Toshiba to Pay $5.4 Billion for Westinghouse

Philip writes "Business electronics firm Toshiba is bidding for 100% control of Westinghouse - famous for making blenders and LCD televisions, but principally in the business of building nuclear reactors. 'By 2020 the market for nuclear power generation is expected to grow 50 percent compared to 2005,' Toshiba CEO Nishida said at a London news conference. 'Toshiba is responding to this challenge by acquiring Westinghouse.'"

Comments

Does this mean...

[metternich]

Nuclear Powered Laptops?

Re:Does this mean...

[20th Century Boy]

Gives a new meaning to the term "Blue Screen of Death".

Re:Does this mean...

[baryon351]

Small, safe and convenient nuclear laptop batteries, right here right now. :)

Re:Does this mean...

[kesuki]

there Are nuclear powered batteries, that provide 10+ years of continuous power for devices such as pacemakers. The amount of radioactive materials are so slight, that the simple battery casing provides an effective shield meaning that no more radiation thanone would recieve from normal background rads will escape it. however, such batteries are a far cry from providing enough power for a laptop.

as far as generating electricity from radioactive materials goes there are two methodologies involved a. the tendandcy of silicon to 'produce' electrcial charge when exposed to the right ffrequencies of radiation. and b. the use of radioactive waste to produce 'heat' to make steam to power an electrical turbine. the former is the type of technology used in 'new' pacemakers etc, the latter is some cold war era technology, primarilly researched by the russians. nuclear decay batteries have been powering satelites etc for decades, however based on the 'facts' for the linked story it seems absurd at best. 12 miles from food processing? does he not realize that virtually every egg and piece of poultry in the Us is irradiated to 'sterilize' it? does he not realize UV lights are installed at the entry points to any US based food manufacturor, to allow for 'bacterial sterilization' to prevent contamination? yes, Uv light is 'radiation' too ;) and it's been known to cause skin cancer too, never mind that millions of people flock to locations where they can bask in the stuff like 'beaches' etc.

Boy times change

[Marxist Hacker 42]

When I was a kid, Westinghouse was REFRIDGERATORS!

National Security

[qwertphobia]

Does the DOE have any limitations on foreign corporations handling parts of our Nuclear Energy programs?

Is anyone else a little concerned about this?

Re:National Security

[kram2598]

This concern is not valid considering that Westinghouse is currently owned entirely by British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL). Also, DOE does not get very involved in the business side of things. This would be an NRC issue.

Re:National Security

[bigtrike]

This concern is not valid considering that Westinghouse is currently owned entirely by British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL). Also, DOE does not get very involved in the business side of things. This would be an NRC issue.

Not entirely. Anything related to DoD (not DOE) is not primarily owned by BNFL. When CBS corporation split up the company in 2000, the DoD stiuplated that US based companies must have a controlling share in those divisions.

Not necessarily

[jd]

There's a campaign to ban energy-wasteful technology where cheaper, superior alternatives exist. In the unlikely event that the campaign achieves a meaningful result, America could dispose of several existing power stations without the need for nuclear stations to replace them.

(Better yet, if the campaign succeeds AND one of the two fusion reactor projects produces cheap energy, we could eliminate all conventional and all fission reactors entirely and have just two or three fusion reactors per continent.)

Re:Not necessarily

[rolfwind]

There's a campaign to ban energy-wasteful technology [banthebulb.org] where cheaper, superior alternatives exist. In the unlikely event that the campaign achieves a meaningful result, America could dispose of several existing power stations without the need for nuclear stations to replace them.

I find that capitalism is better than banning lightbulb:/

For instance, I use CFL (compact fluorescent light bulbs) regularly, but especially in the hot summer where the extra heat generated from traditional light-bulbs in a fully lighted house is like putting on a 1500+ watt electric heater and then wondering why the AC has to be cranked so high (and expensively).

But traditionally lightbulbs can't be replaced - they're nice in an otherwise small underheated bathroom and less expensive than an oilheater :-D (plus one doesn't forget to turn the lights off as much).

