Over at Greentech Media, clean energy reporter Katie Fehrenbacher has an excellent article about the current state of play with Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) financing - "among the most successful energy-efficiency financing tools in U.S. history." Fehrenbacher notes that PACE programs, "which fund building efficiency upgrades and rooftop solar panels through loans paid off in tandem with property taxes, are closing in on $4 billion in transactions across 140,000 American homes, and have created 35,000 jobs." And the creator of PACE's original concept, Renew Financial CEO Cisco Devries, is quoted that PACE today "is entering the big leagues and bringing the benefits and requirements that come with that."

If you want to stay on top of the latest developments in cleantech, Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) is without question one of the best sources of information and analysis available. For instance, recently BNEF's "Head of Americas" analyst, Ethan Zindler, testified to the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources regarding how the United States needs to "rethink its whole approach to energy infrastructure in the years ahead, in order to position its economy to benefit from the age of the empowered consumer and of tumbling costs for solar panels and batteries." Here are a few key points, but definitely check out Zindler's full statement.

Other than fossil fuel industry executives, is there anyone out there who still isn't aware that clean energy jobs are the among fastest growing in the country -- "12 times faster than that of the rest of the U.S. economy?" So it's certainly true in terms of growth rate. Now, a new report by the Sierra Club finds that it's also true in terms of absolute numbers when compared to the fossil fuel industry - and it's not even close.

Last week, the International Energy Agency (IEA) found that world carbon dioxide emissions were flat for a third straight year in 2016, even as the global economy grew. That's good news, but clearly a lot more is going to have to happen, specifically a rapid transition from dirty to clean energy, in order to limit the damage from fossil-fueled global warming. What would such a transition look like?  Yesterday, the IEA and International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) rolled out a new report laying out the investment path to reach a "low-carbon energy system" by 2050 and a complete phaseout of fossil fuels by 2060. A few highlights from the report include:

We've previously written about how long-term forecasts of clean energy by the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) have been wildly, almost laughably low.  Now, a new study by Oil Change International and Greenpeace finds the same pattern for oil companies' forecasts of renewable energy, and also for electric vehicles. Here are a few key findings:

A brand-new study by the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) and Navigant Consulting looks at the jobs and economic impacts resulting from U.S. wind power projects through 2020, and the results are highly encouraging. Note that AWEA and Navigant assume no change in the current Production Tax Credit (PTC) policy, and also that the Clean Power Plan "will not be implemented at the national level but that some states will proceed with similar plans for reductions in CO2 emissions." With that, here are some highlights that jumped out at us.

Yesterday, Greentech Media reported reported on some exciting cleantech news: namely, that U.S. energy storage installations grew by 100% in 2016.