Renewable energy industry

Several renewable energy companies became listed on stock exchanges in the period after 2000. The early 21st century was a very productive time for the renewable energy industry, since many governments set long term renewable energy targets. Some chose to directly subsidize the renewables with feed-in tariffs and other temporary measures to bridge the gap to full cost accounting that would properly reward these technologies for their low emissions and lack of interference with ecosystem services, and also to ensure some capacity and motivation to install conservation-focused smart grid technologies.

Smart grid policy in the United States was especially important in driving renewable energy in that country (see also load shedding, energy internet, home area network and cleantech for more on the structure of the industry and why renewables vendors are closely aligned industrially and politically with the vendors of networking technology), smart appliances and energy conservation software, and opposed in general to those of other "energy" firms, which effectively depend on the lack of this intelligence or accounting to appear competitive. For instance, coal vendors rely on a lack of accounting of about US$345 billion in harms done by coal to remain competitive in the US.

In 2004 Russia ratified the United Nations' and the first order under this agreement came into force for the period 2008 to 2012. The period from 2002 to 2008 was a period of rapid growth for the renewable energy industry with the photovoltaics industry experiencing an average of 60% growth per annum, the biodiesel industry 42% and the wind industry 25%. As of the end of 2007 the renewable energy industry was worth an estimated US $77.3 billion. As a result of this growth several companies listed IPOs.

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