Inside SunEdison's Acquisition Bonanza

Energy Gang

Wood Mackenzie

Tech News, Environment, Sustainability, Innovation, Renewable Energy, Technology, Alternative Energy, Energy, News, Cleantech, Wind Energy, Business, Climate Change, Solar Energy

4.6 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 23 July 2015

⏱️ 49 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

SunEdison is on a mission to become one of the biggest energy companies in the world – built entirely on renewables. It still has a ways to go. SunEdison has a $9 billion market capitalization. The two biggest oil companies, PetroChina and ExxonMobil, are worth $376 billion and $342 billion respectively. And Duke Energy, America’s largest utility, has a market cap of $50 billion. But with a slew of billion-dollar acquisitions of wind and solar companies – most recently Vivint Solar -- SunEdison believes it is on the path to rivaling the world’s supermajors. "We are building the next generation of the biggest energy companies on earth," said Julie Blunden, SunEdison's chief strategy officer, this week after announcing plans to buy Vivint Solar for $2.2 billion. In this week’s show, we will discuss SunEdison’s business strategy and ask if the company is on a sustainable growth path. In the second half of the show, we’ll talk about a new report showing renewables outpacing nuclear power, and look at a scientific study of climate records that were shattered in 2014. This podcast is sponsored by ReneSola, a Tier 1 solar cell and module manufacturer with a decade of experience in the cleantech industry. The Energy Gang is produced by Greentechmedia.com. The show features weekly discussions between energy futurist Jigar Shah, energy policy expert Katherine Hamilton and Greentech Media Editor Stephen Lacey. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Transcript

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0:00.0	The Energy Gang is brought to you by Rennesola America, a Tier 1 solar module producer and LED light manufacturer with a decade of experience in the clean tech industry.
0:10.0	Rennesola is your complete procurement provider of clean energy solutions.
0:15.2	The company has a proven track record of being a partner for project developers looking
0:19.2	to maximize their return on investments.
0:21.9	Call 415-852-74-21 to find your local
0:27.6	representative or head on over to their website at renasolar. US. at Renaissance
0:35.4	for the week of July 23rd 2015 this is the energy Gang from Green Tech Media. Welcome to the show. I'm Stephen Lacy in Washington, D.C. I'm a senior editor with Green Tech Media and you are regular host.
0:56.4	This week, Sun Edison is making a bid to be the world's first renewable energy super major.
1:01.8	We'll talk about the company's plan to buy Vivant Solar,
1:04.0	the second biggest residential PV installer in the US for 2.2 billion dollars.
1:08.6	And just a little aside here before I mention the first or the other two topics.
1:15.0	And that is that we've heard from some of you that we cover solar a lot.
1:18.5	And of course today has a solar story dominating the headline. And I just want to say we cover solar a lot
1:24.9	because there are very few sectors where you're seeing so many major acquisitions
1:30.5	a new IPO activity breakneck development, and of course the political wars that we talk so much about on this show.
1:37.0	So we're very receptive to our listeners and we're also going to do our best to diversify, but we are following the biggest news stories out there and that is often in solar these days.
1:48.0	The other two topics are not about solar at all.
1:51.0	In our second segment, we're going to be discussing a new
1:53.6	global nuclear status report that shows the industry slipping behind
1:56.8	renewables and we'll end with a look at the scary number of climate records we
2:01.7	continue to break around the world.
2:04.4	And we'll close out the show by telling you something you do not know.
	...

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