Or in uses such as the oven, fridge, etcetera where the plastic ballast of a CFL doesn't have a chance....

Re:Not necessarily

[captain_craptacular]

Maybe I've got bum equipment then because I have CF bulbs in many rooms in my house and they frequently take minutes to warm up to full brightness. I have 2 (in 1 fixture) in my bedroom and while they do turn on immediately, they are extremely dim for 5 minutes or more almost every time I turn them on. Furthermore, I just plain can't fit CF bulbs into all my fixtures, meaning if I wanted to completely move away from traditional bulbs I'd have to buy and install new light fixtures in a number of places as well. Also, there are spectrum problems with fluorescent bulbs, they just don't make the same quality of light unless you buy full spectrum bulbs which are 10x the cost (and they don't come in compact sizes at all). Where I live we only get a couple hours of daylight in the winter and there are serious health concerns associated with switching wholesale to non full spectrum bulbs.

So far my solution has been to replace 1/2 my bulbs with CF where I can. So I cut down on power usage some and still have rich full spectrum light...

I'm no "greenie" either. I'm just practicing what the energy business refers to as "Demand Destruction", the cost of electricity has gone up so high that myself and many other consumers are motivated to find ways to cut our usage. A large percentage of those cuts will never be regained by the energy industry once made, even if the cost of power suddenly drops. A good example of demand destruction is Hybrid cars. People buy them because the price of gas is high, but if the price of gas drops you don't see people running out and trading in their prius on a F-350.

Hydrogen Economy

[Eightyford]

I hope everyone realises that the much hyped hydrogen economy of the future is totally dependent on nuclear energy. If I had the money, I'd invest heavily in the companies ivolved in the nuclear industry. Solar, hydro, and wind energy will not be enough to replace oil.

Re:Hydrogen Economy

[plover]

Nuclear generation isn't the only answer. A recent study here in Minnesota showed that we have enough wind resources here to provide 14 times our current electric consumption. That is, if we built all the windmills that they say we could build. And yes, the greenies are drooling all over these figures.

Right now, we have approximately 800 megawatt-hours generated in this state by wind turbines. That's the equivalent of one or two coal-fired electric plants. Our problem right now is one of distribution -- we barely have enough capacity to carry this energy now from the windy part of the state to the Minneapolis/St. Paul region. There are plans underway to build more distribution lines, but those always take a long time and stir up controversy.

Of course, this doesn't take into consideration anything to do with current oil- or natural gas-based consumption. As you said, converting any significant percentage of vehicles to hydrogen fuels would obviously require massive amounts of power we're not yet generating. And it takes lots of time and money to physically erect more turbines. But there's a lot less regulation required and a lot less complaining about wind power vs. nuclear power.

One advantage to hydrogen is that it could be shipped via truck. Rather than invest in thousands of miles of costly transmission lines (and pay the 10% power cost in transmission losses), hydrogen plants could be built next to new reactors located out in the Nevada and Utah deserts, and the hydrogen trucked to market.

For that sort of market

[faloi]

Wouldn't certain countries have to abandon their fear of opening new reactors? After all, building nuclear reactors in some developing nations violates security restrictions. Some European countries already have a decent take rate on nuclear power, at least from what I've heard, I'm too lazy to do any research.

Re:For that sort of market

[Eightyford]

Here's a good reference. http://www.uic.com.au/opinion6.html

24

[Douglas Simmons]

How can we developing more nuclear technology without securing the manual override from our defense contractors? Am I the only one watching these 24 Monday Marathons???

Re:WoW

[Registered Coward v2]

From blenders to refrigerators to Nuclear power plants. Sounds like something was put on a back burner for a while. Just a little difference from an electric motor to nuclear reactors!

GE has been doing that for decades - add in locomotives; lightbulbs, and plastics as well.

In other news...

[pmike_bauer]

...Iran's bid for Westinghouse is 5.5 billion

Re:I thought Siemens already owned Westinghouse??

