My Portfolio’s Latest Casualty And Addition
The Casualty Last Monday, I discussed how I had recently reviewed Railpower Tech with a view to potentially adding to my position on grounds that: (a) the company had a fair amount of cash in the bank, which reduced the need to go to capital markets for financing for a while; and (b) that it was getting badly battered by general market conditions, potentially offering an attractive entry point. Although my portfolio has taken a beating in recent weeks, I remain ready to take small positions in stocks if I feel they are being unfairly bashed, including in...
Microinverters Make a Move on Multi-MW Solar Power Installations
Tildy Bayar A microinverter from iEnergy Photovoltaic (PV) microinverters, traditionally used in smaller rooftop solar installations, are being used in a 2.3-MW commercial rooftop installation in Ontario, Canada, supplier Enphase Energy (ENPH) has announced. The installation is the largest commercial rooftop project under the province’s feed-in tariff (FiT). Analysis firm IHS Research has called the announcement a milestone in the microinverter segment’s progress towards establishing itself outside its biggest market, the U.S., and outside the residential solar segment. According to IHS’s analysis, PV microinverter shipments are forecast to exceed...
The Sector Information Technology Forgot
Tom Konrad CFA Information technology has mostly passed the energy sector by... but for how long? Information Technology revolutionized the way we buy things (Amazon, eBay), how we get information (Google, Wikipedia, the decline of newspapers), and how we interact with out peers (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn.) Yet so far, it has had little, if any transformative impact on energy. Tim Healy, CEO of EnerNOC (ENOC), the world's largest third party provider of Demand Response to utilities and grid operators, thinks that's about to change. Demand Response (DR) began decades ago with Interruptible loads and Interruptible rates,...
AMSC’s “Secret Sauce” Starts to Simmer
Market Heats Up for Disruption-Resistant SuperconductorsBy Joyce Pellino CraneWhen electrical transmission cables and tree branches glisten in brilliant sunlight, drop your camera and run to the nearest hardware store for a generator. I learned this hard lesson in December after an ice storm left downed wires, branches and debris throughout several counties northwest of Boston and across six other northeastern states, leaving one million without electricity, some for as long as two weeks. It will be a long time before I forget what it’s like to wrap holiday presents by a smoky fire with gloves on. American Superconductor’s (AMSC:...
List of Electric Grid Stocks
Electric grid stocks are publicly traded companies whose business involves electric infrastructure, including transmission, distribution, pricing, conversion, and regulation. Includes the list of smart grid stocks.
This article was last updated on 8/12/21.
ABB Ltd (ABB)
Advanced Energy Industries (AEIS)
AMSC (AMSC)
Avangrid, Inc. (AGR)
AZZ Incorporated (AZZ)
China Ruifeng Renewable Energy Holdings Ltd (0527.HK)
Companhia Paranaense de Energia - COPEL (ELP)
Custom Truck One Source, Inc. (CTOS)
Digi International (DGII)
Echelon Corporation (ELON)
EMCORE Group, Inc (EME)
ESCO Technologies, Inc. (ESE)
Fortis, Inc. (FTS, FTS.TO)
General Electric (GE)
Hammond Power Solutions Inc. (HPS-A.TO, HMDPF)
Hubbell, Inc. (HUB-B, HUB-A)
Itron (ITRI)
Landis+Gyr Group AG (LAND.SW)
MasTec Inc. (MTZ)
MYR Group Inc. (MYRG)
National Grid PLC (NGG)
Prysmian S.P.A (PRI.MI, PRYMF)
Quanta Services Inc...
Is the New Smart Grid ETF GRID All That Smart?
Tom Konrad, CFA First Trust Launched a Grid Infrastructure Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) on November 17th. Although the First Trust Nasdaq Clean Edge Smart Grid Infrastructure Index Fund (Nasdaq: GRID) is labeled a "Smart Grid" ETF to capture popular excitement around smart grid technology, it covers the whole grid infrastructure sector. This broader focus is good for clean energy investors. I've been an advocate of investing in electric transmission and smart gird stocks since early 2007, and for almost a year now, a regular reader has been telling me to create a transmission ETF so he can buy...
Grid-based Energy Storage: Widely Misunderstood Challenges and Opportunities
John Petersen The most widely misunderstood subject in the field of energy storage is the potential for grid-based applications. They fire the imagination because the grid is so pervasive and the need is so great. They also present immense challenges to storage technology developers because the fundamental economic value per unit of grid-based energy storage is very low. While the subject of grid-based storage provides rich fodder for media reports and political posturing, the reality bears little relation to the perception. On March 9th, Lux Research published a sorely needed reality check in a new report titled "Grid...
