The Green Investing Handbook

The Green Investing Handbook ? a detailed investment guide to the technologies and companies involved in the sustainability revolution. Nick Hanna, Harriman House Publishing, 354 pages, RRP £24.99.

Nick Hanna is a freelance writer who became interested in the impact of global warming. He now focuses on green investment, and this book, a more detailed version of his website www.thegreeninvestmentguide.com, is a useful guide to this fast-moving field.

There are four sections to the book. A short introduction discusses how to invest (via ?green? funds or by building a direct portfolio). The next and longest section covers where to invest, with chapters on ten sectors including solar, wind and geothermal as well as waste-to-energy. Each chapter describes the technologies involved, comments on trends within the sector, gives an investment overview and current investor/expert opinions, and then gives a summary of individual companies, both quoted and unquoted (?companies to watch?).

The third section is a directory of the quoted companies, including international as well as UK companies (this is a global field), giving a more detailed description of those mentioned in the earlier section, as well as covering green funds, green ETFs and indices, and UK-based green private equity providers. Understandably, not all quoted companies in the sectors are covered, but it proved comprehensive on the sectors that this reviewer knows. The financial data given on the companies is limited, but web addresses and stock exchange codes are included to allow further research. A last and short ?resources? section has information on news feeds etc.

Hanna believes that ?time has now been called on the old-world economy? and that there is a race to win market share in the technologies of the future, creating opportunities for investors in the energy and environmental sectors. His handbook is a clearly laid out guide to current technologies and investment opportunities. It is however a guide ? there are no strong technical opinions and limited financial data is provided on the companies discussed, but it?s a useful book.

Jeremy Prescott