General Electric Scales Back Cleantech Goals; Spent $7.14 million on Lobbying in 1Q (GE)

Where's the ecoimagination?
From Reuters:

General Electric Co (GE.N) abandoned its $25 billion sales target for its energy-saving products, but said it would double its investment in cleantech research and development.

The largest U.S. conglomerate said on Thursday that it now aims to grow sales of green products, which last year hit $18 billion, at twice the rate of overall corporate sales. In its annual "Ecomagination" report, the company backed off from an ambitious goal of $25 billion in annual revenue by 2010 that it had set last year.

"Going forward, we're looking at a more sustainable, continuous commitment on revenue growth as opposed to a one point in time out into the future when so many things can change," said Steve Fludder, vice president of the Ecomagination push, which encompasses a range of GE products, from wind turbines to fuel-efficient jet engines.

GE has stopped giving investors specific profit and revenue targets, instead providing a "framework" of how it expects its various businesses to perform. Analysts, on average, expect GE's 2010 revenue to be roughly flat with 2009 level and to decline about 1 percent in 2011, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Ecomagination revenues, which stood at about $6 billion in 2004, rose 6 percent last year. The company last year adopted the $25 billion by 2010 goal, which it described as a "stretch" goal and replaced an earlier $20 billion by 2010 target....MORE

One of the problems with political capitalism, ya gotta have the politicians. Not that they aren't trying.
From the AP:

General Electric Co. spent $7.14 million during the first quarter lobbying the federal government on issues ranging from defense spending to health care legislation.

The conglomerate, which operates businesses in most of the economy's major sectors, spent well more than the $4.54 million it devoted to lobbying in the year-ago quarter and the $6.8 million it spent during the fourth quarter of 2009.

That's likely due to the fact that several major bills and spending proposals in Washington earlier this year affected GE's operations....

...Among the other issues that GE lobbied on were water-related legislation and funding for research of wind power, solar power and electric vehicles. The company, which also owns the NBC network that it is selling to Comcast Corp., also lobbied on matters related to broadcasting....MORE