General Electric Touts Its Greenness

May 30, 2007 – Vol.12 No.10

GENERAL ELECTRIC TOUTS ITS GREENNESS.

When a company sends out a bevy of press releases (eight) keyed to one particular subject matter (in this case green energy) they’re trying to catch the attention of the editors at media organizations including little operations like this one.

OK they win. A few words for GE.

--- In its Ecomagination initiative, revenues from its portfolio of “energy efficient and environmentally advantageous products and services” surged past $12 billion in 2006, up 20 percent from 2005. Its order backlog by the end of 2006 rose to $50 billion. Sales growth is on track to meet a goal of $20 billion in annual sales by 2010.

General Electric now has 45 products which it certifies as Ecomagination-worthy. That’s up from 30 products in 2005.

--- The company’s energy financial services unit, appropriately named GE Energy Financial Services, announced through GE’s now-annual Ecomagination report, that its investments in greener energy will avoid 3.9 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions per year. The unit also has promised to double its investments in renewable energy to $4 billion by 2010.

--- GE will partner with BP in the construction of five hydrogen-fueled, carbon-dioxide-capturing power plants.

The power plants of about 500 megawatts capacity each will run on hydrogen extracted from fossil fuels with petroleum coke or bituminous coal as feedstock for hydrogen. Extracted carbon dioxide will be pumped into oil reservoirs for sequestration and may assist in the recovery of previously unrecoverable oil. Up to 90 percent of the carbon dioxide from the reformation of the fossil fuels is expected to be captured and pumped underground.

The collaborative effort will be coordinated by BP’s new “Hydrogen Energy” division.

--- GE Energy Financial Services is making its first equity investment in Canada while diversifying its renewable energy portfolio. GE will invest up to CAN $112 million ($104 million) to acquire a 49 percent equity and 60 percent economic interest in the 196-megawatt East Toba River and Montrose Creek run-of-the-river hydro project in British Columbia being developed by Plutonic Power Corporation.

Run-of-the-river hydro projects are considered to have a low environmental impact because they do not require damming and water storage. Instead, flowing water is diverted, passed through a turbine generator, then returned to the river.

--- GE Energy Financial Services is also making new investments in traditional renewable energy: wind power.

The company unit, along with a subsidiary of Wachovia Corp., have each invested in the 209 megawatt, $300 million Roscoe Wind Farm. The investment will make GE and Wachovia partners with Airtricity of Dublin, Ireland which is currently building the project. Roscoe is Airtricity’s third and largest wind project in the US.

Roscoe is located in the West Texas counties of Mitchell, Nolan and Scurry. It will have 209, one-megawatt turbines from Mitsubishi and is scheduled to be online by the end of the year. GE and Airtricity are also collaborating on the operational 125-megawatt Forest Creek Wind Farm 25 miles southeast of Big Spring, Texas.

And that’s not all for GE Energy Financial Services’ Texas wind energy investments.

The company, again with a subsidiary of Wachovia, will invest $180 million for 50 percent of the structured equity in the 241-megawatt Sweetwater 4 and the 80-megawatt Sweetwater 5 projects. Sweetwater’s 4 and 5 had been fully owned by a partnership of Babcock & Brown and Catamount Energy. Together all the Sweetwater wind farms (1 through 5 ) will equal 585 megawatts.

With the new investments, GE Energy Financial Services now has 1900 megawatts in 29 wind farms in its wind-investment portfolio.

--- GE’s green portfolio also extends to energy from methane gas. One of the company’s ecomagination-certified Jenbacher landfill gas generators is powering the world’s first commercial landfill gas (LFG)-to-liquid natural gas (LNG) conversion facility designed specifically to create alternative fuel for vehicles.

Now being commissioned and operated by Prometheus Energy Company, the Jenbacher combustion generator provides the electricity needed in the gas compression and liquefaction stages of the LFG-to-LNG process.

The breakthrough landfill gas conversion facility is at the Frank R. Bowerman Landfill, located in Irvine, Orange County, approximately 40 miles south of Los Angeles,

The facility will initially produce approximately 5,000 gallons of LNG per day and, at full build-out, will produce more than 36,000 gallons of LNG per day. The LNG will be sold to mass transit and large vehicle fleets in the Los Angeles area.

Visit General Electric at http://www.ge.com/ GE Energy at http://www.gepower.com/ GE Energy Financial Services at http://www.geenergyfinancialservices.com/ The GE Ecomagination report at http://www.ecomagination.com/report Prometheus Energy Company at http://www.prometheus-energy.com/ Airtricity at http://www.airtricity.com/america/ and Plutonic Power at http://www.plutonic.ca/