“Last year, although China…nearly doubled renewable investment, the U.S. was the world leader in investment,” she said. “It’s a benefit for U.S. businesses that China is developing.”

How Big Is Your Sandbox?

Other signs abound that a U.S. dominance of green business is far from assured.

Venture capital flowing to cleantech companies shifted last year from a heavy focus on North America to one more globally balanced, according to the Cleantech Group, which tracks investment in the field. North American companies captured 62 percent of the cleantech venture investment in 2009, compared with 72 percent in 2008, while the share for Europe and Israel rose to 29 percent from 22 percent. China and India each still drew less than $1 billion in venture investment.

Overall, as in other fields, venture capital investment in clean technology fell in 2009, but it didn’t fall as precipitously as in other fields. Worldwide, venture capitalists invested about $5.6 billion in 557 deals. That was equal to the 2007 level of investment. Other venture capital investments fell back to 2003 levels.

Be that as it may, everyone involved in green business understands that they’re playing in a very large sandbox and that both competition and opportunity can be as close as the next town or as far away as China and India.

“We are a small startup company,” said Tom Carbone, CEO of Nordic Windpower, based in Berkeley, California, with a research office in Bristol, United Kingdom, and a manufacturing facility in Pocatello, Idaho. “But we have a very global footprint.”

Nordic last week announced that it raised $38 million in a round of funding including players from around the world. The round was led by legendary investor Vinod Khosla’s Khosla Ventures, but U.S./Europe-based Novus Energy Partners and London-based Impax Asset Management also joined in the funding.

International involvement is nothing new to Nordic Windpower. The company itself was founded when it acquired technology developed by Swedish scientists for two-bladed wind turbines and started making and selling those turbines in North America.

And while the company is focused primarily on selling into the North American market—the largest market for wind power—it also just recently sold its first turbines in Uruguay. They made that sale to start exploring Latin America as a possible new market.

“We’ve had to go beyond the U.S.,” Carbone said. “We have to form those relationships and nurture those relationships.”