At the end of last week, as the Feds were busy closing more banks, including one in California, the state Employment Development Department, EDD, released California unemployment numbers for November. The state wide unemployment rate fell from 12.5% to 12.3%. Below are some updates on businesses of interest to West Orange County people.

The Boeing Company
With major operations in Seal Beach, Long Beach, El Segundo, Huntington Beach, and Anaheim, The Boeing Company is probably the largest employer in the area. As such, there is almost always something newsworthy happening at Boeing.

Finally Boeing has something firm to celebrate at its Long Beach C-17 assembly plant. Boeing employs about 5,000 in Long Beach to produce the C-17 military heavy airlifter and those jobs have been under a cloud since last April when Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced that the Air Force didn’t need any more of the planes.

That announcement started a boxing match between the congress, which wanted to save jobs and votes, and the Obama Administration which wanted to save money. Eventually, the Administration tossed in the towel and on Saturday morning, the congress sent the bill to President Obama. The legislation orders 10 more of Boeing’s C-17s.

Meanwhile, as Boeing continues to search for more international orders, the company confirmed that Brittan will buy one more of the big planes. Boeing produces about 15 planes per year, so these orders will give the plant nearly another year of work. Presumably, Boeing is still working on another 10 plane order from India, but nothing official has been announced.
The next major hurdle could be next year’s budget battle, when the issue of how many C-17s the U.S. Air Force needs, will be debated all over again.

While the Boeing folks in Long Beach were keeping one eye on Washington DC, their satellite building compatriots in El Segundo celebrated two more milestones. The company announced that the second satellite in a series of Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites, GOES-14, has completed on-orbit testing and been accepted into service.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA, will use GOES-14 to accurately predict storms and monitor weather conditions across approximately 60 percent of the planet, including the United States. GOES-14 now joins GOES-13 as a backup satellite for the two-satellite GOES constellation. The two spacecraft are ready to become NOAA's primary operational satellites. NOAA's current plans call for GOES-13 to become the operational east satellite during spring 2010 and begin providing critical data for the next hurricane season.

On Dec. 16, Boeing shipped the third satellite in the GOES series, GOES-P, from the company's satellite integration and test complex in El Segundo to Cape Canaveral, where it will undergo final preparations for launch early next year. GOES-P will be launched aboard a Delta IV rocket procured from United Launch Alliance through Boeing's commercial launch business, Boeing Launch Services. The launch is planned for Feb. 25 from Cape Canaveral's Space Launch Complex 37.

Amonix
Seal Beach based manufacturer Amonix is “the world leading designer and proprietary producer of patented high-performance High Concentration Photovoltaic power generation systems for utility scale applications.”

Last week, the company scored another victory with the City of Seal Beach. The City Council voted to rebate back to the company 80% of sales and use taxes greater than$25,000 per quarter. This comes on top of the city council’s recent decision to move forward with $10 million in private activity bonds for Amonix.

Clean Energy Fuels Corp.
This Seal Beach based company continues its strategy of developing a national fueling infrastructure to support the use of natural gas as a vehicle fuel. They recently announced that Veolia Transportation Services, Inc., North America’s largest private provider of public transit services, has awarded Clean Energy Fuels Corp. (Nasdaq: CLNE) a contract to build, operate, and maintain a compressed natural gas (CNG) bus fueling station at Veolia facilities in downtown Los Angeles. Under contract with the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro), Veolia will begin operating new environmentally friendly CNG buses for the agency in April 2010, as Metro accelerates efforts to replace older diesel-fueled buses with new CNG models. The Veolia-operated transit buses are deployed in Metro’s North Los Angeles County service area.

Construction of the new Veolia/Clean Energy CNG station will begin in January 2010, with completion set for mid 2010. CNG fuel requirements are projected at more than 420,000 gasoline-gallon-equivalents in the first year of the Veolia station’s operations.
James Harger, Clean Energy Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer, said “We are very grateful for the confidence that Veolia Transportation has placed in Clean Energy to support them in their efforts to help Metro achieve the full potential of its clean-air natural gas bus policy. Across the U.S., Clean Energy is partnering with major metropolitan public transit agencies and their service providers to fuel over 5,000 buses and to help them implement and expand clean-fuel programs for their bus fleets. CNG has proven to significantly lower harmful emissions like nitrogen oxides, particulate matter, toxic pollutants and greenhouse gases as compared to diesel fuel.”
Harger added that Clean Energy works with Veolia at other public transit agencies across the country including Foothill Transit and Valley Metro in Phoenix, Arizona. The new CNG station supporting a Metro contractor will be Clean Energy’s second project of this type. The company also partnered with Southland Transit, Inc. for a fueling facility for CNG bus service to the San Gabriel Valley section of LA County.

This article is part of a regular biweekly survey of significant business and job developments of interest to West Orange County communities. This biweekly series appears every other Monday, alternating with our Orange County residential real estate Updates. In the context of national, statewide, and Orange County/Los Angeles County trends, this series focuses on, for the most part, local companies which are moving forward, even in these difficult economic times. Whether you are a senior level executive, an artist, salesperson, a contractor, or a customer service representative, your business opportunities will more likely be successful with companies which are ahead of the curve. If you are looking for a job, have a professional service to offer, or business-to-business products for sale, the progressive companies referenced in this series could be good places to start.