If you’ve ever wanted to see how a single email travels from your account to someone else’s, Google has you covered with its new “Story of Send” site.

While the site appears to mostly be a push by Google to show off its green credentials, it is still cool in that it shows the actual process of something many of us do hundreds of times a week. Email travels from our computer browser over cables to Google’s data centers. There the email is copied, scanned for viruses, and sent back out over cables to the recipient’s email account.

Google Green team member Erin Reilly writes on Google’s blog:

“We’ve included videos and photos throughout the journey so you can explore certain areas more deeply. For example, if you’re curious what data center servers look like, we’ve included some photos. Or you can watch a video to learn about how we purchase clean energy from wind farms near our data centers. And because technology doesn’t always have to be serious, you might find a vampire or two lurking around or uncover other surprises on the journey.”

Check out the “Story of Send” video below:

This sponsored post is produced by TiE.

Successes such as Instagram, has got the whole tech community up in restless excitement. At least 2 developers approached me the day the Instagram acquisition was announced. They needed to do something. If not here, surrounded by the startup frenzy in the Silicon Valley, then where else, they said.

This is the right time, the right economy, the right place and everyone wants a ride on the startup train. And TiEcon is the biggest Entrepreneurship Conference, which has something for everyone – from Entrepreneurs, Investors, to Engineers, Recruiters.

Entrepreneurship – What it takes

The rosy successes and all – there is a lot that goes into entrepreneurship. What people to hire, who to pick for your founding team, who to partner with, when & how much to take to market, when to raise funds and if you are lucky like Instagram & many others before, when & whether to sell. Do you have what it takes? The Entrepreneurship panel at this year’s TiEcon , gives you food for thought.

Entrepreneurship for Women

Entrepreneurship, is perfect for women! And here is why. For one, it destroys the myth of the Glass ceiling (A woman Entrepreneur – To be or not to be) exposes Gender socialization (Deborah Gruelfeld at TiEcon on Mastering the Body Language for Power and Influence) and only your technical, social and business skills are the ones on the line. There is no limit to your creativity.

What goes into making your startup a success

If you are on the entrepreneurial track, there are many things that go into making your startup, a success. Whether to bootstrap, or take money from Angels or VCs or How to take your product to market? A startup is about a team with the perfect complementary skill-sets. So how do you build your winning team or judge whether you are part of that winning startup team. Once your startup is off the ground, does it have the belts and buckles in place for the journey up the hockey stick curve? And well – if you are young, right out of or in school/college and wondering how you could start a company– there is the Young entrepreneur’s guide to getting started doling out advice on it, at the TiE Youth Forum.

For the Geeks in us

‘What if Im not an entrepreneur’, ‘What if I love coding and and, building things?’ Well, this year’s TiEcon fuels the developer’s passion and knowledge as well.

The Social Panels talk about the next frontiers in Social Gaming, how internet commerce has been impacted by Social media, and what the emerging trends and opportunities are in the Social space.

The Mobile panels talk about the latest mobile trends and opportunities. You could learn best practices from mobile companies for deployments in the enterprise space.

The Energy panels talk about the upcoming applications and emerging trends in energy fields, the hottest opportunities in the cleantech area, and the evolution of energy efficiency in the automobile sector.

The Life Sciences Panels talk about Medical device innovation in emerging markets, and opportunities in Mobile health.

The Cloud Panels talk about how Cloud & SAAS are being used in the real-world, emerging trends and opportunities in Cloud and how Consumerization in the Enterprise is driving opportunities in the Cloud.

What the Stars foretell

And that’s not all. This year’s TiEcon 2012 (May 18 – 19, 2012) also has some amazing Keynotes from Dr. Vishal Sikka, Head of Technology at SAP and Carlos Dominguez, Cisco SVP. In the Breakthrough Thinkers keynote, Dr. Deepak Chopra, talks about Prosperity and Leadership. And finally, Sam Pitroda tells the story of how innovation was ignited in India, which has led to the Internet revolution there and the new booming economy that we see there today.

And this isn’t all. At the TiEcon Expo you will find 100 or so startups displaying their latest products and innovations. And in the corridors of the convention, you will find endless opportunities to Network and talk to the smartest of entrepreneurs, investors, passionate developers who are on the cutting edge of technology. A boundless, priceless opportunity to connect, network, learn, grow and prosper…

We already know that April was a great month for Toyota Prius hybrid sales, but it turns out that the first quarter of the year produced stellar sales numbers for hybrids in general, as well as plug-in electric cars.

More than 100,000 hybrids and plug-in cars — 113,457 — were sold in January, February, and March combined, against roughly 79,000 in the same period of 2011.

The vast bulk of those sales — 106,207 — were hybrids, of course.

The hybrid sales included not only much higher sales of the Toyota Prius, now a lineup of three models plus a plug-in, but also Buicks and Chevrolets fitted with the General Motors eAssist mild-hybrid system.

All varieties of plug-in cars accounted for 7,250, according to data compiled by industry trade journal Automotive News.

Plug-in sales totaled about 17,000 units for all of 2011, the bulk of them either the Nissan Leaf battery-electric vehicle or the Chevrolet Volt range-extended electric car.

For 2012, the strong new plug-in entrant is the 2012 Toyota Prius Plug-In Hybrid, whose April sales beat those of both the Volt and the Leaf.

Analysts expect perhaps 30,000 to 40,000 plug-in cars to be sold in the U.S. during calendar 2012, against perhaps 400,000-plus conventional hybrids.

As always, the bulk of the hybrid sales will come from Toyota.

This article originally appeared on Green Car Reports, one of VentureBeat’s editorial partners. Image via Green Car Reports.

PowerTrekk first debuted at the Consumer Electronics Show 2012. The small device can charge cell phones, MP3 players, and eventually laptops with the addition of mere tap water. The key is a special reaction that produces hydrogen on demand, which is stored in a hydrogen fuel cell battery. All you have to do is pour water into the device to start charging whatever your heart desires (so long as it can be charged with a USB cable).

The water is confined to a PowerPukk, a small disc that holds the powder and can be sealed up after the water is added. That way you don’t accidentally spill water all over the iPhone you’re trying to charge. The PowerTrekk charger is currently available in parts of Europe and slowly making its way to the U.S., retailing for $230. By the end of this summer, you’ll be able to buy them at REI stores across the United States.

The science behind PowerTrekk was developed by Michael Lefenfeld of Signa Chemistry. Lefenfeld’s grandfather challenged him to create a bathroom air freshener, never realizing he’d wind up with reaction that could produce hydrogen.

“My grandfather was a vain man who had stopped smoking in later years, so he no longer carried matches around. He wanted an air freshener for the restroom,” said Lefenfeld in an interview with VentureBeat.

He used his chemistry background to develop a metallic powder-based air freshener that could go in the toilet. The powder had one key problem though: When combined with water it would ignite. After some tinkering, Lefenfeld removed the combustible aspect of the reaction, but was pleased to discover he could now create hydrogen on demand.

