General Electric has announced that it has signed three contracts to sell about $2.7 billion in gas and steam turbine equipment to the North African nation of Algeria.
Generator sales have been weak since the recession... but things are changing. Schenectady GE -- which employs over a thousand hourly workers -- will manufacture 12 steam turbines for six new power plants being built for Algeria's state-owned utility.
26 gas turbines -- which work hand-in-hand with steam turbines in combined cycle power plants to maximize output -- will be made at GE's Greenville, S.C., factory: the 38 generators needed for the turbines will also be made in Schenectady. The Algerian order will keep GE busy for two years or more. The end result: Algeria's power generating capacity will be boosted by a whopping 70 per cent.
