In This Article
30-Second Summary
Headline Link: ‘GE Invests $300 Million in Houston-Based Power Firm’
Background: ‘GE to Double Renewables Investment’
Opinion & Analysis: The future of wind energy
Reference Material: GE press release; Union of Concerned Scientists
Related Topics: ‘Spanish Energy Spin-off Takes Flight’
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General Electric Invests in Wind Power
by
findingDulcinea Staff
GE announces a multimillion-dollar investment in a wind turbine project. Business analysts debate the long-term prospects for green-energy ventures.
30-Second Summary
General Electric’s Energy Financial Services division has announced that it is buying up a major stake in Houston-based turbine company Horizon Wind. A press release on GE’s Web site puts the size of the investment at $350 million.
The GE/Horizon partnership plans to have turbine projects up and running in Minnesota and Oregon by the end of January. Turbines are due to go up in central Texas by mid-2008.
Pundits have lauded GE from both environmental and business standpoints.
Cassie Walker, a frequent blogger on green issues, has been following GE's interest in environmentally-friendly initiatives for many months. Last year, she wrote, “It would be nice if companies made changes to improve their footprint out of a concern for people and the environment, and a few companies do just that, but the business world is not designed to reward such behavior.”
For that reason, Walker concluded that GE’s increasing visibility in the green energy sector has to be a positive development.
Clint Wilder writes in The Huffington Post that while the economy as a whole may be sluggish for the next few months, green energy still looks like a solid investment. “Despite 2007's global credit woes, new investment in clean energy grew 41 percent last year,” Wilder wrote.
Other market watchers aren’t quite as bullish on green investments. In a Wall Street Journal article, Ken Lawler, a partner with Silicon Valley firm Battery Ventures, wrote, “There is a little bit of a bubble going on."
The GE/Horizon partnership plans to have turbine projects up and running in Minnesota and Oregon by the end of January. Turbines are due to go up in central Texas by mid-2008.
Pundits have lauded GE from both environmental and business standpoints.
Cassie Walker, a frequent blogger on green issues, has been following GE's interest in environmentally-friendly initiatives for many months. Last year, she wrote, “It would be nice if companies made changes to improve their footprint out of a concern for people and the environment, and a few companies do just that, but the business world is not designed to reward such behavior.”
For that reason, Walker concluded that GE’s increasing visibility in the green energy sector has to be a positive development.
Clint Wilder writes in The Huffington Post that while the economy as a whole may be sluggish for the next few months, green energy still looks like a solid investment. “Despite 2007's global credit woes, new investment in clean energy grew 41 percent last year,” Wilder wrote.
Other market watchers aren’t quite as bullish on green investments. In a Wall Street Journal article, Ken Lawler, a partner with Silicon Valley firm Battery Ventures, wrote, “There is a little bit of a bubble going on."
Headline Link: ‘GE Invests $300 Million in Houston-Based Power Firm’
General Electric Energy Financial Services announced a $300 million investment in Horizon Wind. In partnership with a subsidiary of banking giant Wachovia, GE will invest in a set of wind turbine projects in Minnesota, Oregon and Texas. Horizon Wind, which is headquartered in Houston, expects to have the Minnesota and Oregon projects up and running by the end of January. The Texas projects are scheduled for operation by mid-2008. “The Horizon investment is part of GE’s effort to increase its renewable energy investing goal for 2010 from $4 billion to $6 billion,” said Alex Urquhart, president and CEO of GE Energy Financial Services.
Source: Houston Chronicle
Background: ‘GE to Double Renewables Investment’
General Electric’s latest move into green energy investment is emblematic of an overall trend by business conglomerates to “capitalize on concerns over global warming and pollution.” GE has put over $3 billion towards renewable energy concerns, and Alex Urqhart, the president and CEO of GE’s energy investment wing, told the Financial Times that green energy was his division’s fastest-expanding interest.
Source: Financial Times (registration required)
Opinion & Analysis: The future of wind energy
Clint Wilder, blogger for The Huffington Post, says that clean energy is the next hot destination for venture capital. He cites data supplied by clean energy investment research firm New Energy Finance. The London-based company “found that despite 2007's global credit woes, new investment in clean energy grew 41 percent last year to blast past the $100 billion mark to $117.2 billion.” Wilder wraps up by saying that even though a recession may be likely in the medium term, clean energy still seems like a solid investment.
Source: The Huffington Post
As oil prices remain above $90 a barrel and more investors recognize the importance of cutting back greenhouse emissions, venture capitalists are rushing to invest in green energy initiatives. According to The Wall Street Journal, 2007 was the biggest year for spending on renewable energy since 2001. According to data from research firm Venture One, funds spent by venture capitalists on green energy doubled over the past two years. Some financiers aren’t so sanguine on the prospects for renewable energy initiatives, however. Ken Lawler, a partner with Silicon Valley firm Battery Ventures says, “There is a little bit of a bubble going on.”
Source: The Wall Street Journal (registration may be required)
Cassie Walker, a blogger on environmental issues, wrote on May 29, 2007, that green initiatives will only work if they help a company’s bottom line. “It would be nice if companies made changes to improve their footprint out of a concern for people and the environment, and a few companies do just that, but the business world is not designed to reward such behavior,” she wrote. Yet Walker concluded that GE’s forays into renewable energy can only be positive due to the company’s visibility and the potential impact of their large investments.
Source: Cassie Walker’s blog
Reference Material: GE press release; Union of Concerned Scientists
A press statement on General Electric’s Web site says that the company’s $350 million investment in the green energy project reflects “GE’s ecomagination initiative, a program to help its customers meet their environmental challenges while expanding its own portfolio of cleaner energy products.”
Source: General Electric
The Union of Concerned Scientists has a tutorial that explains how wind power works and provides a history of the use of wind power for energy. Wind power held great promise in the United States into the early 1990s, when utility industry deregulation deterred utility companies from funding alternative energy projects, and government subsidies were too small to meet the gap.
Source: Union of Concerned Scientists
Related Topics: ‘Spanish Energy Spin-off Takes Flight’
Iberdrola, Spain’s largest energy company, launched a spin-off of its wind energy unit, Iberdrola Renovables in December 2007.
Source: findingDulcinea
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