“I started working on the science side, I found that the material would react with water and produce hydrogen in a controllable reaction,” Lefenfeld said.

Fuel cell company MyFC got wind of Lefenfeld’s discovering and saw the great potential in creating hydrogen by mixing water and small amounts of the metal powder. The company realized it could use the hydrogen in a fuel-cell battery set up and wound up developing PowerTrekk.

Signa Chemistry grew out of the air freshener project, becoming a full-fledged business that specializes in stabilizing reactive metals. Other companies took notice of Lefenfeld’s work for consumer applications.

Lefenfeld’s hydrogen-producing powder is also used in Pedego electric bicycles. He hopes that his chemical discovery will be used to replace “noisy gas generators,” and will push forward an overall trend of greener energy solutions.

Other fuel-cell chargers have popped up in the last few years, most notably the Horizon MinPak. The device uses a special cartridge to create hydrogen, but isn’t mass marketed. You can only purchase the MiniPak from Horizon’s website and you must inquire for pricing information.

As electric vehicles gain popularity in the automobile market, EV charging station manufacturer Coulomb Technologies has raised $47.5 million in fourth-round funding.

With Tesla, Nissan, Chevy, and Toyota pushing out economy to down-right luxury electric cars, more people are shunning gasoline in favor of electric models. For EVs to be practical and more widely adopted, there needs to be a strong infrastructure of charging stations for people to fill up their electric tanks. Coulomb Technologies made its way in the green tech market by providing outdoor charging stations for EV owners on the go.

Coulomb Technologies boasts 6,000 charging stations in 14 countries, in North America, Europe, and Australia. Every station is connected to a network called ChargePoint, helping electric car drivers find them on mobile apps and the ChargePoint website. Each station is also capable of sending text message alerts to a driver to tell them when their car is juiced up.

The company has partnered with Nissan to be the official charging stations for it Leaf electric cars. Coulomb Technologies has also worked with BMW, Ford, GM, and Fisker Automotive to create charging station support for their electric offers.

Braemar Energy Ventures and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers led the funding round, joined by Toyota Tsusho Corporation and existing investor Rho Ventures. Voyager Capital, Siemens Venture Capital GmbH, Harbor Pacific Capital Partners, and Hartford Ventures also participated.

Better Place is one of Coulomb Technologies biggest competitors these days, because it offers an alternative chargingapproach for EV drivers. Better Place lets you swap your depleted battery for a fully charged one, a process that takes significantly less time than completely recharging a battery. EvoCharge and OpConnect also provide commercial EV charging stations.

“These funds enable us to provide cloud-based solutions to cities, retailers, employers, parking operators and property managers that will drive the adoption of clean transportation,” said Pat Romano, chief executive officer of Coulomb Technologies in a statement.

Coulomb Technologies is based in Campbell, Calif., in Silicon Valley. The company has raised a total of $80.3 million, including this new round.

Electric vehicles charging image via Flickr user Travis Sweet

For the private sector, making money isn’t enough anymore.

It’s not enough for Walmart to have a market capitalization of $200 billion — more than the GDP of 147 countries worldwide. Or for Nokia to sell 420 million new phones in a year — increasingly to developing countries in Africa and Asia. People expect global brands to use their vast resources to make the world a better place. Now more than ever, consumers are making decisions based on companies’ social agendas — and market share hangs in the balance.

While Walmart supports everything from women’s empowerment to disaster relief through its foundation, the public is expecting even more from major tech companies like Google, Facebook and Amazon. Not only do they have some of the most visible wealth, they’re also intrinsically innovative — capable of solving some of the world’s hardest engineering problems and creating sustainable solutions.

As investment in social enterprise becomes more common, major brands and venture capitalists alike are learning how to make a difference without sacrificing their profit-driven missions.

Nokia is a prime example. With 51% of the mobile market share in Africa, it’s one of the continent’s most recognizable brands. Lacking televisions, computers — and, in some cases, electricity — many people throughout Africa access information and communicate solely through their mobile phones. Nokia has not squandered this opportunity — it’s using it to extend affordable, life-changing services and tools to African farmers.

Through its Ovi application store, Nokia offers Ovi Life Tools, an SMS-based app available on extremely cost-effective handsets that provides farmers with timely weather and agricultural information to optimize preparedness and crop yields. Nokia partners with organizations like the Kenya Meteorological Department, agriculture NGOs, and more to serve up tips, techniques and market stats that could help them prevent food shortages and get the best prices for their goods. Life Tools is also being used to deliver lesson plans to teachers, learning games to kids and accounting services for small businesses.

Facilitating connections between people and expanding access to global networks is one major way tech companies are doing their part for social good. Both Twitter and Facebook exploded last year during Arab Spring, becoming primary platforms for coordinating rallies, organizing protests and disseminating news and information quickly among millions of young people. Nine in 10 Egyptians and Tunisians surveyed by the Dubai School of Government said they organized or found out about protests on Facebook alone.

These social networks found themselves playing huge roles in historical democratic movements, and gaining users by the millions. The number of Facebook users in the region jumped by 30%, and tweets from Egypt jumped from 2,300 to 230,000 in the week before Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak’s resignation. It might seem counter-intuitive for platforms essentially created for entertainment to be playing key roles in geopolitical events, but in this case, revolution was also good for business.

Like Twitter and Facebook, Google also provides tools that have helped people around the world communicate, organize, and be more productive. But its made a more concerted effort to not just promote social good, it’s investing in it too. In 2009, it created Google Ventures, a venture capital investment arm that funds for-profit tech startups. And while its investments are financially motivated, many of the companies it backs have strong social missions.

All six of Google Ventures’ energy-related portfolio companies are pursuing clean, efficient and renewable energy solutions. They include Nest, maker of the world’s first learning thermostat that helps users become more energy-efficient, and attracted a lot of buzz for its sleek, Apple-esque design. Its life science portfolio is stacked with companies pursuing innovative cancer therapies and genetic diagnostic systems to make medicine simpler, leaner and more affordable. And even some of its mobile picks have a social bent, like Miso Media, which creates entertaining educational software to make learning fun and easy.

Google may be more overtly philanthropic through Google.org — it gave away $115 million in grants and over $1 billion in in-kind support to nonprofit and educational orgs last year alone — but, in many ways, Google Ventures is more indicative of the future of tech brands and social enterprise. It combines doing good with doing well, a hard balance to strike.

That said, it’s a balance pursued not only by big names in tech, but also by the VCs trying to find and fund the next generation of big names. More and more, venture capital firms in Silicon Valley are seeking out socially-minded startups that have the potential to make money and a positive impact at the same time.

Marquee firms like Khosla and Kleiner Perkins are investing heavily in cleantech startups like Ecomotors, Stion, Sundrop Fuels, and Fisker Automotive. Kleiner even launched what it calls its Green Growth Fund to support later-stage greentech ventures that have gained traction and have the potential to slow climate change.

