The president of General Electric slams his previous company green policy as being “too elitist”, vows to get back to “working”. Maybe this will mean no more “green sin week” on GE owned TV networks.
His quote is similar to the headfirst smack into reality experienced this week by über greenist George Monbiot:
From Reuters: The head of the largest U.S. conglomerate, who in January was named a top adviser on job creation to U.S. President Barack Obama, said on Tuesday that GE’s focus on the environmentally friendly aspects of its wind turbines and high-efficiency appliances might have led his critics to believe he was more interested in saving the planet than growing the company.
“If I had one thing to do over again I would not have talked so much about green,” Immelt said at an event sponsored by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “Even though I believe in global warming and I believe in the science … it just took on a connotation that was too elitist; it was too precious and it let opponents think that if you had a green initiative, you didn’t care about jobs. I’m a businessman. That’s all I care about, is jobs.”
…
“I’m kind of over the stage of arguing for a comprehensive energy policy. I’m back to keeping my head down and working,” Immelt said.
h/t to junkscience.com
As a former GE employee I can tell you that GE cares about nothing except the bottom line. “Green” is only useful if it helps the bottom line. Period. If it starts to hurt thr bottom line, it will be thrown out faster than a speeding GE Hybrid Locomotive.
GE’s focus on the environmentally friendly aspects of its wind turbines and high-efficiency appliances might have led his critics to believe he was more interested in saving the planet than growing the company.
Someone can see which way the wind is blowing!
This has nothing to do with saving the environment and everything to do with the fact that companies spending their time saving the environment no longer get the public Kudos needed to make it worth wasting their time and effort on this green nonsense.
Translation: “Hey, we just realized that some of the things that will be done in the name of global warming would actually hurt our profitability.”
You’re not the first CEO/politician to figure that out Jeff.
Don’t worry, there is a new guy on the horizon. He will take GE back into products people want.
Mr Immelt is over.
Maybe his believe correlates with the success of the wind turbine business… Vestas approaches its 5 year low… probably prices are under heavy pressure.
Speed says:
May 5, 2011 at 10:34 am
“She’s goin’ down. Abandon Ship!”
Better yet, She’s going down. All you rats abandon ship!
Immelt, the king of government corporate welfare, what a low down, dirty four flusher.
woodNfish says:
May 5, 2011 at 11:22 am
“Immelt and GE are rent-seeking bastards. Please boycott GE. The same for Siemens and the rest of their ilk.”
That leaves you with no applicances. Well, you could buy Bosch, but Bosch bought Ersol, a solar company so they’re probably out as well… Have fun washing your cloths by hand.
“Even though I believe in global warming and I believe in the science…”
GE: “Imagination at work.” Only appropriate they should believe in imaginary climate change.
I recently bought a new washing machine. GE was my last choice. I asked the salesman for “the one with the biggest carbon footprint.” Unfortunately, I ended up with the GE. Hmm.
I believe in Global Warming! BRING IT ON!!! I hate snow.
Kum Dollison says:
May 5, 2011 at 10:37 am
A lot of us (myself included,) think Global Warming is a bunch of nonsense, but are very amenable to “Renewable” energy Technologies. We believe that, maybe it’s okay to spend an extra two or three cents per kilowatt/hr, now, in order to prepare for the day when fossil fuels really do begin to “run low.”
Not I, and I say no a thousand times no to paying extra for the inefficiency that is renewable energy (wind/solar).
Mr Immelt is an appropriate name for a Warmist.
What a heretic. Doesn’t he know that Green Energy means ‘jobs, jobs, jobs’?
Can’t let China get the jobs, jobs, jobs, Jeff, so suck it up and practice before the mirror a little more, before the EPA gets on your butt.
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The Board of Directors should use this opportunity to get rid of Immelt and change course toward real capitalism. He just admitted that what he was doing was the wrong thing. Any bozo can make bad decisions and would do it for much less $.
The fact that GE paid no income tax last year is a good indication where their efforts have been. They got enough special write-offs for their enviro shenanigans that they were able to hide billions of profits, thus in effect legally confiscating billions in taxpayers money. I object.
The cratered price of GE stock has been a disaster for thousands of GE employees who were paid in options. Immelt was largely responsible for the drop in stock value, yet still gets paid his outrageous salary. That just plays into the hands of socialists and other anti-capitalists, and is frankly hard to justify.
In the meantime, another trainload of BS (aka ethanol) just spilled it’s taxpayer funded load of misplaced environmentalism and is burning happily.
One appliance sales guy I talked said that every big-box store brand (GE, Kenmore, Electrolux, etc) are basically all the same Chinese crap with different names and features slapped on them. There are exceptions, but those exceptions are usually 3x as much.
It will take a lot more than this to convince me the corporatists at GE have given up their policy of making themselves rich by manipulating green hysteria. i.e. carbon markets.
Maybe that’s why they had no money left to invest in customer service.
When I began working on farms, it was pointed out to me that successful farmers never chased the latest farming fad and generally epitomised the term ‘conservative’ with a very small and nonppolitical ‘c’. One old hand explained that his own generally-acknowledged success as a farmer was down to doing the same things every season, but finding ways to do them better was always a challenge..
“Good farming is actually pretty dull – just the same old hard work every year!”
Many businesses are similar to farming; I guess Immelt forgot that and is paying the price for chasing irrelevant novelty.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v473/n7345/full/473031e.html
According to Nature, it’s rational to doubt official pronouncements (in certain circumstances only).
He looks like a liar to me since the bottom line should have been that all along because the reason for business is to make money. Given his job it can be assumed that is the reason he was hired. if the company is successful the jobs will follow.
How many have got religion on the gallows? How does he feel about those mercury loaded light bulbs he so eagerly promoted and is now mandatory because of his efforts without any consideration of what the population prefers and he had no problem forcing the US population into buying an unwanted product and ignoring the value of good will?
Back in the day, long, before GE went ballistically green, they produced one of the best high def projectors worth having at half the cost ten years before EU even got HDTV.
Now they produce crap of absolutely no use like propellers, literally, bending to the wind, with shorter lifespan than the older, way more complex hardware, that GE Imager projectors was.
What was it that really happened? Do they ponder today: Yay we got rid of all the pesky engineers, just like NASA, and look at us today . . . we’re ever so hip(pie).
Immelt only understands one kind of green and it’s not related to science. That said, I do wish GE well for selfish reasons. Still, I don’t support bailouts in general.
“Both Warren Buffett, and Jeff Immelt are betting the same way – that fossil fuels will get a lot more expensive. “Morality, and Ethics,” aside, I would feel uneasy betting against them.”
When an administration basically says that there will be no new drilling and there’s chaos in the old places, it’s no longer speculation that prices will rise it’s a license to print money.
Abandon ship !!!! AGW is going down.
This are warning signals for the rest of the pack. They will follow suit quickly now.
The game is over.
But it will last 5 to 10 years before we stop hearing this carbon tax bullshit from the most stupid politicians on this planet.
The politicians in Norway.
Considering the size of GE and considering that I paid more in taxes than GE last year, why would they want to change?
Chameleons are such fascinating creatures. This one won’t be looking Elite Green again. He is swearing it off for Head Down Business Bluedog.
Kum Dollison says:
May 5, 2011 at 11:18 am
Both Warren Buffett, and Jeff Immelt are betting the same way – that fossil fuels will get a lot more expensive
Warren Buffet’s railroad hauls 2.5 million rail cars of coal per year. I don’t think he believes his railroads biggest customer is going away anytime soon.