technologies, Cool Earth Solar and Green Volts.

The group, which also announced a partnership with the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, issued a challenge today: For entrepreneurs, VCs, university, governments and non-profits to creat 100,000 cleantech jobs in the next 5 years.

“Entrepreneurs are the key to re-building the nation’s economy; their optimism and innovation is exactly what the country needs right now,” said Santullo. “Many participants in the Clean Tech Open are first-time entrepreneurs — they have a great idea, but could really use some assistance. This is where the Clean Tech Open steps in: we connect entrepreneurs with the expertise, talent, and funding to create a successful, sustainable business.”

Here’s a link to the Clean Tech Open Web site.

SolarBuzz, a San Francisco consultancy, is out with its list of the world’s hottest spots for solar today.

In 2008, it says, Spain become the world’s No. 1 solar nation, as its amount of PV solar installations grew 285 percent last year. Germany fell to No. 2, and the U.S. is third. (At 0.36 GW, the U.S. accounted for about 6% of the world’s solar market in 2008.) Korea, Italy and Japan round out the top 6. Europe still accounts for 82% of solar demand, it noted.

Worldwide, 5.95 GW of PV solar were installed last year, a record and a 110% increase from 2007.

Other findings:

* Solar cell production reached 6.85 GW, up from 3.44 GW in 2007. Nearly half of all solar cells (44%) came from China and Taiwan.

* Polysilicon supply increased 127%.

* The PV industry generated $37 billion in revenues, while raising $11 billion in equity and debt.

You can find a press release on the report and order one for yourself for just $3,950 at Solarbuzz.

The only stock I track on my Yahoo! homepage that fell Thursday was SunPower, the San Jose solar cell and system builder.

According to a MarketWatch story, that’s because company execs at two events this week cast doubt on first-quarter revenue and earnings due to European and North American business, the troubled global economy and the weather.

The story quotes J.P. Morgan analyst, who said, “We are concerned that the company may need to raise additional funds within the next 12 months given its balance sheet position.”

Shares of SunPower closed at $23.10, down 3.95%.