On the far end of the spectrum, you have firms like social enterprise incubator Hub Ventures and Omidyar Network, which exclusively seek out companies looking to do good in the world. The latter not only gives grants to a slew of nonprofits, it funds for-profit microfinance organizations and consumer tech companies focused on connection building and information sharing like Digg, Meetup and Wikia.

Across the board, Silicon Valley seems to be waking up to the reality that having resources and brainpower obligates them to do more for the rest of the world. With consumer eyes fixed on which brands do what — whether it’s Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg giving $100 million to Newark Public Schools, or Amazon launching an environmentally-friendly packaging initiative — it’s more important than ever for tech companies to do their part.

That said, if recent examples prove anything, it’s that making money and a difference don’t have to be mutually exclusive.

Finding these ideas that sit at the intersection of impact and profitability is what the Grand Challenges Exploration program is all about. A grant program funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the program is looking for bold, creative ideas to solve the biggest problems in global health. People from all disciplines, age groups and professions are encouraged to apply. In the past, the program has seen groundbreaking submissions come from unexpected sources, from astrophysicists to mechanical engineers to students.

The deadline for submissions to this year’s program is May 15. Successful projects will win support and have the chance to land $1 million in additional funding to bring their ideas to fruition — and maybe even change the world!

The other day I was walking through San Francisco’s Westfield Mall when I came across an EcoATM. I had never seen one before, but after figuring out what the ATM did, I wished I had been carrying around one of my many old dumb phones that will never see the light of day again. The kiosk prompted me to insert a defunct electronic device into its deposit slot. The screen said it would scan my old hunk of plastic and metal, tell me its second-market value, and ask if I wanted money in exchange for saying a final goodbye to my old device.

“We read a report from Nokia that three percent of cell phones were being recycled and felt that needed to change. So we thought, how can we make it really easy and rewarding?” said EcoATM chief executive Tom Tullie in an interview with VentureBeat.

EcoATM knows that most people want to keep e-waste out of landfills but also don’t want to part with their $500 phone and get nothing in return. In order to get more people to recycle their electronics, the company will make it worth your while to part with your old device by giving you money or discounts on new phones. If you feel really, really nice, you can donate the cash to charity.

The idea of device-recycling ATMs has gained a lot of attention from investors. Coinstar even dropped some cash into EcoATM’s bucket with an investment two years ago. EcoATM also won the Best Clean Tech Startup Crunchies Award for 2011. Investor Randy Hawks of Claremont Creek Ventures is clearly impressed.

“They’ve got a great business model, [with the] idea of having kiosks that are convenient for consumers. They are constantly updating their price estimates for devices, so you know you are getting the best pricing for your 18 month-old Android phone,” said Hawks during a phone call with VentureBeat. “They have a stellar management team and have a great way to monetize the value of old devices.”

Claremont Creek Ventures, Coinstar, and TAO Ventures led the $17 million second-round funding, with PI Holdings, Moore Venture Partners, AKS Capital, and angel investor Koh Boon Hwee participating. The money will go towards a national rollout of EcoATM kiosks.

“[There are] 50 units in the field now, and we plan to deploy nationwide. We will be buying kiosks to deploy and building our infrastructure of sales and marketing,” said Tullie about how the company will use the funding.

EcoATM unveiled its kiosks at DEMO Spring in 2011 and has since raised a disclosed total of $31.4 million in funding. The company is based in San Diego, Calif.

Just in time for Earth Day, Dutch electronics company Philips is unveiling a new super energy-efficient light bulb today with a shelf life that should last about 25 years.

The catch? It costs about $60, but Philips is said to have forged deals with some stores to bring that cost down to about $20, according to the BBC. Still, that price might be too high for consumers, as VentureBeat has previously pointed out.

The new bulbs are made of light emitting diodes (LEDs) that are more energy-efficient than traditional incandescent bulbs, and have same color quality as standard bulbs. LEDs are typically found in TVs, computers, and car headlights.

Philip’s new bulb won the Bright Tomorrow competition last year from the U.S. Department of Energy, which asked companies to create an affordable energy-efficient alternative to the standard 60-watt incandescent light bulb. Philip was an easy winner, as the only entrant in the competition.

Even at the cheaper $20 price, the new LED lights face heavy competition from the much cheaper  compact fluorescent bulbs.

The new bulbs hit retail store shelves today.

Photo via Philips

“Most buildings don’t have a good way to look at all their systems holistically,” Bartlett told me. “It’s like buying a car without a dashboard to tell you when the oil is running low or the engine is running too hot.” Buildings account for 42 percent of the worlds energy use and emit more carbon dioxide than cars.

With the availability of cheap, wireless sensors, it’s now possible to measure nearly every facet of a building’s energy use. And what Barlett found in L.A. was striking. “You had one air unit that was blowing full on hot air, and another that was blowing full on cold air, working against each other, in the same building.”

Data, data everywhere, now let’s stop and think. That’s the big data model that Bartlett is hoping IBM can impart. “For a public company, an upfront investment in energy improvement can be a hard sell. It may have a long term benefits, but they answer to the market every quarter.”

Bartlett’s message is simple. “We’re not asking you to rebuild anything. Let’s look at what you’re working with and see how we can save money through efficiency. We are no longer held back by tech. Most buildings are drowning in data.” Energy typically accounts for 30 percent of a buildings annual costs, so savings through sustainability can have a big impact on a company’s bottom line.

The average consumer might relate to Bartlett’s work by thinking of a product like the Nest learning thermostat. IBM is working with big corporate clients, but the same principles apply. Visualizing data, layering on machine learning that tracks user behavior, and making an intuitive interface that non-technical experts can grasp when dealing with heating or cooling their homes or offices.

Bartlett specializes in what he calls miniature cities, like Tulan University, which is being completely rebuilt after the flooding of Hurricane Katrina, is working with Bartlett to create smart systems from the beginning that will lay a foundation for a more efficient, environmentally friendly campus.

But computers are only part of the story. “We always looking for ways to get people involved,” says Bartlett. At the LA School Dsitrict, IBM created a smartphone app, in partnership with the startup Citysourced, that lets students and teachers photograph, geotag and report things like cracked windows or broken air conditioners. “Crowdsourcing is a powerful way to augment our data. I always say, when it comes to new gathering information, humans are the smartest sensors.”

Photo by Ben Popper

This weekend people will unplug their electronics, get out of their houses, and ride their bikes to a tree planting Earth Day celebration, hoping to make up for all those times they sent a water bottle to a landfill or poured paint down their drains. But if the thought of going outside and interacting with nature makes you shudder, you can do your eco-friendly part from the comfort of your couch.

Recyclebank, a company that rewards people for doing earth-friendly things like recycling and planting trees, put together an infographic of social actions you can take to be more eco-friendly.

If every one of Facebook’s 845 million users cut one minute off their shower time, the amount of water saved would fill 1.1 million Olympic-sized swimming pools. If every person on Twitter turned their computer off for one hour, the energy and carbon emissions savings would be equivalent to taking 9,128 cars off the road each year.

