When Depot asked customers who made their water heaters, GE received the third-largest number of votes--and GE doesn't even make water heaters.
But GE's water unit accounts for less than 2% of its overall revenues.
So Depot convinced Rheem, a division of Japan's Paloma Industries and the biggest water-heater maker, to slap GE's name on a line of water heaters.
Executives have been pressing officials in China to include GE's advanced boiling-water reactors in their next five-year economic plan (China uses the pressurized reactors championed by perennial GE rival Westinghouse, now part of British Nuclear Fuels Ltd.).
Another line, the GE Profile, automatically streams water into containers of any size using sound waves.
He says only General Electric would be large enough to swallow American Water Works whole, but companies like GE, ITT Industries and 3M have not shown previous interest in water utility assets, preferring to stick to water industrial assets--e.g. filtration, desalination and instrumentation markets.
Another new line of business: water purification, which GE entered a few years ago with several acquisitions.
Low-flow fixtures inside the building cut water consumption by 42% and GE eliminated outside landscape irrigation, accoding to the company.
GE's primary role is distribution, primarily water and electricity.
Still on the block, some analysts say, are GE's appliance, lighting, industrial controls and water chemicals businesses.
The company identified 17 products that met its standard of providing "significant and measurable environmental performance advantages, " including a Lexan film that replaces conventional paint, Harmony water-conserving washing machines, the new fuel-efficient GEnx jet engine and GE's Evolution locomotive, a 208-ton, 4, 400hp workhorse that burns 3% less fuel and puts out 40% less pollution than its immediate predecessor.
Because GE crops require less chemical pesticide, fewer farmers and their families risk being poisoned by runoff into waterways and ground water.
FORBES: The New York Times' Mark Bittman Offers Poisoned Food For Thought
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