[kram2598]

In the 90s, Westinghouse was split up by Viacom, the owner at that time. The electronics side of the business was sold to Siemens and currently goes under the name Siemens-Westinghouse. All the other divisions of Westinghouse were sold to a variety of companies except for the nuclear division. The nuclear division retained the name Westinghouse Electric Company and was sold to British nuclear fuels.

GE ESBWR

[chipperdog]

As far as the next generation of "traditional" fission reactors, I guess I've been more impressed with GE's ESBWR , than Westinghouse's APxxx ...
IANANE (I am not a Nuclear Engineer), but BWRs seem to have fewer problems (no steam gnerators to leak/plug up, no vessle head degradation) and are theroetically more efficent (single cycle)...
I wonder if anyone is going to make a bid for GENE (General Electric Nuclear Energy)...
I also wonder why we dont hear more about CANDU reactors . They use natural uranium instead of enriched uranium, which could provide more peaceful energy in unstable areas of the worls

Re:GE ESBWR

[thanatospsu]

Actually, I am a nuclear engineer here... The BWR has a greater efficiency, but on the other hand, you get much more radiation dose, and you have issues with fuel moderation when you have 2 phase flow that gives us nuces a major headache. The PWR is much better on the safety/design side of things. The current generation of steam generators don't have the leaking issues that the previous ones have, so you don't have to plug them. And the vessel deterioration that happened at Davis-Besse was management stupidity, which is why they got their ass whooped for $28 Million. Most of the relevant engineers were going you need to check this. The latest generation of CANDU's do NOT run on natural uranium. They used slightly enriched uranium with the D2O moderator. You still have to enrich the uranium! The new Westinghouse designs IMHO kick ass. The AP-600 is a sweet piece of engineering, and the AP-1000 makes me drool. The reduction in machinery, in operating ease, and also in increased efficiency makes it one of the prime choices for new safe nuclear power plants. And the PWR is a mature technology. They have had 40+ years of operating experience to go from. I know that most of the new orders for nuclear power plants that are being thought of are thinking about using the AP-1000 design. The new smaller reactors, like the one that they are building up in Galena are great for out of the way environments, like a salt water desalination plant on the Mediterranean coast. Not for powering a massive urban grid like in New York, DC, whatever.

Re:GE?

[kram2598]

GE does not own Westinghouse proper. GE owns some of the divisions of Westinghouse when it was split up by Viacom in the 90s. GE is one of the main competitors to Westinghouse Electric Company, the nuclear division which is currently owned by British Nuclear Fuels. The other main competitor is Areva/Framatone out of France.

Thank you, Greenpeace

[mi]

If not for the hysterical campaigns against nuclear energy, we would not be having this awful dependency on oil and other grossly unhealthy fossil fuels...

It seriously set the nuclear power industry back, which is a shame. Old plants continue to operate, but new ones are very slow to appear. Safe and non-polluting technologies were available for decades and we are wising up to using them only now.

Re:Thank you, Greenpeace

[drinkypoo]

On top of that we would have probably retired at least some of the U.S. nuclear plants by now. ALL of them are based on inherently unsafe, antiquated designs. I spend a LOT of time talking about nuclear and alternative energy with my girlfriend's housemates, one of whom has a couple of books out on the subject of humanity's future and who is getting a column in The Fifth Estate , a leading anarchist rag, and another of whom is a professor who used to work for ARPA as a programmer/engineer and who has worked in certification of nuclear power plants. Granted, these are by far the two with the most impressive pedigrees along these lines, but anyway...

Our current reactors are pretty sloppy, and since we can't build any new ones (due to misled hippies) we keep the old ones running long past the time when they should be decommissioned. Thus we build more coal plants. Every year, the U.S. alone puts more radioactive material into the atmosphere as a result of burning coal to develop electricity than all of the nuclear accidents, tests, and bombings put together have done. EVERY YEAR! In 2000 alone it was approximately 1250 metric tons of uranium (Something like 0.7% of which is U-235) and 5000 metric tons of Thorium. In fact, if we could capture that material and use it for nuclear fuel, it would actually produce more energy output than the coal that formerly contained it.

