My latest column just ran at Colorado Biz magazine.  It investigates alt.energy investments at any level, from the WalMart shopper to President Obama.   Here’s an excerpt:

Angel-level investing
If you are a bona-fide angel investor, looking to cash in on clean-tech, there are two places where an investment of a couple hundred thousand dollars will actually create a reasonable return in a reasonable amount of time. Service companies are focused in two areas, distributed generation and energy efficiency or conservation.
Average cost: Investments in smaller companies are generally made in no less than $25,000 increments.
Expected return: In a recent study by the Kauffman Foundation, angel capital investments returned 2.6 times the initial investment over 3.5 years, for a 27 percent internal rate of return. Of course, performance here varies heavily, and 52 percent of investors in the survey received less than 100 percent of their money back.

VC-level investing
If you are a venture capitalist with a $100 million fund, you can start to look into the actual technology of the energy revolution. Thin-film solar, new battery technology, improved wind turbines and many other technologies are not quite ready for prime-time, but offer a huge upside if they hit.
Average cost: Expensive, with investment rounds averaging 10 times greater than parallel IT investments. An investment round may be $25 million to $100 million
Expected return: Very few clean-tech investment exits have happened thus far, and the investment horizon could be 10 years or longer. But the long-term potential is incredible.

More opportunities identified over at Colorado Biz.