Wind

Avoiding the Rush Whenever there is a gold rush, the people who make the real money are seldom the gold miners, but rather the suppliers to the miners that come home with the lion's share of the profits.   This is not because there is not an incredible amount of money to be made in mining gold, but because the nature of a gold rush is that too many optimistic miners are encouraged by the early profits of a few to rush to pursue too few opportunities. To many, the rush into solar stocks seems to be just...

Tom Konrad CFA Offshore Wind in the United States Last week, the long-embattled Cape Wind project got a break: Utility NStar(NST) agreed to buy 27.5% of the proposed offshore wind project's output.  Together with a previous power purchase agreement with National Grid (NGG), this gives Cape Wind a buyer for 77.5% of the project's total projected output.  Jim Gordon, Cape Wind's President speaking at Offshore Wind Power USA in Boston, called the NStar deal the "starting gun" for Cape Wind's financing round. Yet speakers and attendees at Offshore Wind Power USA agreed that the Cape Wind story...

Western Wind Energy (WND.V) is pleased to announce the execution of a formal power purchase agreement with the Southern California Edison Company ("Edison") for the procurement by Edison, from the Company, of up to 120 megawatts of wind powered electrical generation. The agreement is for a period of 20 years. The location of the wind energy facilities will be the famous Tehachapi Pass Wind Park. Tehachapi Pass is the site to over 4,600 wind turbine generators delivering over 1.4 trillion watt hours of energy from 670 megawatts of name-plate capacity.

A Great Deal for Plutonic Shareholders, Not bad for Magma Tom Konrad CFA As a shareholder of Magma Energy Corp. (MGMXF.PK), I'm reading through the joint information circular on the proposed merger of Plutonic Power Corp (PUOPF.PK) and Magma to form "Alterra Power Corp." I'm not thrilled with the merger, although I plan to vote for it, now that it's arranged. Overall, I think the merged Alterra will be a stronger company than either company alone. Both companies are in capital intensive niche Renewable Energy industries, so the added scale and diversification of Alterra should better...

by Debra Fiakas CFA Two weeks ago wind tower builder Broadwind Energy (BWEN:  Nasdaq) announced $28 million in new orders.  Plans are to deliver all the towers within the year, giving a nice boost to the top-line for a company that recorded $170.3 million in sales over the last reported twelve months, well below the same period the year before.  In addition to wind towers, the company produces gearing mechanisms used in the oil, gas and mining industries.  Unfortunately, demand from these customers has been weak in recent periods. The company has had some difficulty in establishing...

In the face of a declining overall energy market today, three of our favorite alternative energy stocks posted strong gains on high volume. The Oil Services HOLDRs ETF (OIH) was down 2% and the PowerShares WilderHill Clean Energy ETF (PBW) was down 1.7%. Indeed, the vast majority of the energy stocks that we track were in the red. But bucking the trend were two energy stocks that we have profiled in the recent past and a third company that we will begin covering today. First on the list is our favorite wind energy play, Welwind Energy International...

Wind advocates like to say "The wind's always blowing somewhere" to counter concerns about the variability of wind power.  This is true, and it means that wind can always be relied on to produce some power, but that does not mean that wind can always meet demand.  In the United States' Great Plains wind belt, wind is typically anticorrelated with demand, meaning that, unless we can shift demand to times when the wind is strong, either through time of use rates or demand planning, overall energy production from wind will not be able to exceed 25-35% of overall demand...

by William Gregozeski, CFA China Ruifeng Renewable Energy Holdings Limited is a holding company with ownership interests in three energy-related businesses.  Its current focus is on wind farm operations, via its majority holdings in Hongsong, a long established wind farm, and Langcheng, a greenfield wind farm (after various purchases and sales of ownership interests it will own 85.36% of the two wind farms on a beneficial level and 68.17% on a direct equity level.  These wind farms have a current installed capacity of 398.4MW, and are expected to increase to 1,190.4MW by the end of 2017.  It...

Update:You can find a comparison of FAN with PWND. a more recent wind ETF here. Since I last covered clean energy mutual funds and ETFs, the sector has seen the launch of two solar ETFs (KWT the Market Vectors Solar Energy ETF from VanEck,  and TAN, the Claymore/MAC Global Solar Energy ETF.)   Continuing in the tradition of cute ticker symbols, First Trust's new global wind energy ETF is FAN. I recommend that investors stay away from the (very expensive) green energy mutual funds, and invest either in one of the ETFs, or if they have...

Without a doubt, ethanol and solar are the 2 alt energy categories that have attracted the most investor attention in North America in the past few years, and that is because they are the 2 categories that feature the most US-listed stocks. However, despite its comparatively lower profile as an asset class, investors should not forget about wind power! On January 18th, Emerging Energy Research published a short study on the growth of wind power in China. For 2006, China installed 1,040 MW of new wind capacity, making it the 5th country in the world in terms...

FPL Group Inc (FPL) wind farms continue to help meet the growing need for pollution-free electricity in Pennsylvania while providing new economic opportunities for local communities and the state. FPL Energy's five Pennsylvania wind farms, with a capacity of 129 megawatts, are capable of generating electricity for nearly 37,000 homes. In 2004, the wind farms offset generation emissions totaling about 192,000 tons of carbon dioxide; nearly 1,400 tons of sulfur dioxide and more than 300 tons of nitrogen oxide.

Renewable energy like wind and solar power and hydrogen fuel cells could blossom into a $100 billion a year global market in less than a decade as technology costs fall, according to a study. The combined market for "green" sources of energy has already grown 68 percent since 2002 to more than $16 billion last year, according to Clean Edge, a research and publishing firm based in California. You can view and download the complete Clean-Energy Trends report at the following link.

The global wind energy industry is expected to enjoy continued strong growth in coming years with total installed capacity seen more than tripling from current levels by 2014, an industry survey showed on Tuesday. Over the next eight years, international installed capacity is expected to increase to about 210,000 megawatts from today's installed total of about 59,000 megawatts, a study by the German Wind Energy Institute (DEWI) showed.

Tom Konrad CFA Owning a wind farm is about to become a lot less risky. Wind power is cheap, clean, uses no water, and emits no pollutants.  Yet wind is far from a perfect source of electricity, since the wind blows when and where it will.  While wind power will never be as constant as baseload power, geographic diversification and better dispatch procedures can go a long way to mitigate the problems to utilities caused by wind's variability.  Yet wind farm developers and financiers are at the mercy of the weather in their...

In order to take full advantage of the recent Congressional extension of the federal Production Tax Credit (PTC) for wind generation, Xcel Energy yesterday filed a request with the Colorado Public Utilities Commission to further expedite a company bidding process for new wind power in the state. On Aug. 11, 2004, the Colorado Public Utilities Commission gave Xcel Energy (XEL) permission to issue a "Request of Proposal" for up to 500 megawatts of renewable energy expected to primarily be wind under the company's overall resource planning process. The bidding process for this wind power began the...

David Appleyard A dramatic turnaround in the wind technology supply chain could bring opportunities for qualified suppliers, finds research by BTM Consultant ApS. Over the past five years the whole of the wind technology supply chain has been in flux. The industry has seen a dramatic turnaround, with a negative supply situation for some key components and materials transformed into the current position, with a significant supply surplus. We present the key findings of the latest BTM Consult Supply Chain Assessment report. Slower than expected economic recovery in the U.S., combined with the eurozone sovereign...