Yesterday's news that Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens is launching a massive campaign to reduce dependence on foreign oil -- a plan that includes thousands of new wind turbines straddling the middle of the country -- got us thinking about a report released last week by the United Nations Environmental Program’s (UNEP) Sustainable Energy Finance Initiative (SEFI). It's a good read, and it demonstrates the massive increase in investment in renewable energy underway around the world.

In 2007, new global investment in renewable energy equaled $148 billion, up 60 percent from 2006. Total financial transactions, including acquisitions, totaled $204.9 billion.

Globally, 23 percent of new power generation came from renewable energy last year. This comes out to 31 gigawatts of new renewable capacity in 2007, putting renewables at 5.4 percent of global installed capacity. Of this, wind energy was the big winner. Wind continues to attract more investment than any other non-fossil fuel energy source, including large hydro and nuclear. In the EU and the US, wind energy made up 40 percent and 30 percent of new power capacity respectively.

Of note is the geographic shift of renewable investment traditionally found in Europe moving more towards China and the US. In China last year, investment in non-hydro renewables quadrupled to $10.8 billion. US financial institutions Citi, JPMorgan Chase and Morgan Stanley have adopted a set of carbon principles through which they are advising power companies to include energy efficiency and renewable energy in their portfolios.

Another interesting trend has been a shift of renewables investment from developed to developing countries. China, India and Brazil have seen an increasing share of new global investment in renewables, from 12 percent in 2004 to 22 percent last year, totaling $26 billion.

According to the report, renewable investment will be $450 billion a year by 2012, rising to more than $600 billion a year by 2020. In other words, hold onto those renewable energy funds. UNEP head Achim Steiner points out that "what is unfolding is nothing less than a fundamental transformation of the world’s energy infrastructure."