Last week, Southern Power – a subsidiary of electric utility company Southern Co. (SO) – announced its decision to build one of the country’s largest biomass power plants in eastern Sacul, Texas. Construction of the 100-megawatt plant is slated to commence this fall, with commercial operation projected for the summer of 2012.   As part of the project, Southern Power has agreed to acquire the Nacogdoches Power LLC biomass project from American Renewables LLC, a developer and operator of clean energy facilities utilizing biomass materials as fuels.   The power plant’s output has already been committed through a 20-year power purchase agreement with Austin Energy, the municipal utility owned by and serving Austin, Texas.   The plant, to be built over 165 acres, will use about 1 million tons of biomass materials (including forest residue, wood processing residues and municipal wood waste) annually as fuel, which is planned ...

China is Investing Billions in Renewable Energy One firm has already built China’s largest wind turbine manufacturing factory. And it’s working with the Chinese Science Academy to develop new wind, solar, and geothermal technologies… for which it will own 70% of the rights. But this company’s business reaches far beyond the Chinese border, with operations in Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Eastern Europe. It’s first quarter net income increased by 294% over a year ago. Click here for the full report.

The financial services industry in the United States and Europe is still reeling from the financial crisis, shedding tens of thousands of jobs each month – even a year after the crisis hit its apex.

However, recent evidence suggests that the financial services industry in Asia – particularly China, which was largely isolated from the toxic assets that caused the crisis – is starting to rebound.

Indeed, many …

In late January, Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM), the world’s most ubiquitous oil giant, capped off a whipsaw year in the global oil markets by reporting net income of $45.2 billion, an all-time record for corporate profits that shattered the former record it had set a year before.

The number was so big and the results beat Wall Street estimates by so much at a time when the credit crisis was wreaking havoc on so many other sectors that Oppenheimer & Sons (NYSE: OPY) oil analyst Fadel Gheit couldn’t help but quip that he didn’t think Exxon “will be lining up for any TARP money or government handout anytime soon.”

Exxon wasn’t the only heavyweight reaping the benefit of a zooming energy market that had seen crude oil climb to an all-time record of $147 a barrel in July. The combined revenue for

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Edison International (EIX) is a utility holding company operating through three principal subsidiaries: Southern California Edison Company, Edison Mission Energy, and Edison Capital.Consistent projected core earnings growth over the remainder of 2008 and fiscal 2009, driven by improved performance in unregulated power generation and energy trading, a solid base of stable utility operations, higher price realizations, ongoing alternative energy projects, balance sheet strength, and a relatively cheap earnings-based valuation collectively support our bullish outlook for Edison International. These are partially offset by volatile gas prices, regulatory risk regarding rate hikes and recovery of capital expansion costs.Accordingly, we maintain our BUY recommendation on EIX common stock with a six-month target price of $36.00. Price appreciation to our near-term valuation, coupled with the stock's recently increased $0.31 per share quarterly dividend which we view as very sustainable and secure given low projected payouts represents annualized total ...