Given Pinterest’s ever-growing popularity, if every person on Pinterest pinned a green tip to one of their boards, there would be 12 million green tips pinned every month. This tip may be the least energy-saving of the bunch, but spreading the green love around can’t hurt.

Whether you celebrate Earth Day indoors or out, you can reduce your carbon footprint by shutting down your computer, taking a shorter shower, and recycling those water bottles already.

Click on the infographic to enlarge.

Holding leaf and Earth image via Shutterstock

The Chevy Volt is unique among electric cars because it runs on two sources of energy. You have an electric source – a battery – that allows you to drive gas-free for an EPA-estimated 35 miles. And there’s also an onboard gas generator that produces electricity so you can go farther. So if you want to drive using only electricity, you can. If you want to drive using electricity and gas, you can do that, too. Feeling all charged up? Check out what this current Chevy Volt driver has to say about his unique driving lifestyle:

Adam Meltzer’s life is anything but predictable. With three jobs and plenty of running around to do come the weekend, he says he relies on his Volt to keep him moving and motivated. “In Los Angeles you spend a lot of time in your car. If your car is not comfortable, it’s like working in an uncomfortable desk chair with a bad computer screen,” he says. Luckily, he loves his ride. “Before this car I didn’t even like driving. It was something I had to do.”

Meltzer says his affinity for the Volt has everything to do with how the car appeals to his environmentally conscious side. “The Volt for me has been an opportunity to step into a luxury car, not at a luxury price, and at the same time contribute to the ongoing conversation about how to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from cars and trucks in the world.” In fact, Meltzer feels like he is making a statement every time he gets behind the wheel. “When I get in front of large SUVs on the road and they see the back of my car, maybe they’ll think for a minute: ‘Why am driving this out-of-date gas guzzler?’ he says.

The Volt has definitely made the term “gas guzzler” a thing of the past for Meltzer. “I get about 175 mpg, and drive mostly electric,” he says. His favorite place to charge up is at the Electric Lodge Arts and Environment Center in Venice. “It’s 20 miles from my house. I top off my battery, and I can pretty much get anywhere else in Los Angeles,” he says. Overall, Meltzer highly recommends the Volt to people every chance he gets. “It’s modern, sleek, technologically sophisticated, and most importantly, doesn’t pollute the air [when in electric mode].”

Volt is available to order at participating dealers.

Have you become a Volt convert, too? Tell your amazing story here.

Environmental activist group Greenpeace released a report today examining how energy-efficient and clean cloud computing really is. The group called out Apple and Amazon as having some of the dirtiest clouds in the industry.

The report, titled “How Clean is Your Cloud?“, gave each company a score based on the energy efficiency of its data centers and the type of energy used to power them. Apple received low marks, getting a D in energy transparency and an F in “infrastructure sitting.” Amazon got nearly straight Fs across the board. Google had the highest scores, with an A in renewables and advocacy, and a B in energy efficiency.

Greenpeace’s report noted that understanding the true efficiency of so-called green data centers is quite hard and that metrics that many companies rely on, such as Power Usage Effectiveness, are ineffective. This is in largely because many companies aren’t willing to disclose their data center’s energy usage.

One interesting tidbit from the report: Greenpeace says that “If the cloud were a country, it would have the fifth largest electricity demand in the world,” based on the fact that in 2007, the combined electricity demand of the cloud was approximately 623 billion kWh. The cloud apparently beats out India, Germany, and Canada as far as energy demand goes.

The report accompanies a new ad campaign aimed at cleaning up the cloud and naming Apple, Microsoft, and Amazon offenders.

After the report was released, Apple countered, saying that Greenpeace’s numbers were flawed, All Things D reported. A footnote in the Greenpeace report says that Apple and Amazon were given the data for review and both companies told Greenpeace the data was incorrect, but neither offered Greenpeace alternative numbers.

Interestingly, Apple reported today that its Maiden, North Carolina data center operates with much less electricity than Greenpeace reported. Greenpeace said that the facility had an estimated energy demand of 100 megawatts. Apple said it only needed 20 megawatts of electricity when running at full power.

Apple has prided itself on its green North Carolina data center and is building the largest privately owned solar array to power the facility.

Smoke stack image via Shutterstock

IPE, which is based in Beijing, will look into one of Apple’s printed circuit-board factories to measure pollutants and their effect on the environment. The current audit is only a pilot, however, and is not an indication of further joint investigations between Apple and IPE. The organization will post the results of the audit on its website, and hopes they will open the door to further audits with other Apple suppliers.

This is not the first time IPE has looked into Apple. In late 2011, the organization released a series of reports called, “The Other Side of Apple,” (PDF) detailing a few of Apple’s suppliers and their offenses against the environment.

Recently, Apple allowed the Fair Labor Association to audit its Foxconn factories in China. Foxconn had been accused of providing poor working conditions to its factory workers. Many employees complained about long hours, little pay for overtime, and small dormitories. A rash of recent worker suicides (related to Microsoft’s Xbox assembly lines) that prompted Foxconn to install suicide nets on its buildings drew additional scrutiny. The FLA performed a thorough audit in January 2012, concluding that Apple was, in fact, violating some of the FLA’s standards, as well as Chinese law. Apple and Foxconn have since agreed to make necessary changes.

via Macworld; Apple tree photo via Shutterstock

It’s become a tired pattern these days: create an innovative product, then sit back and watch the patent lawsuits pile up. That’s what happened to the smart thermostat maker Nest, which wowed the world with its gorgeous web-connected device in October, but later faced a patent infringement lawsuit from Honeywell.

Today, Nest officially denied Honeywell’s claims (PDF filing), and made it clear it wasn’t going to let up without a fight. The company has brought on former Apple chief patent counsel Richard Lutton Jr. as a vice president and general counsel, who has been advising it for several months.

Nest Labs is no ordinary startup — it was founded by Tony Fadell and Matt Rogers, two people who were instrumental in developing Apple’s iPod, and it has the investor backing of Kleiner Perkins, Google Ventures, and other heavyweights. Fadell tells The Verge that investors are “totally behind us,” which means Nest is better equipped than most small companies to take on industry heavyweights like Honeywell.

“This lawsuit is a bald effort by Honeywell to inhibit competition from a promising new company and product in a field that Honeywell has dominated from decades,” Nest wrote in today’s court filing. “Instead of countering product innovation with its own new products, Honeywell has a track record of responding to innovation with lawsuits and overextended claims of intellectual property violations.”

Honeywell claims Nest is infringing on seven of its patents, but Nest refutes that in today’s filing. The company points out that many of the patents require a mechanical hardware like a potentiometer, which the Nest doesn’t have, and it says many of Honeywells patents are invalid since they were never disclosed to the Patent Office.

