Energy Efficiency

By Jeff Siegel It's all about the money. I don't care how you slice it  when it comes to investing, personal politics are irrelevant. This has long been how I've approached wealth creation, and it works quite well. Even as I denounced the continued reliance on outdated and economically inferior energy and transportation systems (i.e. the internal combustion engine and tar sands production), I make no apologies for profiting from new opportunities in fossil fuels. My gains in shale over the past few years alone are reason enough to stick to this strategy. Of course, when I'm given...

by Debra Fiakas CFA There's Platinum in them catalytic converters. Mention platinum and most of us think about beautiful and expensive jewelry.  However, platinum can be found in the dullest of products.  Catalytic converters used in automobiles for emissions control represent about one-third of the demand for platinum. The devices attached to the rear of our cars uses a mix of previous metals to remove nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide and hydrocarbons from engine exhaust.  The catalytic converter on a typical car uses a gram or less of platinum,...

Joel Makower If you start with the premise that many of the solutions to our global sustainability challenges require smart design and systems thinking, it doesn’t take long before you find your way to Autodesk (ADSK). The 29-year-old design software company has made a series of impressive moves into the sustainability realm over the past few years. It’s one of those largely unheralded companies creating the tools used by architects, designers, manufacturers, and most recently cleantech entrepreneurs to produce the next generation of greener, cleaner, more efficient products. Over the past year or so, I've had...

by Debra Fiakas CFA One of the companies in our novel alternative energy indices is Forcefield Energy, Inc.  (FNRG:  Nasdaq).  For a time it was listed as among alternative chemical products and now is included among waste-to-energy developers, but it could be as easily included in our data base among sellers of LED lighting products.  The identify confusion is due in part to Forcefield’s own description, which includes a laundry list of capabilities and technologies. The company lays claim to proprietary products for heat recovery and the conversion of waste heat to useful purpose.  Forcefield comes by...

When incandescent light bulbs are phased out in the United States between 2012 to 2014, managers of utility Demand Side Management (DSM) programs will be between a rock and a hard place.  At the Southwest Energy Efficiency Project's 5th annual Energy Efficiency Workshop, this fact seemed to be the elephant in the room that most of the utility executives in attendance did not want to talk about. One Trick Pony It's not for nothing that the compact fluorescent bulb, or CFL, has become the international symbol of energy efficiency.  While it is true that we're not going to stop...

Tom Konrad, CFA Baldor Electric Company stands to benefit from new Federal energy efficiency standards and other efforts to improve industrial energy efficiency. One of the lesser-known provisions of the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA) will be to require efficiency standards for the majority of industrial electric motors.  This will be a boon for motor manufacturers when EISA comes into effect in December 2010: efficient motors require higher quality materials and manufacturing, and so can be sold for higher margins.  A major beneficiary of this transition will be Baldor Electric (NYSE:BEZ).  Baldor is...

Lunch with an Efficiency Expert Yesterday, I had lunch with Howard Geller, Ph.D., one of our nation's leading experts in energy efficiency and energy policy. Howard is the director of the Southwest Energy Efficiency Project (SWEEP), former Executive Director of ACEEE, and has a Doctorate in Energy Policy from the University of Sao Paulo in Brazil. My first question for industry experts is which companies are doing good things in their feilds, and I was especially interested in Howard's answers because energy efficiency is so much more difficult to pin down than most other types of...

It's no longer breaking news, Deloitte released earlier this week the results of two surveys, one of state public utility regulators and one of residential electricity consumers (both PDF documents). Deloitte's interpretation of the results can be found here. The results have also been interpreted by two prominent alt energy/environmental blogs: the WSJ's Environmental Capital and Grist. The former argues that policy-makers and 'smart-money' are out of whack with the little guy, because the little guy simply isn't willing to pay for solutions to climate change out of his electricity bill. The latter, looking at the same data,...

Tom Konrad CFA When Lime Energy (NASD:LIME) reported accounting problems, including the possibility of fictitious revenue on July 17th, investors abandoned the stock, unwilling to own a company in which they knew the financial statements to be misstated.   Over the next two weeks, Lime found a floor around $0.90 (down from over $2 on July 16th), as those investors who would sell at any price were replaced by those who, like me, feel that $0.90 is less than any reasonable estimate of LIME’s true value even in liquidation. Volume then dried...

