Welcome to the Green Chip Review Weekend Edition — our insights from the week in everything alternative and cleantech, as well as links to our most-read Green Chip Review and sister publication articles. 

I was writing an article this week about the history and development of the Green Chip websites, when I realized something few people may know...

We've been covering the green side of the market longer than anyone else.

Since before First Solar (NASDAQ: FSLR) and Suntech (NYSE: STP) were publicly traded...

Before an Inconvenient Truth finished filming...

Before terms like smart grid and cleantech were even coined...

We were giving green stock advice before wind turbines graced the plains, and certainly before CNBC and Bloomberg were quick to jump on the latest solar news.

The Difference Between News and Ideas

Sometimes, I get frustrated when I put together these weekly news round-ups for you.

You see, many of the topics that are "news" now, we covered months — and sometimes years — ago... when they were merely ideas.

Take the Chinese cleantech boom, for example, which we've been touting since 2007. Back then, we told readers that China would be a clean energy force to reckon with, that their solar companies could produce at lower costs, that their non-democratic government could fast-track projects with minimal bureaucratic red tape.

As such, many of our readers have profited handsomely from our Chinese cleantech picks like JA Solar (NASDAQ: JASO), Trina Solar (NYSE: TSL), Hong Kong Highpower (NASDAQ: HPJ), and plenty of others.

But only lately, as the hindsight data is revealed, has the mainstream media jumped on board, with everyone from the Wall Street Journal to the New York Times touting China's cleantech abilities and the United States' laggard position.

It's not "news" until it happened.

But the profits are made while it's happening (... Whatever it is.).

That's the difference between news and ideas.

You read the news. You profit from ideas... and you usually read them here first.

This Week's News (And Our Ideas)

So it's news this week that Japan, South Korea, and China are spending $9 billion on "infrastructure and information technology to make electricity networks more efficient."

It's news, according to Reuters, because Zpryme, a market research firm, compiled the data and released a report.

But it's been an idea for the past year, as we constantly reported on the necessity of a smart grid to aid the deployment of renewable resources. Green Chip readers have profited from this idea... others are only now reading the news.

It was also news this week when a Chinese wind turbine maker, A-Power Generation (NASDAQ: APWR), announced it's building a production plant in Nevada. The plant will have an annual capacity of 1,100 megawatts and create 1,000 long-term jobs.

I guess it was only an idea on February 10, when I ran an article entitled, Chinese Cleantech Companies: Made in the USA (by China), in which I specifically mentioned A-Power and their plans for a U.S. plant.

In the month it took for that story to go from a Green Chip idea to mainstream news, the stock has gone up more than 17%.

In other news this week, German installer Phoenix Solar (XETRA: PS4) announced it's "expecting business in the ongoing first quarter to be significantly better than in the year-earlier period."

But we've been reporting on the German feed-in tariff cuts since last year, and how that would lead to more installations fueled by Chinese-built panels before the subsidies disappeared, i.e, higher business in the first and second quarters.

And finally, it was news this week that China and India signed up to the Copenhagen Accord for fighting climate change, after being lambasted by politicians and the media alike for stymieing the talks last December.

But we've been reporting on China's and India's ambitious climate energy and energy goals for some time now and how, in many ways, their goals are more ambitious than ours. In an article entitled The Clean Energy Battle: U.S. vs. China, I reported that China and U.S. actually have similar emissions targets, but China's are official policy while the U.S.'s are simply White House announcements.

So you could've known the real story before it hit the wire.

And that's really the point of Green Chip: To know the market so well that we're ahead of it. And by reading these pages, you are, too.

Our premium services take that one step further, and help you invest in green trends before others know about them.

We help you invest in the ideas that will be profitable when they become news.

You can read this week's ideas below.

Call it like you see it,

Nick

How to Rebuild America: The New Road to Energy Sustainability
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A Game-Changer for Nuclear: The Most Profitable Advancement in Half a Century
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The Global Energy Race: The Countries Keeping Their Energy Dollars
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Renewable Energy Capacities by Country: An At-a-Glance Look at Wind, Solar, Geothermal, and Biofuel Energy Resources
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The Profitable Stocks behind Cash for Caulkers: How to Profit from Cash for Caulkers Investments
Green Chip Editor Jeff Siegel highlights opportunities in energy efficiency and green building.

Investing in Africa with ETFs: Globe-leading Growth Stuns Even the IMF
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New Green ATF Seizes Canadian Power Grid: A $30 Mil Market Created Overnight
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