“We’d be more than happy to have a professional discussion with Honeywell to understand what their issues really are” Fadell tells the Verge, adding that Nest is open to multiple options “if there’s something that makes business sense to our investors, our employees, and our consumers.”

Electricity infrastructure provider ABB, often described as one of the “Four horsemen of the power grid“, just boosted its water business by leading a $6 million investment in water infrastructure monitoring startup TaKaDu.

“Water is a key focus area for ABB and this investment will further strengthen our power and automation offering for the sector,” said Franz-Josef Mengede, head of ABB’s Power Generation business.

Lux Research published a report last year which estimated the size of the water infrastructure repair (drinking and waste water) market at $17 billion a year worldwide. Cities lose large amounts of water through leaks and inefficiencies. Water companies call this  “non-revenue water”, since they treat the water but cannot charge for it since it does not reach customers.

“A city such as London loses 30 percent of its water; over 600 million cubic meters, ” said  TaKaDu’s VP of Marketing Guy Horowitz. “A cubic meter can cost anywhere from a $0.20 to a few dollars, so we’re talking about hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions, per day. Indirect losses such as road and property damage, traffic interruptions, paying detection crews and repair crews, and in many cases regulatory fines, amount to hundreds of millions per year in large cities. ” The situation is much worse in the developing world where water that could supply 200 million people is lost every year.

TaKaDu offers water infrastructure monitoring as a service. The company’s software links to existing sensors in the water network like flow meters, quality sensors and pressure meters. Geographical information system (GIS) data, maintenance records, access control records and seasonal fluctuation data is also used. All this data is crunched to detect problems like leaks,  inefficiencies and faults in the water network.  Thames Water, which runs London’s water system, detects leaks up to 9 days earlier with TaKaDu than with its previous system.

TaKaDu uses various data mining techniques to identify problems. One example algorithm is cross-site correlation that matches up neighborhoods which display common water consumption behavior over time.  ”Assume your neighborhood’s consumption goes up by 10 percent while the ‘similar’ neighborhood does not, ” explains Horowitz. “That may indicate a problem, while if both increase it may indicate a warm day, or some other benign explanation.”

In general, the water management business makes minimal usage of IT and is grappling with outdated and decaying infrastructure. Leaks were often only detected manually or by comparing current system behavior to historical behavior, such as last year’s pipe pressure compared to this year. Having an operator inspect a pipe manually inch by inch is still a common practice to track down a local leak, as is replacing an entire pipe. Even small water companies have hundreds of miles of piping. A town of 50,000 typically has more than 200 miles of wastewater pipe alone.

TaKaDu was founded in 2009, has 25 employees and  is based in Yahud, Israel. The new $6 million investment was led by ABB Technology Ventures, ABB’s venture capital arm and also included existing TaKaDu investors Emerald Technology Ventures, Gemini Israel Funds and Giza Venture Capital. TaKaDu raised $3.5 million in 2009.

Sefaira just landed a $10.8 investment to harness cloud computing to crunch large amounts of building design data, allowing it to perform in minutes building design analyses which previously took days or weeks.

Designing zero-energy buildings, or retrofitting old ones, isn’t easy. Each combination of building strategies like renewable energy usage, insulation type and window design results in different energy, water and carbon consumption benefits and construction and operating costs. Building designers need to quantify and compare the various options.

The green building industry currently often uses static building codes and rules-of-thumb to make design decisions. Sefaira’s data-driven green building design takes building codes, location-specific building data like weather, renewable energy availability, and a sophisticated building physics engine in order to assess various building strategies. Sefaira won the Green Building Innovation of the Year award at London’s Ecobuild 2011.

Sefaira’s business model is Software-as-a-Service (SaaS). Customers include architectural firms, construction companies, retrofit assessors and utility companies. Autodesk is among the company’s competitors.

Sefaira was founded in 2009, is based in London and New York and has 30 employees. The $10.8 million funding round was led by Braemar Energy Ventures in partnership with Amsterdam-based Chrysalix SET and UK-based Hermes GPE.

Formerly known as Powergetics, Stem emerged from stealth today to help businesses save energy. Stem uses a meter-like device that learns how a building uses energy over time and can predict an entire year’s worth of power use.

With smart meters, LED lighting, and sophisticated cooling and heating systems, many large companies –such as Apple and Google — have made their facilities greener. But even smaller companies that can’t afford fancy systems can cut down on their energy consumption.

Stem’s device plugs into a building’s power system and quietly learns about all the energy spikes and lulls that occur. Over time, it can predict how much energy the building will use and make adjustments to its power consumption. The tracking device also includes a lithium-ion battery, which stores energy for later use. For example, a retail store uses a lot of energy during business hours, but overnight only a few devices and lights are left running. Overnight, the battery can store energy and use it during the day when a power spike occurs.

“Our energy storage device can moderate or change energy use to reduce [a company's] energy bill without asking them to compromise,” said Stem’s chief executive Brian Thompson in an interview with VentureBeat.

All the data the device collects is displayed in an analytics software program, so business managers can make decisions about whether to leave certain lights on, or how running an extra server impacts their energy bill.

Thompson tells me his service is revolutionary because it couldn’t be done three to four years ago. Now we have the computing power and large energy batteries to make this technology possible, he said.

Stem occupies the same space as BuildingIQ and EPS, which provide similar energy analytics and optimization services.

Stem raised a $10.2 million round of funding last fall from Angeleno Group and Greener Capital. The company is based in San Francisco, Calif.

Power meter image via Shutterstock

If simple common sense can’t curb energy usage, perhaps a little peer pressure from Facebook friends will do the trick.

Facebook has joined forces with energy efficiency startup Opower and the National Resources Defense Council to release a social energy application that encourages people to track, and ultimately reduce, energy use in the home.

The simple application invites Facebook members to log in and automatically track monthly energy use by connecting the app to their utility account. The friendly, non-threatening conservation-themed app encourages competition, highlights rankings among friends and groups, provides national benchmarks, and offers energy-saving tips.

“People can connect their utility account directly to the app to track progress and share energy saving accomplishments with friends,” Facebook said in a memo on the news.

The social network estimates that it can reach 20 million households at launch, although not all utility providers (SDG&E, for one) are supported.

Facebook’s app partner, Opower, has been in the business of consumerizing energy use data since 2007. The Arlington, VA-based company has raised upwards of $65 million in venture funding, including a $50 million round from Accel and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers.

We appreciate the gesture, but we’re not yet sold on the idea of Facebook and gamification tactics making a sizable dent in energy use. We’re open to being proven wrong, of course. What say you, Dear Reader?

Photo credit: Jake Mates/Flickr

In recent years several startups have emerged to create fuel out of plant material, all hoping to lure people away from gasoline made from crude oil. Solazyme, Algae.tec, and Sapphire Energy all dominate the space, trying to edge out not only each other but oil companies as well.

All three companies covert algae into a petroleum replacement, one that can work with the traditional cars we already have on the road.

