Makani Power, the company founded in part by Larry Page and Sergey Brin's kitesurfing buddy Don Montague, has scored another $5 million in investment from Google as part of a second round that could net as much as $20 million. That's on top of the $10 million already invested in the startup's plan to create electricity from high-altitude air currents. This money, like the first round, presumably comes from Google.org's project to tap into renewable energy that's cheaper than coal. I may have to revise my opinion of Google.org as just another corporate venture fund and green PR ploy.

Considering how CEO Eric Schmidt funnels money to his real estate-developer wife Wendy Schmidt through charitable organizations and cofounder Sergey Brin's wife Anne Wojcicki cashed in on Google's money for her vanity gene-sequencing startup 23andMe, Google.org seems more like another vehicle for the Mountain View advertising firm's executives to lavish money on friends and family.

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