Plug Power Shows One Way to Survive Cleantech’s Booms and Busts

The momentum behind cleantech stocks may be fading—again. For about a year, companies pushing to decarbonize and electrify the world captured the market’s imagination as never before. But now, as investors try to determine which companies can make it over the long run, they may want to consider the story of Plug Power Inc.

The hydrogen fuel cell maker, based in a suburb of Albany, N.Y., has already survived boom-bust cycles that devastated many other cleantech companies. Its shares reached almost $150 in early 2000, then flirted with penny-stock status for much of the next two decades. The company changed management and adjusted its business strategy. Then, as investors’ appetite for climate-friendly technologies returned, Plug Power became a Wall Street darling again, with a market value that topped those of utility giants such as PG&E Corp. and Consolidated Edison Inc. in early 2021.