Only about half of our coal consumption is for the generation of electricity. That means we put out more like twice that in 2000. And of course, it's only gone up since.

Wind power actually surpassed Nuclear a little while ago, in terms of energy production. However, wind is not highly reliable. This is the primary attraction of coal or nuclear power; you can get it when you want it. It's ideal for industrial power consumption, such as that for manufacturing or for high-energy-consumption research like running particle colliders.

My basic recipe for fixing the power problem is:

1) Shoot all the people who stopped nuclear plants from being built while not stopping coal plants from being built.
2) Build some new nuclear reactors, and some breeder reactors for reprocessing the fuel. Also build wind farms as feasible, because using no fuel is infinitely desirable as compared to using some fuel.
3) Decomission as many coal plants as possible.
4) Return to step 2 (you could return to step 1 but hopefully all those people will be dead already.)

Why am I using such strong language? Like shooting people? Because cancer rates doubled in the industrial revolution. Why? Because they started burning an absolute shitpot of coal. Now, here we are many moons later, making the same idiot mistake. I blame the people who are responsible for the continued rule of the coal plants for the non-smoking-related lung cancer deaths in this nation. With cheaper electricity, we'd probably already be driving electric or hydrogen vehicles...

Re:Thank you, Greenpeace

[mi]

Nuclear is currently used primarily for non transport energy so would have near zero impact on our oil

Electrical heating, electrical rail road engines, electrical cars would've made far more economic sense if electricity was as cheap and abundant as nuclear power can make it.

You need to include all costs for an accurate comparision, this site includes all costs

That's the point. Greenpeace's et al.'s passionate protests make the nuclear power's cost much higher financially. Even worse -- politically it was prohibitively expensive for decades.

Now that Chinese (no more willing to depend on foreign fuel suppliers, than us) are about to build dozens of new nuclear plants (Toshiba's main motivation for this purchase), the world is suddenly reconsidering...

Re:Thank you, Greenpeace

[mi]

If nuclear plants were truly low cost, they would be getting built without government subsidies.

I wonder, then, why do Chinese plan to build dozens of nuclear plants by 2020? Do they know something, you don't?

Perhaps, the main burden preventing new plants in the US is the unsurmountable amounts of red-tape imposed by the Greenpeace-influenced electorate and politicians? Coal-firing plants, meanwhile, are getting exemption from environmental regulations -- because someone has to keep the lights on and nuclear remains an anathema. (Coal, I guess, reminds people of stoves and steamships of the "good old" era.)

As for having effect on the oil itself, energy is largely a commodity. Less demand in one area increases supply in the others. See other posts in this thread.

Brakes

[grahammm]

I have never heard of Westinghouse blenders or TVs. To me the name Westinghouse means railway brake systems.

It's already in play in the west

[Quirk]

In Canada during the recent federal election campaign an add ran on national TV showing nuclear power as a clean air alternative to existing technology. The ad sported the requisite azure blue skys and big fluffy white clouds while touting nuclear power.

In the UK the BBC website recently ran articles pointing to upcoming reviews of existing nuclear power plants and the impact of bring new plants online.

As noted before the environmentalist camp has had some of it's big guns come out in support of nuclear power as the only alternative available to stave off global warming.

Probably the various political power bases have decided nuclear power is the way to go and have given the spin doctors orders to soften public reaction.

Good news for Canada with a mature nuclear technology, substantial Uranium resources, not to mention being oil and hydro rich.

Toasters, LCD televisions and Alternating Current!

[Omega]

While Westinghouse may be known for it's every day electronics (elevators, microwaves, TVs) and the Westinghouse Science Award (which is still a pretty cool and pretty geeky achievement) and it's defense contracting (nuclear power), I think it's most important achievement is bringing Tesla's idea of alternating current to the consumer.

