GE Official Touts Steam Turbine Unit
By Larry Rulison, Albany Times Union, N.Y.
Jul. 9–ALBANY — General Electric Co.’s commitment to its operations in Schenectady was on display here Tuesday as more than 300 people packed a downtown hotel conference room to hear about the company’s steam-turbine business.
Schenectady is where the company manufactures steam turbines used in various power plants and industrial settings around the globe. The historic industrial campus, which also is also home to GE’s renewable energy business, employs 3,200 people.
Steve Bolze, vice president of power generation for GE Energy, told attendees at GE’s Steam Turbine & Generator Users Conference that the company is bullish on steam turbines and is pumping a lot of cash into the business.
That is one reason GE decided to move the conference this year from Atlanta, where GE Energy is based, to the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Albany.
As part of the three-day event, which ends Thursday, GE is taking attendees on tours of the plant, as well as its research and training facilities in Niskayuna.
"It’s really where the company started," Bolze told the crowd. "Edison started here in Schenectady."
It’s hard to know exactly how much GE is investing in the steam-turbine business and Schenectady. Bolze did not reveal those figures, although he said the business is as vibrant as he has seen since he came to Schenectady in 1995. The company has added 750 jobs in Schenectady over the past year.
"It’s an even more exciting business today," said Bolze, who also worked for GE in Europe before returning to Schenectady in 2005. "We’re spending even more money now than last year."
The company also has a successful gas-turbine business based in South Carolina that supports natural gas power plants. Steam turbines are used for coal and oil plants and in combination with gas turbines in combined-cycle plants.
Nuclear plants also use steam turbines and if more nuclear plants are built, that could be a big market for GE. GE Energy also has said it is supplying steam turbines for 50 biomass power plants being built in China that will run on rice husk, straw and animal manure.
GE Energy had $22 billion in sales last year, and that number is expected to grow as the world’s demand for electricity grows by 50 percent by 2025. Markets such as India, China and the Middle East offer huge opportunities.
As a result, GE has been doubling and tripling its budgets for engineering talent and technical programs throughout the power-generation business over the past three years.
"We’re investing," Bolze said. "This is a lot of money. And this is people. These are people in the U.S." Rulison can be reached at 454-5504 or by e-mail at lrulison@timesunion.com.
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