The Go-Go Days of Wind Energy Are So Over

Who was the biggest name in wind energy during the go-go days of renewable energy? If GE was not number one, I'm not sure who was (Siemens, overseas, was bigger, I believe; but in the US, it was GE).

Any news lately about GE and wind? Thought not.

Any news where GE is headed?

Back on February 14, 2011, MDW had a huge story about GE diversifying into oil.

Now today it is being reported that GE will buy an oil service company, Lufkin, paying a $25 premium for this $60 company. There are two story lines here.

First, this tells me that the oil industry revolution is just beginning. A company doesn't pay this kind of premium without expecting a like return.

Don alerted me to the second story line which I completely missed: this is simply another sign that the go-go days of wind energy are over. It should be noted that the CEO of GE, Jeff Immelt, is Mr Obama's economic adviser.

If there are a dozen nails in a coffin, the Merkel/German/wind story yesterday was worth about seven (7) nails. The fact that GE no longer talks about wind but pays a $24 premium for a $60 oil service company is worth another two or nails in that wind coffin.

By the way, a bit of trivia. This is not an investment site, but I pride myself in posting a lot of ideas for investors. I mentioned Lufkin some months ago.  This reminds me of the folks who made money in gold country during the gold rush by selling jeans and shovels.

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Wind tower collapse
I couldn't decide between a video of dancing at the Hollywood Whiskey A Go-Go or this wind tower video. Both seemed catastrophic so I went with this one. For a transcription/translation of the audio, see below.

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I sent this e-mail to Don earlier. Some relevance to GE paying a $24 premium for a $60 oil-service stock.

GE paying this much of a premium for an oil services company tells me there is still a lot of upside in the oil sector. I was working on a post last night for today discussing Kaiser-Francis, American Eagle (Dick Findley), Harold Hamm, oil reserves in the Bakken, and oil reserves in Saudi's largest oil field, but I couldn't finish it/post it because I got well beyond my comfort zone.

The thesis is that day in / day out, the oil men (like Harold Hamm and Dick Findley) know how much oil is in the Bakken, but the average investor and the average North Dakotan cannot comprehend the magnitude of the Bakken and only when they look back ten years from now they will realize it was all obvious.

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A transcription/translation of the Danish audio from the above video:

• First engineer, supervisor, inside ops center: Okay, slow her down.
• Second engineer, on site, very loud voice: Oh, my goodness. Not good.
• Third engineer, inside ops center, monitoring oscilloscope: That did not sound good. Is it stopping?
• Long pause.
• Third engineer, repeating: Is it coming to a stop?
• Second engineer: Yes.
• First engineer, after a very, very long pause, almost inaudible: time for lunch.

Disclaimer: knowing no Danish, I cannot guarantee the accuracy of the translation.