Lock 'n Spin

[macwarriorny]

I wonder if that means Westinghouse nuclear plants have the "Lock 'n Spin" feature, like their old washing machines from the 1960s and early 1970s (before "White Westinghouse") did.

Re:WoW

[DeepDarkSky]

I'm personally waiting for the Westinghouse Deathstar product next.

The purchase of Westinghouse...

[nero4wolfe]

Actually, this is just about Toshiba buying the Westinghouse nuclear unit. The current owner of this unit is a British company.

The rest of the old Westinghouse has been gone for many years. When you see a new "Westinghouse" consumer product, such as a lcd television, that's a separate individual or company that purchased the right to use the brand name in a certain product area, and then contracted with an asian manufacturer to produce the product.

The same point is true of "Polaroid" lcd televisions; an investor bought the right to use the brand name for electronic products at Polaroids bankruptcy auction, and then contracts with asian manufacturers to bring in product.

The Inventors of Alternating Current

[wsanders]

Back in the Goodle Days, the battle was set for AC vs DC on the electricity grid. Thomas Edison backed DC, and Westinghouse backed AC.

AC won, and Westinghouse became rich and famous: http://www.sparknotes.com/biography/edison/section 6.rhtml

Toshiba Mini Reactors

[DigitalRaptor]

I'd love to see Toshiba's mini nuclear reactors widely deployed in the U.S., or at the bare minimum looked into with a few test deployments.

They are small, safe, and cost effective.

They are the size of a grain silo, buried 100 feet underground. They are idiot-proof (think of the causes of Chernobyl) because the nuclear reaction only happens while a plate is moving in front of the rods. If the plate stops, the reaction stops. The plate cannot move except intentionally, so the chance of a runaway meltdown approaches zero.

If the U.S. were smart it would take a months budget for the war in Iraq and just buy the technology outright from Toshiba, then deploy them as widely and cheaply as possible.

CANDU

[TubeSteak]

That CANDU link is quite interesting

http://canteach.candu.org/library/20000101.pdf

Existing reactors work by using an expensive fuel (enriched uranium) and a cheap moderator (graphite or water).

CANDU's idea is relatively safer. Instead of enriched uranium, CANDU reactors use natural uranium (which is cheap) along with an expensive moderator (heavy water). The design is a bit safer too.

OTOH, heavy water is still a part of the nucleur weapons making process & is export controlled.

Re:CANDU

[hayfever]

CANDU reactors (as currently constructed in Canada) have a positive void coefficient and can't be licensed in the US. A next-generation design (the ACR-700) is undergoing licensing in the US but is not drawing much attention as its competitors (Framatome's EPR, GE's ABWR & ESBWR, Westinghouse's AP-1000) are all higher power output reactors.

Re:CANDU

[ChumpusRex2003]

The CANDU reactor while an elegant design suffers from 2 problems which have limited its uptake outside of Canada.

1) It is incredibly expensive - $400-$500 million worth of heavy water are required to commission each reactor. As a result, CANDU designs are 20-30% more than conventional BWR/PWRs.

2) It doesn't meet minimum safety requirements for licensing in many countries (including the U.S.). The problem with CANDU is 'void coefficient'. Most countries require a negative void coefficient for a reactor to be licensed - this means overheating, or loss of coolant pressure, exerts a braking effect on the nuclear reaction via basic physical principles. CANDU has a Positive coefficient - and overheating reactor, or one losing coolant, will tend to accelerate the reaction.

Some countries have approved CANDU, because the void coefficient was designed around - big safety margins, and oversized safety systems. The Chernobyl accident was caused in part by having positive void coefficient - although in the RBMK design, little attention to avoiding run-away was given.

Solution to distribution issues.

[jd]

Use extremely high voltages and very low current. Power loss is proportional to voltage, but proportional to current squared. Extremely high-tension lines with next to no current should be able to deliver power over a very large region with very little loss.

