Ritter, BillAs Siemens and the government’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory announced the biggest undertaking in industry research for wind power, Bill Ritter was quick to claim some credit. “Investments, like the one we’re celebrating today, will help us build that new and different future, it helps us improve energy efficiency to expand the use of renewables, and decrease our reliance on foreign oil,” the Democratic governor said earlier this week (via 9News). While the state has seen a renewable-energy boom under Ritter, it has also witnessed a major decline in overall venture-capital investments, according to the latest MoneyTree Report cited by the Denver Business Journal, which notes that the $50.3 million invested in Colorado companies in the third quarter of 2009 is less than one-fourth as much as in the prior quarter. That’s also less than the total venture capital spent in Colorado in the third quarter of 2008. The report’s authors caution that if it hadn’t been for a $146 million investment by Clovis Oncology Incorporated in Boulder during the second quarter of this year, investments would seem pitiful. Paradoxically for Ritter, the report also indicates the surge of funding other states have seen in the “clean technology” sector has surpassed Colorado’s.