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Photovoltaic technology is an interesting case study. Americans firms have pushed their way in thin-film technology, but are finding it difficult to scale up manufacturing. Meanwhile, the Chinese have invested heavily in reducing manufacturing cost of traditional technology. Though it is still early to understand which is the winning bet, it shows that it is not easy to make such far reaching choices

Photovoltaic panels are apparently following a nice s-curve, with 100% year-on-year growth. But this has happened  mostly because of public  subsidies, which are about to be reduced, also because cash-strapped governments will not be able to bear the burden of generous feed-in tariffs in the future. The impact is likely to be critical for highly-levered operators, who will find it difficult to service their debt, and for PV makers, who are likely to discover that the industry has a serious problem with oversupply. Add the likelihood of some breakthrough innovation leading to a new generation of cheaper and/or more efficient cells, and you see a critical investment case.