GE Tilting Towards Windmills - NYT

[hatrack]

EDIT

For now, wind energy is the only profit star in G.E.'s alternative energy galaxy, and both the finance and equipment sides of the company know they are gambling when it comes to solar and other fledgling technologies. Still, analysts applaud their decision to move on them. "When you get the president talking about renewable energy, it has to be turning up the dial at G.E.," said Deane M. Dray, an analyst at Goldman Sachs who has an outperform rating on General Electric shares.

Certainly, it is getting attention from Energy Financial Services. The unit recently bought a wind farm in Germany and is installing new turbines there at a rapid pace. It has invested in solar energy farms in California and is in the end stage of negotiations for a large solar project in Europe. Indeed, renewable energy projects already account for $1 billion of the unit's $11 billion portfolio and are its fastest-growing niche. "The renewables space has really heated up, and I hope it will account for 20 or 30 percent of our investments in five years," J. Alex Urquhart, the unit's president, said.

Today, alternative energy financing is barely a footnote in G.E.'s revenue stream. But the G.E. machine is gearing up for change. On Jan. 30 — a day before the president bemoaned the nation's "addiction to oil" — Mr. Urquhart carved out a separate group to focus solely on renewable energy projects. Lorraine Bolsinger, who runs G.E.'s Ecomagination program, says she has begun to "run the financial projects through our scorecard process" to see which ones she should include in her group of G.E.'s "green" products.

The pace is quickening in G.E.'s industrial camp, too. Energy equipment and related services, which accounted for about $42 billion of G.E.'s $149.7 billion in revenue last year, is G.E.'s largest industrial business. Alternative energy products like wind generators accounted for less than $6.3 billion of last year's sales. Four years ago, G.E. bought Enron's wind-turbine unit, and it is now a $2 billion business, heading rapidly toward $4 billion. In five years, G.E. expects that alternative energy products will account for more than a quarter of energy equipment revenue.

EDIT

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/15/business/15electric.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

[phantom power]

1. Interesting, they lump solar in with "fledgling technologies."

And wind is their only profitable renewable product...

[eppur_se_muova]

4. Wind is particularly abundant under the present administration. nt

[Kolesar]

2. who here has read Don Quixote?

I have not. I wonder about these writers and activists. They are well read, but most people are not. Is it any wonder we have trouble "connecting" on some issues with the larger population?

[phantom power]

3. Furthermore, it's not a very appropriate allusion in this case.

The entire notion of "tilting windmills" is supposed to connote a futile activity. Yet the content of the article is that wind is profitable for them. Certainly not futile!

[Kolesar]

5. That was very insightful

A complement from the man with the Luddite avatar

[phantom power]

6. I'm not just cognoscenti... I'm literati!

[Massacure]

7. Wind turbines are the most effective form of solar generated electricity.

[JohnWxy]

8. WIND generated electricity is the cheapest source of power today

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=115&topic_id=42009

But you won't hear that on the Corporate network News, well not until about 25% of our power comes from wind power, in about 15 years - then they'll have a 'bulletin'!

If you think MSM is, again, failing at there job (so as not to offend the NeoCons) go to congress.org/ media guide and tell them about it. Congress.org makes it easy to send emails to the networks and government representatives. TEll the media sycophants to stop bending over for the NeoCons.