Congress Approves Billions in Energy Storage Incentives
On Friday, the House of Representatives and Senate passed H.R. 1, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 and sent the bill to President Obama for his signature. The impact on companies that manufacture advanced batteries and other energy storage devices will be staggering. The principal energy storage appropriations include: $2,000,000,000 for grants to manufacturers of advanced battery systems and vehicle batteries that are produced in the United States, including advanced lithium ion batteries, hybrid electrical systems, component manufacturers, and software designers; $4,500,000,000 for grants for “Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability” including activities to modernize the electric...
Discom-fort: Barriers to Renewables in India
by Ishaan Goel
Energy is crucial to India’s policy agenda. Millions of households are yet to gain reliable access to electricity, hampering their potential for economic growth. Severe pollution issues create widespread health problems. Renewables are prioritized as viable solutions across the political spectrum, with their low costs and ease of installation in remote regions. The current administration has ambitious plans for renewable energy (RE), targeting an almost 4x increase in installed capacity to 450 GW by 2030 and introducing a spate of tax and investment reforms.
At the heart of the Indian power supply chain lie distribution companies (discoms). The...
Transmission Stocks: Bringing Wind Power to Where it’s Needed
Last week, Charles told us to expect wind power industry suppliers to benefit from shortages in wind turbine components. Owens Corning (NYSE:OC) which I mentioned in my Blue Chip Alternative Energy Portfolio fits nicely into this category with their composites for turbine blades, as do the power converter stocks I mentioned two weeks ago. As essential to wind power as any of these is improved power transmission. The National Wind Coordinating Collaborative states, Electrical transmission facilities connecting windy areas and load centers are sometimes non-existent or minimal. Even in cases where a good wind resource has...
Welcome To The New World
Perhaps ironically, it took one of the worst financial and economic crises of the past three decades to bring "the grid" into investor focus. To be sure, certain alt energy aficionados such as Tom have been on this topic for a long time (Tom is actually the one who introduced me to the grid as an investment theme). However, it is fair to say that most investors, including alt energy investors, have not historically paid the grid a huge deal of attention. That is because most people outside of alt energy and VC circles held, until recently, the Old...
Ten Solid, Clean Companies Ready For Stimulus, and Five That Aren’t
by Tom Konrad Last February, I wrote " I expect the Fed-induced reprieve to be fairly short lived, ten solid companies I'd be happy to buy more of if and when the bottom really falls out of the market." When I wrote those words, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was over 12,700. Now, it's around 8,500, and I doubt anyone remembers the "Fed-induced reprieve" I was referring to. The "bottom fell out" in September and October. On October 12, with the DJIA at 8451, I wrote "I don’t know where the market will go from here, but I...
Hither and Yon: Transmission and Biofuels
In the most recent two installments of Energy Tech Stocks' interview with me cover my views on transmission stocks, and biofuel stocks. Readers of AltEnergyStocks know that I am a big fan of electricity transmission, a theme I keep coming back to. You also know that I have a very ambivalent relationship with both ethanol and biodiesel. So I liked Bill's transmission article, but I just wasn't able to convey to him the subtleties of how I feel about biofuels. But he got one thing right: the owners of biofuel feedstock are likely going to be the biggest winners....
PowerSecure on a Solar Roll
by Debra Fiakas CFA Last week PowerSecure International (POWR: Nasdaq) announced the award of orders valued at $100 million for new solar projects. About 15% of the work will be completed in the final quarter of this year and the rest of the revenue will be recorded in 2016. The announcement sent investors into a tizzy. PowerSecure reported $283.4 million in total sales for the twelve months ending March 2015, primarily for solar power infrastructure and smart grid technology destined for electric utilities and microgrids. Securing orders equivalent to 35% of its current revenue run rate...
Ten Solid Clean Energy Companies to Buy on the Cheap: #8 Quanta Services, Inc....
It may be a stretch to call a company with a P/E ratio in the high 30s "cheap," but in the case of Quanta Services (NYSE:PWR), it's a bargain. I won't repeat myself about why electric transmission and distribution (T&D) investments are a good bet. Put simply, the grid has been long neglected, and improved long distance transmission is essential to bringing large scale renewables such as solar and wind onto the grid. How does Quanta fit in? They build transmission line for utilities. When I ask industry insiders what company is best placed to actually string the wires...
Clean Energy Stocks Shopping List: Five Electricity Transmission Stocks
We may be headed into a renewed market slump. If so, it will pay to wait before buying, but when the time does come to buy, here are 5 electric transmission stocks I have my eye on. Tom Konrad, Ph.D., CFA On June 2, I wrote that I thought the market was near its peak. That day, the S&P 500 closed at 944.74. On June 12, it closed up 0.15% at 946.21, and has since trended down, currently trading down 5% as I write. I expect further declines this year, either with the market heading straight down from here,...
