At first glance, Best Buy (BBY) and Maxwell Technologies Inc. (MXWL) appear to have little in common. The latter makes ultra-capacitors, which are small battery-like devices, while the former is, of course, the giant electronics retailer.

There are at least two axioms that I believe alternative energy investors should follow. The first is to have an investment horizon of at least three to five years, in order to be able to take advantage of several upcoming sea changes – such as global cap-and-trade and the mass introduction of plug-in electric hybrid vehicles – that are expected to power the sector higher.

For the Week of October 4 – 10, 2009

Preeminent environmentalist Lester R. Brown of the Earth Policy Institute last week raised the discomforting question: “Could Food Shortages Bring Down Civilization?” Brown’s concern: Water irrigation losses.

Can You Name Today’s Two Best Green Energy Pure Plays? How about EnerNOC (ENOC) and Comverge (COMV)?

An unprecedented overflow crowd at this week’s “smart” grid conference in Washington, D.C., could put a pop in the shares of several companies that are likely to garner media attention.

While definitions vary widely, the “smart grid” generally is a multi-year project (strongly backed by the Obama administration) whose cost has been estimated at up to $75 billion. It is intended to give the nation’s power grid a new telecommunications backbone, transforming it into an “energy Internet.” Over time, this new smart grid is expected to save the nation trillions of dollars by eliminating blackouts and the need to build hundreds of new power plants. It’s further expected to significantly reduce consumers’ and businesses' power bills.

In Great Britain, more than 60 gigawatts (GW) of power, a quarter of that from renewable sources, reportedly is waiting to be connected to the nation’s power grid. In California, electric utilities say they have little hope of meeting the state’s mandate of achieving 20% of their generation from green sources by 2010 largely because of delays in getting transmission lines licensed and built. Meanwhile in Brazil, work is underway on what will be the world’s longest power line, which is being built with high-voltage, direct-current (HVDC) technology because it is ideally suited for hooking up renewable energy sources located in remote regions of the country.

Notice a trend here?

Colorado power utility

(XEL) is among the leading U.S. developers of “smart grid” technology, but when it needed a partner with know-how for operating a wind-to-battery storage system, it turned to

With so much financial news being reported these days, it can be tough to spy the stories that really matter – stories that suggest a big payday awaits shareholders of certain firms. When it comes to alternative energy, EnergyTechStocks.com has found that nobody is better at spying stories that matter than Mike Millikin of the web site Green Car Congress.

EnergyTechStocks.com asked Millikin to take a second look at stories he posted over the last couple of weeks, looking for important developments and the companies that could benefit from them.

At the rate things are going, the best way for investors to play the upcoming brawl in the U.S. Senate over cap-and-trade may be to buy shares of the very companies this carbon-busting legislation is intended to squeeze out of business.

We’re talking the big coal-mining companies: Peabody Energy Corp. (BTU), Arch Coal Inc. (ACI), Massey Energy Co. (MEE) and CONSOL Energy Inc. (CNX).

Having correctly predicted that Exelon Corp.’s (EXC) attempted takeover of NRG Energy Inc. (NRG) would fail and that both firms’ share prices would then rise (See Prediction: Exelon’s NRG Takeover Bid Will Fail; Both Firms Will Then See Their Stock Prices Rise), Daniel Scotto of HFP Capital Markets is back with another eye-catching observation.

Scotto, the veteran electric utility and energy analyst, thinks Dynegy Inc. (DYN), the big independent power generator, could become a takeover candidate, and that NRG or Exelon could become its suitor.

Stop thinking of Toyota Motor Corp. (TM) as just a car company.

Henceforth, think of Toyota as both a car manufacturer and a key supplier of what may well become THE component of the coming “smart” energy revolution.

Too many green investors – and the U.S.-based fund managers that cater to them – are about to miss out on green energy’s long term trillion-dollar payoff because they insist on investing in companies that generate 50% or more of revenue directly from sales of green products like wind turbines and solar panels.

Nobody would mistake German engineering giant Siemens AG (SI), Swiss engineering behemoth ABB Ltd. (ABB), or Deutsche Bank AG (DB) as green energy companies. Indeed, Siemens and ABB are detested by many environmentalists because they construct fossil-fuel and nuclear power plants.

Although Bloomberg News is reporting that traders think there is a better than 50% chance that Exelon Corp.’s (EXC) takeover bid for NRG Energy Inc. (NRG) will succeed, EnergyTechStocks.com predicts that it will fail – and that both firms’ share prices will actually go higher as a result of the failed offer.

This prediction is based on a lengthy discussion with long-time electric utility and energy analyst Dan Scotto, who recently joined HFP Capital Markets in New York. Exelon “is behaving like they’re going to win,” Scotto told EnergyTechStocks.com, noting that, among other things, the Chicago-based utility holding company has cancelled plans for two of its own nuclear reactors because it would be acquiring NRG’s nuclear units.

Have you looked closely at what will happen to your portfolio if and when carbon cap-and-trade legislation currently moving through Congress becomes the law of the land?

The Investor Responsibility Research Center Institute has. While IRRC finds in a new report that cap-and-trade would depress earnings by less than 1% for about 200 of the 500 firms in the S&P 500, it also concludes that electric utility earnings could plummet, and that three utilities – Allegheny Energy (AYE), American Electric Power (AEP) and Ameren Corp. (AEE) could see their earnings wiped out completely.

If they ever write a rule book for green investing, Rule One should be: don’t get your advice from a traditional financial analyst. When Enron came a cropper several years back, the Street soured on alternative energy. A generation of green financial experts who would now be at the top of their game were unceremoniously shown the door.

Instead, turn to industry specialists – people who, while they can’t tell you if Widget Corp. is going to earn 2 cents or 3 cents a share next quarter, can see how the clean and green energy economy is coming together and which companies could ultimately be big winners.

The only thing that will be missing from this summer and fall’s carbon capture debate in Washington will be that announcer who revs up pro wrestling fanatics with his battle cry, “Let’s get ready to rumble!”

In declaring carbon dioxide emissions a threat to the general public, Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency is trying to pin its Congressional opponents even before the match begins by declaring that it can move to force companies to reduce their carbon without Congressional approval. But the sideshow over the White House’s insistence on cap-and-trade over the taxation approach that is preferred by many leading environmentalists promises to become the main event. Right now, any investor who thinks he knows what the outcome will be (cap-and-trade, taxation, or nothing at all), is kidding himself.

Shortly before test-driving Nissan Motor Co.’s (NSANY) still-unnamed electric vehicle last week, Edmunds.com consumer advice expert Phil Reed told EnergyTechStocks.com that investors shouldn’t expect the EV revolution to arrive until gasoline is back up to $4 a gallon, which given the state of the economy, could be a lot later than the fourth quarter of 2010, which is when EVs are expected to appear in dealer showrooms.

In an exclusive interview, Reed said he was dismayed that lower gasoline prices “have cooled off lots of interest” in plug-in electric hybrid vehicles (PHEVs). “Consumers have gone back to their wicked ways,” he said, noting the growing sales of bigger, less fuel-efficient vehicles. “It’s as if last summer never occurred,” he said glumly. “Nobody seems to care about global warming. I’m afraid we’re going to have to go back to $4-a-gallon gasoline” before the EV market takes off.