The Economic Geography of Financing Clean Energy Technologies

This article seeks to describe the geography of clean tech investment which has emerged in recent years in the USA and the UK. An empirical approach was used, relying on close-dialogue interviews with senior investment managers in both markets. The article draws three conclusions. First, clean tech investment is often strongly influenced by physical geography, particularly in the area of renewable energy technologies. Second, regulatory settings play a strong role in the flow of investment. Third, capital flows unevenly between the different stages of technological maturity in clean energy products — a phenomenon which has been described as the ‘valley of death’ financing gap.