Have you ever wondered why wind farms are built where they are? No? I didn't either. I just assumed, naively perhaps, that they looked for spots that were really windy. Apparently though, there are a lot of variables to consider. Wind patterns follow trends. Some trends last for days, or weeks, while others run into years and even decades. These trends overlap and interact to form some of the most complex datasets known to man. The same basic principle applies to solar and even tidal energy. This might all seem kind of irrelevant to the average Joe, but to the energy companies that are investing billions of dollars world-wide on renewable energy infrastructure, such as wind farms, solar plants and tidal turbines, it's kind of a big deal.

 Worldwide every day, untold amounts of information are collected on weather. Anemometers measure wind speed, barometers record atmospheric pressure, psychrometers present relative humidity, and the ubiquitous thermometer measures air temperature. Augmented by satellite imagery, this information can be a powerful weapon in the arsenal of the weather forecaster. However, when it comes to investing billions of dollars in the renewable energy infrastructure of the future, the predictions of our humble weather men and women just won't cut it. Just because the wind blows strongly on the west coast of Ireland today, doesn't mean it will always be so. And as the sun givith, it can also taketh away.

Now, one company hopes to improve the odds of the investors in renewable technologies getting a better return on their money. How? By crunching numbers. 3Tier, a Seattle based company, take data produced by weather instruments and feed it into their network of computers as the basis for sophisticated predicative computer models. These models are so complex that they can accurately predict how much power a wind farm or solar plant will output over time, and that has sparked the interest of some very big hitters in the energy and financial information sectors.

In a scene reminiscent of the modern computer age, the founder and CEO of 3Tier, Kenneth Westrick, started the business in his bedroom back in 1999. Since then his team has grown to include around seventy people in such areas as Software Engineering and Atmospheric Science. Westrick points out that the models are so accurate that they can analyse a wind farm's power output over time and suggest a better site a short distance away to optimize output. The models are used to create powerful maps that indicate where wind and solar power are optimal and abundant, but they are also predictive in nature so they can indicate if renewable sources of energy will be optimal in a particular location for years into the future.

It's this predictive nature that has sparked the interest of companies such as GE, Horizon Wind Energy, Iberdrola Spain and Seattle City Light. Indeed, at a time when many businesses are going into recession throughout the world, 3Tier, like many involved in the renewable energy sector, have seen consistent growth. The company claims to have boosted sales by 50% per year for the last four years.

Boasting more computing power than most American Universities, 3Tier's computers currently store more electronic information than existed world-wide in 1990. And it's information with an extreme value to those with investments affected by weather patterns. Indeed, the company are currently in talks with Bloomberg, the financial information giants with a view to providing information from 3Tier's predictive computer models to Bloomberg's clients.

While 3Tier's elaborate computer models are beyond the means of the average consumer, they do offer a free service to the public in the form of Firstlook. Currently available to the public in the continental United States, parts of Canada and South America the FirstLook service uses Google Maps to give users a "solar assessment" for their homes, or businesses in just minutes. Whether or not 3Tier's models will increase uptake of renewable energy remains to be seen, but with the attention of such big players, the outlook can only be bright.