GE makes another big wind buy

It's the second major wind investment announced by General Electric in two days (see yesterday's GE places big bet on French wind co. Theolia.)

GE Energy Financial Services, a unit of GE (NYSE: GE), announced today that it has committed to invest in a 410-megawatt wind farm portfolio, among its single largest wind investments.

The company has committed to invest approximately $270 million for 70 percent of the Class A equity, with a subsidiary of Wachovia Corp. providing the balance, in six wind farms in California, Illinois, New Mexico and Pennsylvania, until now wholly owned by affiliates of global investment and advisory firm Babcock & Brown.

The portfolio consists of:

• Aragonne Mesa (90 megawatts) in Guadalupe County, New Mexico. Built with Mitsubishi 1000A turbines, it sells electricity to Arizona Public Services.
• Allegheny Ridge I and II, (80 and 70 megawatts respectively), in Pennsylvania’s Cambria and Blair counties. FirstEnergy Solutions, a subsidiary of FirstEnergy Corp., has contracted to purchase the output of the two wind farms, which use Gamesa G87 turbines.
• GSG (80 megawatts), in Illinois’ Lee and LaSalle counties. Using Gamesa G87 turbines, the output will be sold at market prices.
• Mendota Hills (52 megawatts), in Lee County, Illinois. The wind farm uses Gamesa G52 turbines and will sell output at market prices.
• Buena Vista (38 megawatts), in the Altamont Pass area of Northern California. The output is contracted to PG&E Corporation and uses Mitsubishi 1000A turbines.

All the wind farms have either been completed or will be completed by the end of April, except Allegheny Ridge II, which is expected to be finished by December.

The six wind farms combined will annually produce electrical energy estimated to be sufficient to power 100,000 homes.

With this transaction, GE Energy Financial Services has invested or committed to invest equity in 25 wind farms, bringing the total capacity of its wind equity holdings globally to more than 1,300 megawatts.

With $13 billion in assets, GE Energy Financial Services, based in Stamford, Connecticut, invests more than $5 billion annually in two of the world's most capital-intensive industries, energy and water.

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