Stratton C.

Morningstar Screen Reveals Potential Value in Energy, Materials ETFs

Curious, the XLE is trading at almost 17X earnings and the XLB is trading at nearly 22X earnings (according to yahoo! finance). Aren't these still trading somewhat rich? Average price/book on the XLB is almost 3X... (XLE is under 2X)

Green Energy Prospecting: Eye on Ocean Power Technologies

I want to thank you guys for a very informative read. I'm very interested in OPTT and ocean-derived power in general. As a layman's perspective, the Power Buoy's strike me as less about direct competition with primary power sources. It strikes me as serving two purposes: 1) Adding supplemental "green" power to regions that are already served by a primary power source; and 2) Providing power to regions that a) lack adequate power sources to begin with; b) don't require the amount of power to justify an entire new plant; and/or c) are in an environmentally sensitive location.

Again, this is a layman's observation - I'm neither an expert in the energy field nor an analyst. But I'd think under those circumstances the customer in question would be willing to pay a little more per kwh for their power. The question of competition in my mind relates more to other forms of passive green power -- solar, wind, etc. And there, again, we're talking about very specific regional issues: is there adequate sunlight to get the most out of solar? same for wind? and so on. Either way it seems like we're really talking about a niche power product whose application may be pretty limited compared to traditional power.