With fewer power stations, the grid would be simpler and less likely to go into spasms when a tree falls on a power line or when some other accident occurs. Keeping things simple is Good.

Maybe three is an underestimate, but even one per State is vastly superior to the existing setup.

Re:Solution to distribution issues.

[dfenstrate]

My nuke plant puts out about 3400 amps at the New England Grid's 345,000 Volts. I don't know what the resistance is for the lines, but it's pretty damn low.

  The outgoing three phase lines have to be kept at a considerable distance from each other (16 feet) meaning that the minimum tower width is 32 feet or so.

If you bring them any closer, you'd have arcing, or you'd need to heavily insulate them.

If you increased the voltage (some places in the US run as high as 750,000 volts), you need to move the lines further apart, or insulate them greatly- not only is this expensive, but it makes them heavier, so you'd need tougher towers, you'd have less margin for ice buildup, etc, etc.

There are numerous reasons why the main grid distribution voltage can't get substantially higher.

Also local lines need to be kept at relatively low voltages to reduce maintanance costs. Again, the higher the voltage, the more prone a line is to arching to nearby grounds. If you run 100,000 volts through a neighborhood line you'd reduce line losses, but you'd have to send tree trimming crews out alot more often, and they'd have to cut trees much further back.

In short, when you decide on a grid voltage for a particular line run, you have to weigh construction costs vs maintanance costs vs material cost vs line losses.

There are numerous factors at play here.

Re:Solution to distribution issues.

[dfenstrate]

The cost factor still plays in strongly as burying a line is a lot more expensive (3x more?) than stringing it along poles. Also, a power line in the air doesn't need to be insulated if it's a proper distance from other pole mounted elements, but burying a 345kv line would require ridiculously thick rubber insulation, or even need to be run in a SF6 gas-insulated bus.

(Ever see what happens when you ground 345kV ? We did that once in New Hampshire and grid operators in New York were asking about it)

(SF6 gas is a fantastic insulator, but it's no longer mass produced, and is thus very expensive. Why is it no longer mass produced? Because it tears holes in the ozone like nothing else)

Like I said, there are many factors at play when choosing grid voltage, and to the folks who built and are building it, losing some electricity is preferable to the investment required to keep more of it.

Re:Solution to distribution issues.

[achbed]

Maybe if they buried all the electric, it would train all the backhoes to stop cutting Internet fiber! "Hey, I got a 50-50 chance of cutting the Internet for these poor schlubs, or getting fried. Hmm... Think I'll move on now..." :)

not to be confused with the Westinghouse of...

[swschrad]

electrical switchgear and turbines, which is part of Siemens... or the historic Westinghouse of air brakes, which is part of Honeywell, through the Allied Signal/Bendix merger... or the Westinghouse of light bulbs and fans, which is some marketer with two tin desks, two telephones, 500 folks with red ties, and containers of Stuff from China arriving daily on docks.

such is the stuff of de-mergers of the US' industrial base in the late 80s and 1990s.

uhhh... no.

[temojen]

While XCell-N has obvious advantages in the area of time between battery replacements, Shephard advises there are some minor disadvantages. "Due to government regulations, use of a laptop powered by XCell-N is prohibited in airports, government offices, schools, hospitals, public transport, hotels, residential areas or within 12 miles of food preparation areas.". XCell-N also weighs substantially more than a regular laptop battery, coming in at 7 kilograms (15.4 lbs).

Re:uhhh... no.

[serutan]

prohibited... within 12 miles of food preparation areas

Crap. My living room is way less than 12 miles from my kitchen.

Refrigerators - Nuclear Reactors... Same thing

[temojen]

Only backwards.

How qualified is Toshiba to managing nuclear sites

[EMIce]

Famed investor Peter Lynch says to start worrying when companies "diworsify" as he calls it. When companies find themselves unable to gain additional marketshare in the industries they already compete in, they tend to go around buying into other industries at inflated prices. Often they buy into industries that require different know how to run effectively, and many botch the job once things have played out in a few years. Think of all the internet startups that were overvalued, bought up, and mismanaged. The same thing happens in other fields as well.