Creating green crude, a substance that can be converted into jet fuel, automobile gasoline, and diesel, is a process that has been around for several years. However, Sapphire’s recent investment proves that the technology is still going strong and that we could all very well be driving around on algae-based gas sometime soon. Sapphire has gained a lot of traction by signing deals with Continental Airlines and Boeing to test out algae-based jet fuel, and the company provided fuel for an algae powered Toyota Prius.

“It has never been more critical to invest in a long-term energy solution in order to wean us off of foreign oil, improve our nation’s energy security, and provide jobs,” said Cynthia Warner, president of Sapphire Energy in an statement to VentureBeat, ”Due to the significant funding we announced today, as well as government support, Sapphire Energy is on track to commercialize algae-based fuels within this decade.”

Seed company Monsanto was one of the investors in this round and the company has been using Sapphire’s technology for its own genetic modification needs. Arrowpoint Partners and other private undisclosed investors led the round as well. This $144 million third round brings the green tech company’s total to $300 million.

The funding will be used to expand its Green Crude farm in New Mexico, an algae energy demonstration plant. Sapphire expects the plant to produce 1.5 million gallons of green crude by 2014.

Sapphire Energy was found in 2007 and has been funded by Arch Venture Partners, the Department of Energy, the Department of Agriculture, the Wellcome Trust, Venrock, and Bill Gates’ Cascade Investment.

FRX Polymers raises $26.7M for eco-friendly plastics

In the green-tech arena, FRX Polymers announced a $26.7 million second round of funding on Friday. The company has made an environmentally friendly plastic that is flame retardant for consumer electronics and other applications. DB Masdar Fund and BASF Venture Capital led the round.

Everything.me gets money for better mobile search

Mobile search app Everything.me raised $3.5 million in funding from Horizons Ventures. The company recently pivoted and offers an app that searches multiple places for information about a certain topic. For instance, if you search for country singer Taylor Swift, Everything.me would grab YouTube videos of her, her Wikipedia page, tweets, and IMDB information.

Learnzillion secures $2.4 million for video learning

Learnzillion announced a $2.4 million first round of funding on Friday. The company hosts short video lessons for students and teachers to improve math and literacy skills. DC Community Ventures led the round, with participation from O’Reilly Alpha Tech Ventures, Learn Capital Venture Partners, NewSchools Venture Fund, Citybridge Foundation, ULU Ventures, and Calvert Social Investment Fund

Violin Memory grabs new funding for flash memory

Violin Memory has raised $50 million in a fourth round of funding at a market value of more than $800 million, the company said today. The company makes flash memory arrays that are used in enterprise data center servers. Toshiba, Juniper Networks, SAP Ventures, and Highland Capital all participated in the funding.

If you’ve got funding news to report, send it our way at tips@venturebeat.com.

Plastic bottles image via Shutterstock

Energy management systems startup Vigilent has raised a $6.7 million round of funding to optimize energy efficiency at data centers using the power of “big data,” the company announced Tuesday morning.

One huge problem companies struggle with when it comes to data center management is how much power those facilities use. Google spotlighted its own energy usage at data centers, claiming its centers are 50 percent more efficient than other companies’. But not everyone has the resources to design and implement innovative cooling technologies.

That’s where Vigilent comes in. The company deploys wireless sensors in data centers and crunches all kinds of numbers to find ways to optimize energy efficiency. Vigilent negotiates a certain temperature with the company running the data center and works to come up with the best possible way to keep the center at that temperature.

Vigilent CEO Mark Housley told me there is an exceptional amount of energy being wasted at these centers. Some of that blame goes to poor design, while some goes to lack of innovation in cooling tech. “The companies that sell air conditioners should be ashamed of what they’re selling,” Housley said.

Housley also explained that Vigilent’s software automates the process of cooling and is smart enough to predict events. For example, during the Super Bowl, it would know to deploy more cooling than usual because of the increased heat generated by busy servers.

Vigilent’s first major round of funding was led by Accel Partners and the firm’s new “Big Data” fund. The company also attracted investments from angels Gaurav Garg and Peter Wagner.

“With proven technology and a significant track record with Fortune 50 companies, we believe Vigilent will have a transformative effect on energy efficiency in critical building infrastructure,” said Rich Wong, Partner at Accel Partners, in a statement.

El Cerrito, Calif.-based Vigilent has 90 deployments throughout the U.S., Canada, and Japan, with customers including Verizon, Akamai, and Informatica. Housley said the company is profitable and will likely double its revenues in 2012. The new funds will be used to move into new regions and expand its workforce.

Chilly data center: Supri Suharjoto/Shutterstock

Tucked away in Douglas County, Georgia, next to a Six Flags theme park, lies one of Google’s data centers. The facility houses   unknown number of servers that deliver Google search, Maps, and Gmail. All these servers are powered by up to 250 kilowatts of electricity and can generate high levels of heat, which Google has worked hard to combat. In the Douglas County facility specifically, servers are kept cool with recycled, undrinkable water from the surrounding area.

Since 2008, the search-engine giant has been releasing these annual reports to tell us all how Google keeps its energy footprint low. Each report includes the power-usage effectiveness (PUE) of the collective Google data centers. Google defines PUE as “a ratio of the total power used to run a data center to the amount used to power the servers.”

Using Energy Star data, Google points out that other data centers use equal amounts of energy to power servers and the facilities that house them. In this case, those other data centers have a PUE is 2.0, meaning that one watt of energy goes to running the servers and one watt powers the data center’s lights and cooling systems. Google has shifted that ratio, claiming to have a 12 month average PUE of 1.14 in 2011, down from 1.16 in 2010. Not exactly 50 percent less energy than its competitors, but close.

Google employes a few tactics to keep its PUE low. It keeps its cold aisle temperatures around 80 degrees to save energy and uses outside air to cool its data centers, instead of powered cooling systems. Google has also built its own energy-saving servers.

You can read Google’s full data center energy report, along with reports from previous years, here.

Server room image via Shutterstock

The Chevy Volt* is unique among electric cars because it runs on two sources of energy. You have an electric source – a battery – that allows you to drive gas-free for an EPA–estimated 35 miles. And there’s also an onboard gas generator that produces electricity so you can go farther. So if you want to drive using only electricity, you can. If you want to drive using electricity and gas, you can do that, too. Hear what one proud Volt owner had to say about how the electric car has reinvented his driving experience.

Meet Billy Bell of Orlando, Florida. One might think he loves his Volt because he’s driven more than 1,600 miles without gassing up. That’s because through regular charging and keeping commutes within the EPA-estimated 35 miles per charge, Volt drivers are able to achieve extraordinarily low gas usage.

But for Bell, it goes beyond just saving on fuel costs. “I feel more connected to my Volt than I have with my previous cars — and not just because my phone is connected to it,” says Bell. He’s referring to the fact that iPhone and Android users can download the OnStar RemoteLink mobile app to check charging status, and even schedule future charging times**. He also likes the feeling of being the first kid on the block with a new toy, so to speak. Bell was the first person at his company to get an electric car. “My studio installed a level 2 charger for me and then made an announcement that anyone else that drove an EV to work would also get a free charger to plug into,” he says. Since charging time is about four hours, it can get done during the work day. “Since then, I’ve had lots of people at work asking me about my car, and my coworkers love to ride to lunch with me.”

