Al Gore Adds Another Title To Resume: Venture Capitalist

Fortune   |  Marc Gunther, Adam Lashinsky   |   November 12, 2007 10:57 AM


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It's lunchtime on Sand Hill Road, and Al Gore wants answers. "How does the efficiency decline with latitude?" he asks. "What size community could be served by one plant? If a manufacturer like GE wanted to make smaller turbines, would the technology support a smaller scale?"

We're sitting in the giant conference room at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, where the partners hold their weekly meetings. After loading his plate with Chinese food from a buffet, Gore is firing detailed questions at the management team of Ausra, a Kleiner-backed company in Palo Alto whose technology uses mirrors the width of a flatbed truck that focus the sun's energy to generate electricity.

Once Gore is satisfied -- sunlight lags north of South Dakota, an Ausra plant can serve 120,000 homes, and yes, smaller turbines will work fine -- he shifts from inquisitor to fixer. He was chatting with California Senator Barbara Boxer "on the way over," he reports, and he isn't optimistic that Congress will extend the tax credits Ausra has been relying on. On the upside, he offers on the spot to organize a summit highlighting the company's solar thermal technology to educate lawmakers and other policymakers on its potential. He also thinks a powwow at General Electric (Charts, Fortune 500) would be beneficial, even though Ausra is a tiny customer.

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This is great news.

Although I wish Al would have considered the presidential candidate job instead. What we need most is a leader to take us out of the mess we have gotten ourselves, and the rest of the world, into.

marguerite
http://lamarguerite.wordpress.com

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 12:20 PM on 11/13/2007

I'm hoping that Al can find us the "Angel Philanthropist" who will help bring solar/wind to the masses (maybe through low interest loans?) Since our gov't isn't making it easy for the people to KILL KING COAL / KING OIL. C'mon Al, help us out! I'll be one of the 1st to sign up!

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 11:18 AM on 11/13/2007

He can crown himself the The Royal Princess Anastasia of all the Russias, but he'll still never be the Commander-in-Chief.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 12:19 AM on 11/13/2007
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Al's a CAPITALIST?? I thought he was going to ride in on his White Horse to take back the White House! Now he's just another money grubbing CAPITALIST scheming to make an EVIL PROFIT!

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 11:01 PM on 11/12/2007

The door didn't close, it was hardly ever open! It was the press that was teasing us and Gore played into that at the Golden Globes and Academy Awards.

Just like now, they're teasing us with Mike Bloomberg! Isn't there much more actual news to cover?

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 08:54 PM on 11/12/2007

A few decades from now, the 29 percenters will wake up to the fact that there's a HUGE mountain of money to be made in clean-energy technology.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 05:39 PM on 11/12/2007
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Well I guess now all you praying and lighting candles wishers for the second coming of Al Gore the common man's salvation and hero of populism to run for President can STFU.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:58 PM on 11/12/2007

GOOD NEWS! The US will be spared yet another Gore attack.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 02:03 PM on 11/12/2007
    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 01:41 PM on 11/12/2007
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A blade in the hands of a chef can be used to create something nourishing.

The same blade in the hands of an assailant can cause harm.

Is Al Gore using a Doctrine of Shock therapeutically?

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 01:11 PM on 11/12/2007

It makes sense for Gore to go this route. Anybody with half a brain can see that environmental technologies is the next "dot. com boom." Whether global warming is real or not, man-made or natural cycles, enough of the world's population think it is real to create a massive market for environmentally freiendly products and green technologies and energy supplies.

With teh current luddites in office, the US is in serious danger of being left behind in teh next global economic boom as other nation's capitalize on the "dot green" market explosion. At least some companies like Al Gore's can help to ensure that at least some of the massive amounts of capital investment and economic growth the dot green boom will fuel will be in the US.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 01:07 PM on 11/12/2007

I'm rather glad to see this.

Let's face it: the folks who want Al Gore to run again are "lookin' for a savior." They're not really looking at the man for what he is; they're looking at the present situation for what it is not.

The current crop of politicians that ARE running for this office are such a joke, that it's merely a testimony to just how corrupt the present situation is -- and how much time a meaningful change in that system will take, once the nation has (if it ever does) become sufficiently disgusted with the status-quo to change it.

Should Mr. Gore wait around for that to happen? Should he allow himself to be humiliated in the political-arena once more? Should he run for the office of "savior?" Frankly, I think, "no, no, and no."

There's more than one way to effect meaningful change. If you're smart and persuasive and good on a board-of-directors, as he certainly is and has been, then perhaps that's exactly the way that you should go.

"Politics," in this country, is seriously broken and its going to stay-broken for a very long time. The pigs are still at the trough and it's not smart to try to push a pig out of the way (as any farmer well knows... pigs are big and strong and they know it). If you really want to make change, maybe the best place from which to do that is NOT "among the pigs."

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 12:50 PM on 11/12/2007

G-Money, gee, I wonder how THAT happened...

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 12:12 PM on 11/12/2007

Gore said he had bigger things to do than run for president. He has maintained that his focus is on trying to do something about global warming and he has remained true to that. He knows that if he ran for president it would take years off of what needs to be done to draw world wide attention to the global problems and what can be done. He started this quest when he was just a newbie in Congress and was talking about the problem while at universery so he knows his heart and he is going ahead with the task. Good job Al. People are starting to listen!

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 11:54 AM on 11/12/2007

Al Gore a venture capitalist?

This from a man who wants world socialism.

Liberalism always generates the exact opposite of it's stated intent.

Have you noticed that the limosine liberals never want to live the lifestyle that they propose for the rest of us?

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 11:52 AM on 11/12/2007
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