LED lighting stocks are publicly traded companies involved in the manufacture or deployment of efficient LED lighting technology. AIXTRON SE (AIXA.DE) Acuity Brands (AYI) Amtech Systems Inc (ASYS) Applied Materials (AMAT) Carmanah Technologies Corporation (CMH.TO, CMHXF) Cree, Inc. (CREE) Energy Focus (EFOI) EPISTAR corporation (2448.TW) Koninklijke Philips N.V. (PHG) Lighting Science Group Corporation (LSCG) Lime Energy (LIME: Nasdaq) LSI Industries Inc. (LYTS) Orion Energy Systems, Inc (OESX) Osram Licht AG (OSAGF, OSR.DE) Neo-Neon Holdings Limited (1868.HK) Revolution Lighting Technologies, Inc. (RVLT) Rubicon Technology, Inc. (RBCN) SemiLEDs Corporation (LEDS) Trans-Lux Corporation (TNLX) Universal Display(OLED) Veeco Instruments Inc. (VECO) Zumtobel Group (ZMTBF: OTC or ZAG.VI) If you know of any LED lighting stock that is not listed here and should be, please let us know...

On Monday, I told readers that I was getting out of companies some which I feel are likely to need to raise new money over the next couple years.  I also provided a list of stocks I will be buying when I judge we're near the bottom.  This is the first in a series of short articles about those stocks.  Carmanah Technologies (CMHXF) I've mentioned Carmanah Technologies (CMHXF) in passing in articles about LED companies.  I first became interested in Carmanah in 2005. The company's integrated LED-solar lighting solutions caught my attention because they were (and are) economic regardless...

by Debra Fiakas CFA Shares of Appliance Recycling Centers of America (ARCI:  Nasdaq) has trended downward over the last year, despite some strong fundamental progress in the company’s position the recycling sector.  The corporate name tells at least part of the company’s story.  Besides recycling appliances such as washers, dryers and refridgerators, ARC also sells new and like-new appliances right out of the box.  The company has eighteen stores branded ApplianceSmart across the country.  Services to electric utilities and other energy companies related to energy efficiency programs provide yet another revenue source. In the twelve months ending March 2017, ARC reported...

Lighting Science Group Corp. (LSGP.OB) announced an order for 1,000 of Lighting Science's Optimized Digital Lighting(TM) (ODL(TM)) Low Bay lighting fixtures from Amtech Lighting Services, an ABM Industries Incorporated subsidiary, which is one of the nation's largest lighting management companies. Lighting Science expects to begin shipping the products during the second quarter for installation in select garages operated by AMPCO System Parking, another ABM subsidiary, and in AMPCO client garages. The nation's estimated 40,000 garage facilities provide an excellent platform for Lighting Science to launch their low bay fixtures given the high cost of electricity and the demand...

by Debra Fiakas CFA On Friday Rubicon Technology, Inc. (RBCN:  Nasdaq) announced the appointment of a new chief operating officer to manage the company’s sapphire materials production.  Rubicon is a producer of materials used in electronics components, including the company’s specialty, monocrystalline sapphire materials.   Rubicon chose a seasoned operator for the COO post, which now encompasses functions previously carried about by managers in two different positions.  The new hire, Hany Tamim, was previously with SunEdison (SUNE:  Nasdaq), the developer and producer of solar cells and modules.  He has experience in managing crystal growth and...

By Jeff Siegel Hannon Armstrong (NYSE:HASI), one of my top picks for 2014, just made me very happy. Yesterday, the company announced its Q2 Core Earnings of $4.7 million or $0.22 per share. On a GAAP basis, the Company recorded net income of $2.9 million. Here are some other highlights. . . Raised approximately $70 million in April, 2014 in a follow-on offering. Increased the flexibility and expanded the capacity of its existing credit facility by $200 million. Completed more than $200 million worth of transactions, including the acquisition of a $107 million portfolio of land...

Tom Konrad CFA On April 18th, Hannon Armstrong Sustainable Infrastructure Capital (NYSE:HASI) IPOed on the New York Stock Exchange.  HASI is one of only two publicly traded Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) dedicated to sustainable infrastructure.   The other such sustainable REIT is Power REIT (NYSE:PW), which I have written about extensively.  PW is both illiquid and involved in significant litigation, two factors which may put off the conservative investors who gravitate towards REITs.  In December, Power REIT purchased the land...