Reuters (1/19, Stephenson) reports that Chinese President Hu Jintao, who is in the US for a four-day visit, has also brought business deals and purchasing commitments, according to announcements from a Chinese business delegation and the US government. The Department of Energy said that Alcoa Inc. and China Power Investment Corp. will collaborate on aluminum and clean-energy projects that could lead to as much as $7.5 billion in investments, while Duke Energy Corp., AES China, a subsidiary of Virginia-based AES Corp, and Florida's UPC Management also entered into clean- or renewable-energy projects with Chinese companies. The DOE also said that American Electric Power Co. signed an agreement with State Grid Corp. of China to collaborate on energy-storage, smart-meter and other technologies. And battery maker Ener1 created a joint venture with Wanxiang Group to make batteries for electric vehicles for sale in China, according to the DOE.
The AP (1/19) also covers the deals announced Tuesday, including a deal "to research and build new cleaner-energy infrastructure in China as part of a government summit in Washington." Babcock & Wilcox Co. "said it entered a research consortium with Duke, General Electric and West Virginia University to develop new 'clean coal,' equipment," as part of the US-China Clean Energy Research Center. The consortium will also include Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Los Alamos National Laboratory, and National Energy Technology Laboratory.
The Wall Street Journal (1/19, A9, Davis, Tracy) also reports the announcement of these deals, which also included a joint venture between GE Energy and China's Shenhua Group Corp. to sell clean-coal technology.
Bloomberg News (1/19, Layne) adds that GE Energy was also expected "to sign a five-year agreement...with China's Huadian Corp. that should result in the sale of 50 aero-derivative turbine generator sets." The article explains that "the generator sets, which produce electricity from a variety of fuels, re-use waste gas, heat and steam that would ordinarily escape, thus conserving raw materials. GE is targeting waste-heat as an alternative for cleaner burning fuel in China, the world's biggest user of coal."
