Green is good again: Cleantech venture funding continues its rebound

Cleatech is back in vogue, and financiers are jumping to get back into the green game. The latest quarterly cleantech funding numbers, released Tuesday by consultancies the Cleantech Group and Deloitte, show that preliminary results for the third quarter -- tallying clean technology venture investments in North America, Europe, China and India -- totaled $1.59 billion going to 134 companies. That's a 10 percent increase over the second quarter.

The improvement was fueled by a wave of big venture capital financings, and the successful IPO of battery company A123 Systems (AONE) helped the cleantech sector continue to rebound in the most recent quarter. The U.S. stimulus package also helped VCs make up their minds when placing big bets.