Going with the Volt wasn’t a decision that Bell took lightly at first, however, especially since he traded in a Mercedes Roadster to do it. “Most of my friends probably thought I was crazy. But I work in the tech industry and I’ve always been an early adopter. I’ve been wanting an EV for several years now,” he says.

Now that he is an EV owner, Bell has found that being a Volt driver has made him infamous, at least for a little while. “I’d been going to the different charging stations around Orlando, taking pictures of my Volt charging up and then posting them to an album on Facebook called, ‘Yeah, but where can you charge it?’” he explains. One of my photos was taken at the local zoo’s charging station next to two Prius cars. About a week later, he met a new work hire, who saw the Volt model Bell keeps on his desk and asked if he owned one. “Then he asked if I parked at the zoo the previous weekend.” Turns out, the new coworker was one of the Prius owners. “Needless to say, he rode to lunch with me and had a lot of questions about the Volt that day.”

Beyond the perception of others, though, Bell is grateful for what the Volt does for him on a personal level. “Driving the Volt puts a smile on my face every day, and I could never go back to a non-electric car.

Are you a satisfied Volt driver? Share your amazing story here.

*Volt is available to order at participating dealers. Quantities limited.
**OnStar is standard for three years on the Chevy Volt. Visit onstar.com for coverage map, details and system limitations.

Vice president of Chevron Technology Ventures, Jeffrey Jacobs, gave a speech at the event (where Chevron was also a sponsor). In 30 years, our energy demand will increase by 30 to 40 percent, he told the crowd. In order to deal with the increasing demand, Chevron is investing in new energy technology. In the next few decades, renewable forms of energy will play an “extremely important role,” Jacobs said. This is the fourth year Chevron has sponsored the event.

“We need energy of all forms and we want people who have the core capabilities beyond our own to develop new energy solutions,” Jacobs told VentureBeat in an interview after his presentation, “We believe in all forms of energy, no matter where they come from.”

Chevron’s approach is unique for an oil company. While most of its competitors, such as Shell, are focused on oil and natural gas, Chevron is investing money in renewable energy technology. The company is also partnering with NASA to develop energy solutions that can be used on Earth and in space.

Since the Cleantech Open was hosted by NASA, there was a distinctive space theme. One company, called BioFiltro, developed a system that uses worms and microorganisms to turn raw sewage and waste into clean drinking water, technology it feels we’d need if we ever colonized Mars.

NASA also launched its Night Rover competition, asking entrepreneurs to develop technology to keep a lunar rover charged and running during the 14-day pitch black lunar night, when it can’t use solar energy.

Two European researchers have discovered a way to turn waste from paper-making into a rechargeable battery cathode. The research could lead to cheaper, sustainable batteries made from a renewable source.

The news gets a bit technical and scientific, so stay with me: Grzegorz Milczarek from Poznan University of Technology in Poland and Olle Inganäs from Linköping University in Sweden were able to turn waste from the paper industry into a battery cathode, the part of the battery where current flows out.

The waste in this case is lignin, a compound stripped from wood in the paper making process. During the paper-making process, wood is chopped up and cooked to break it down. Once the wood is done cooking, a substance called brown liquor is left behind, which is full of lignin.  Milczarek and Inganäs combined lignin from brown liquor with a polymer (a large molecule chain) called polypyrrole to form a battery cathode.

Battery cathode are usually made of precious metals such as lithium, nickel, manganese, and cobalt, which aren’t renewable. Lignin, on the other hand, is the second-most-common polymer produced by living organisms in nature, and according to the researchers, it is much more renewable and is readily available from the paper industry.

“The advantage of using a renewable material for charge storage is the enormous amount of this material that is already being produced on Earth by growing plants, which contain about 20 to 30 percent lignin,” Inganäs said in a statment. “Lithium-ion batteries, on the other hand, require metal oxides; and some of those materials, such as cobalt, are rather rare.”

Don’t expect this to make a huge difference in batteries just quite yet, as the batteries they created are limited and slowly lose a charge when not in use. Still, this new research opens up development of this technology and the possibility that batteries with cathodes made from paper waste will be available to all of us in the future.

Milczarek and Inganäs’ full research, full of all the ultra-scientific details, appears in the March 23 issue of the journal Science.

Paper waste image via Flickr user Walter Parenteau

There are more than 10 million vehicles in business fleets in the U.S. Yet American businesses seem to exercise a selective amnesia about the pain of high fuel prices, time and again. We forget to act before the next oil crunch.

McKinsey & Co. released a study outlining realistic scenarios in which an oil price spike could be much worse and last longer this time, right as our economy’s growth accelerates from a crawl. If your business operates vehicles in a fleet to deliver goods or services, there are solutions to reduce your exposure to volatile fuel prices, and at the same time, create strategic advantages versus competitors who wait to act.

Many efficiency options are in-the-money today, so the time to act is now. Here are four steps to take:

1. Measure
It’s hard to modify what you don’t measure, so gather data and arm yourself with facts. If your business doesn’t track fuel use, fuel economy averages, idling time, daily mileage and fuel spend down to the individual vehicle or even to the driver, this is your first step. Baseline your vehicles so you can examine alternatives and create the financial case to adopt the most cost-effective efficiency improvements.

2. Test all options
Try new things and put a yardstick against your baseline so you can sell your chief financial officer or board with the data. The benefits of many alternative vehicle technologies, such as hybrid powertrains, are greatly affected by the drive cycle or real-world use of the vehicle. Find out from the manufacturer the best applications for the technology and create data-intensive pilot tests to examine real-world financial cases for the technology. While electronic vehicles (EVs) are sexy and offer low operating costs, they may not be appropriate for many applications, including high daily mileage routes. The spread between natural gas and gasoline prices has also widened, but be sure to account for the cost of fueling and charging infrastructure in your analysis.

3. Use financing
Over the past couple of years, solar leasing startups have been touted for marketing lease financing mechanisms that reduce up-front costs of solar panels on homes. Guess what? Lease financing has been available in the transportation sector for 100 years. If capital budgets are tight in your company, even for attractive investments, consider leasing more efficient vehicles. Talk to the vehicle leasing companies and tell them you want to consider leasing greener options. Evaluate the lease of a more efficient vehicle in terms of monthly cash flow, rather than simple payback.

4. Start with the worst MPG vehicles
Once you baseline your vehicle fleet’s fuel economy and mileage, consider replacing the least efficient vehicles first, even before their end of life. If a 10-mpg-average delivery van is replaced with a 13-mpg-average option, you have just reduced your fuel consumption by 23 gallons per 1,000 miles driven. You will see quickly diminishing fuel and cost savings once you start replacing 30+ mpg vehicles (click here for an explanation from Duke University professors).

