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GE plans $100M battery plant
for
Schenectady
Monday, July 27,
2009
The Business Review (
Albany
) – By
Pam Allen
General Electric Co. plans to
build its $100 million battery manufacturing center on the GE Energy
campus in
Schenectady
,
N.Y.
The plant has a scheduled opening of 2011 and would create 350
jobs.
IUE-CWA Local 301—a union of 1,250 GE workers—must first
ratify a labor contract by Aug. 7 before the building plans are finalized.
GE and
Schenectady
County
are working on a financial incentive package that also needs to be
completed before GE moves forward with the battery plant, said Chris
Horne, a GE spokeswoman.
She declined to release specifics about those incentives.
Both matters should be finalized in the next couple weeks, Horne
said.
The tentative labor agreement provides a voluntary retirement
program for eligible employees, an extended plant shut-down next summer,
temporary layoffs based on business volume, and no permanent work-force
reductions through June 2010, Horne said.
The recession has “significantly” impacted GE’s energy
business. “It’s ultimately resulted in reduced demand for next
year,” Horne said. "We have to address our volume issues to remain
competitive, but the tentative agreement does it in a way that saves jobs
and even creates new ones."
GE reviewed “scores of sites” in the Capital Region before
deciding on the
Schenectady
campus, said Ray Gillen, chairman of the Schenectady
Metroplex Development Authority.
GE’s newest commitment situates
Schenectady
as a major player in the field of renewable energy, Gillen said. GE’s
Schenectady
plant produces turbines and is also headquarters for GE’s renewable
energy business.
“This would position us as one of the stronger renewable energy
clusters in world,” Gillen said. The plant would produce sodium-based
battery storage systems for GE’s (NYSE: GE) newly formed battery
business.
New York
state will pay $15 million toward the manufacturing center:
$12.5 million through Empire State Development’s Jobs Now program and
$2.5 million through the New York State Research and Development
Authority.
GE already has more than $150 million invested in advanced
battery technologies. The “advanced” battery business is expected to
generate $1 billion over the next decade, GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt said when
news of the battery center was announced earlier this year at GE’s Global Research Center in
Niskayuna
.
“We think the market will be huge,” he said at the May news
conference.
GE’s battery business falls under GE Transportation and will serve
the rail, marine, telecommunications and energy sectors, including new
“smart grid” technology. GE has research and/or product divisions in
all of those markets. The first product from the battery facility will be
GE’s hybrid locomotive, which will be commercialized in 2010.
The batteries made at the factory will be capable of producing
900 megawatt-hours of energy a year, or the equivalent of the battery
power required for 45,000 plug-in hybrid electric vehicles.
GE is also waiting to hear if it will qualify for federal
stimulus money through the U.S. Department of Energy. The company
submitted a grant application earlier this year. Immelt said GE will build
the battery facility with or without the grant.
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