There is incentive on the part of executives to diversify, as managers can then get promoted, whereas there was little room to grow before. In the short term the stock goes up and executive salaries also rise, but in the long term, mismanaged divisions only weigh a company down, offsetting profits from the healthy divisions and hurting long term investors.

There is a rising market for nuclear reactors, so this might turn out to be good thing for Toshiba, but I'd do more research before plopping down some coin for Toshiba stock.

Westinghouse's Endeavors

[Anonymous Coward]

Rotary Steam Engine
Railroad Block Signal
Railroad Air Brakes
AC Power Generation
First Long-distance power transmission
Niagra Falls AC Generation
Steam turbine generators
Light Bulbs
AC Electric Locomotives
First Marine Turbine Engine
Micarta Laminate
Electric kitchen Range
Radios Receivers/Transmitters
Electric Iron
Television Cameras
Televisions
Elevators
Electrostatic Air Cleaners
First Atom Smasher
Radar
Automatic Washing Machine
Electric Clothes drier
X-Ray Machines
Self Defrosting Refridgerator
Electric Rotisserie Grills
Room Air Conditioners
Submarines
Jet Engines
Nuclear Reactors
And on and on and on

For those who don't know...

[iamlucky13]

Westinghouse orginally was a power company. Westinghouse himself was a major proponent of using AC current for the US electrical grid, versus Edison's preference for DC, which was less efficient. It's not really a big stretch.

Westinghouse Electric Company

And the problem with that is...

[everphilski]

And the problem with that is the low density of hydrogen. Hydrogen in liquid form has 10% of the density of gasoline. And it is cryogenic, requiring a large amount of energy to put it into a cryogenic state and then a well-insulated tank and more energy to keep it cryogenic. You could easily have to send 15+ trucks in place of 1 truck with gasoline to get out the same amount of energy. Not to mention the amount of hydrogen you spend powering those trucks. People complain about the inefficiencies of power lines... its nothing compared to the inefficiencies of a "green" hydrogen economy.

Mis-print, should have read 500%

[e1618978]

Other news sites are saying 300% growth by 2015. Toshiba is paying
34 times earnings, for a business that they expect to grow by 12% per
year - unless they think that they will get significant synergy with
their existing nuclear businesses, then I think that they are significantly
overpaying for the business.

Re:Toasters, LCD televisions and Alternating Curre

[nickovs]

I think it's most important achievement is bringing Tesla's idea of alternating current to the consumer.

Absolutely. Westinghouse build the first A/C power station out in Telluride, Colorado in 1891, with design help from Tesla and $100,000 from L.L. Nunn. While we're on the subject, this July 9th will be Telsa's 150th birthday, so light up those Tesla Coils to celebrate; we'll be doing up here so in Telluride!

Re:How qualified is Toshiba to managing nuclear si

[dimension6]

Along with General Electric and Hitachi Ltd. (6501), Toshiba has built BWRs (boiling-water reactors) for Tokyo Electric Power Co. (9501) and other Japanese power utilities. With little near-term growth expected in the domestic market, however, it needs to expand overseas.

But the fact that Toshiba does not have expertise in PWRs (pressurized-water reactors) represents a major disadvantage because this technology constitutes about 70% of the nuclear reactors operating worldwide.

By acquiring Westinghouse, Toshiba will improve its chances of winning orders because Westinghouse both designs and maintains PWRs, in addition to processing uranium.

--The Nihon Keizai Shimbun Tuesday Morning Edition (Nikkei)

This strikes me as a good move as it opens up a huge worldwide market segment for Toshiba.

Re:How qualified is Toshiba to managing nuclear si

[FleaPlus]

According to this table, Toshiba has been building nuclear power plants business since the 1960s, and is currently the largest nuclear plant supplier in Japan. I suspect that they're fairly qualified.