Creating cost advantages
Higher fuel prices can eat into your margins, but all competitors face the same problem. By making your business fleet more efficient, you reduce your exposure to volatile fuel prices. Even better, you can create a cost advantage versus competitors who do nothing. Every dollar you save from vehicle efficiency improvements takes money from oil companies to be reinvested in further efficiency improvements, new products, better warranties, or enhanced customer service. And while laggards’ margins continue to suffer, you’re investing for the future.

High fuel prices increase the financial case for many efficiency improvements, many of which already exceed corporate hurdle rates. The key to success is finding cost-effective options and then deploying at scale.

Justin Ashton is co-founder and vice president of business development for XL Hybrids. He leads market strategy and serves as the head of sales and marketing. Justin enjoys finding ways to take money away from oil companies in his spare time. 

[Gas pump image credit: Melinda Fawver/Shutterstock]

Local Motion has built what it calls a “social vehicle,” which can sense how many people are in it and what the vehicle needs — a charge or a tune-up for example. The vehicle, pictured above with Israeli President Shimon Peres riding shotgun at the Launch conference, holds up to four people or two with cargo. It doesn’t require keys; instead you use an RFID-tag-embedded corporate badge to turn it on. Using an iPhone app, you book a ride and choose a destination, which is displayed on an LED sign on the front of the vehicle. Others can see where you are going and choose to ride with you.

The doorless, open design of the vehicle is meant so passengers can hop in and hop out quickly. The company wants to make the entire experience of getting from point A to point B more social and efficient, by ferrying around as many people as possible on each trip.

It isn’t just for sprawling corporate campuses. This electric vehicle is also street legal and can be driven around your neighborhood. The company doesn’t say how far it can go on a single charge, but its likely close to electric golf carts which can travel around 15 miles.

Local Motion has already signed up a few Silicon Valley companies for its pilot program, including Google, which has a campus covering nearly 100 acres of land.

Golf carts and other small electric vehicles have been used to transport people across large campuses for years, but Local Motion’s vehicle is certainly more funky than the typical golf cart. The company hasn’t released a purchase price, but as long as its comparable to what’s already out there, I can see Silicon Valley companies snatching up a few for their hundred acre compounds.

Local Motion is based in Silicon Valley and is currently raising its first institutional round of funding to supplement the $400,000 the company has already raised.

Intematix announced Tuesday it has raised a new round of funding to make LED lighting for homes, businesses, and other mainstream uses.

Light-emitting diodes (LED) have been making their way into our homes in computers, TVs, and other electronics for several years now, but we are still struggling to replace less energy efficient incandescent bulbs found in most homes with their LED counterparts. Part of the reason is that LEDs have had a price tag far higher than most people are willing pay.

Companies such as Bridgelux, Lighting Science Group, and Dixon Technologies have brought the price down in recent years and made LED bulbs available for residential and business uses. But given their current prices, it could still take almost another decade before people choose LED lightbulbs over compact fluorescents or incandescents at their local Home Depot.

That’s a shame, because LED bulbs are more energy efficient than compact fluorescent lightbulbs (CFL), which have been popular on store shelves ever since they were touted as super long-lasting and better than the traditional bulb.

The other major hurdle to widespread LED lightbulb adoption is the type of light that the diodes produce, which usually has an unflattering and harsh blue tint. Intematix is trying to solve that problem with its phosphor LED coating that creates warmer tones we’ve come to expect from incandescents.

All LEDs use phosphors, a luminescent substance, to emit light. Traditionally, you’d coat the semiconductor that powers the light with a phosphor powder to create a light source. Intematix instead uses phosphor lenses, branded as ChromaLit, that sit above the semiconductor and react to an LED’s blue light to produce light. The result is a LED bulb that emites white light, the type we’re used to seeing from incandescent and compact fluorescent bulbs. The lenses can also be altered, by using different phosphors, to create other lighting hues, such as red or green.

Because the lens is separated from the semiconductor, lightbulbs can be made in different shapes, such as flat panels or a dome. Intematix’s technology also cuts down on the chance that the LED will overheat and burn out too quickly because there is air between the semiconductor and the lens.

The company plans to use the new round of funding, led by previous investors Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Crosslink Capital, and an unnamed new investor, to expand its production facilities and develop its technology.

Intematix was founded in 2000 and is based in Fremont, Calif., just east of Silicon Valley. Since its founding, it has raised a total of $63 million.

GM will also temporarily lay off 1,300 employees who work on the Volt’s production line between March 19 and April 23, Detroit Free Press reported. The company cites the need to “align our production with demand” for the production halt, meaning it’s been producing far more cars than it can sell.

The Volt was released in 2011 and sold a mere 7,671, missing its 2011 10,000 sales goal. Sales have been up this year: In January and February it sold more than 1,600 models. But GM’s 2012 plan is to produce 45,000 Volts for the United States, and with only 1,600 cars sold in the first two months, there is a low likelihood it will be able to push that many units off the lot. It seems GM is taking this time to scale back production and rethink its strategy.

GM announced in early January that it will be improving the Volt’s battery cooling system in response to two Volts that caught fire after their batteries were punctured. Chevy stands by the safety of the Volt, but the bad press from the fires have clearly hurt the Volt’s image and haven’t helped the car’s sales.

Most of us go for the newest model when we are in market for a new cell phone. But if you can’t afford a never-been-touched model, you might reach for a refurbished device, though you might not always know what you are getting. The Device Renewal Forum wants to change that by setting specific standards for recycled phones so they are just as enticing as a brand new one.

“We are trying to create another class of devices. There are already new, used, and refurbished cell devices, but refurbished means something different to different people,” eRecyclingCorps chief executive David Edmondson told VentureBeat in an interview, “The Device Renewal Forum will create a standard for refurbished phones and a new category of goods renewed to a standard of quality that we agree upon as an industry.”

The Device Renewal Forum will consist of representatives from distributors, sellers, re-manfactureres, OEMs, and carriers who will give their two-cents about which devices should be renewed, the technical standards for each refurbished device, and how devices will be rebuilt. The Forum will work as an independent governing body that will set the standards for renewed devices and evaluate the facilities that rebuild handsets. Standards will include which parts need to be replaced in certain devices and which devices shouldn’t be refurbished at all.

“We are creating an organization that gives consumers and carriers confidence in rebuilt devices, and rebuilds devices up to a standard that they believe in,” said Edmondson, “Devices are retired when they perceptually obsolete, we will create a standard that says the devices is not functionally obsolete.”

Edmondson says that devices will carry a certain brand label to tell consumers that a device has been rebuilt to the Forum’s standards, which he hopes will inspire confidence in less expensive, refurbished devices. The Device Renewal Forum’s first meeting will take place February 29 at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. The Forum will also be open to anyone who wants to join for the next few months.

Cell phones in trashcan image via Shutterstock