GE Innovations of 2008 : Innovation : GE
skip to main contentskip to secondary navigationWorldwide, GE filed over 2,200 patents while investing nearly $6 billion in R&D, continuing our 130-year tradition of solving some of the world's toughest problems with life-changing innovations.
Mining operations need big trucks. But stopping these massive vehicles takes a lot of energy. GE’s hybrid vehicle team of scientists figured out how to capture the energy of braking, store it, and re-use it, saving fuel and increasing efficiency. This hauler uses the amazing hybrid technology to put the energy from stopping to work.
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Small enough to fit in a physician’s backpack and operate for up to a week on a single charge, the GE MAC 400 is the first compact electrocardiogram (ECG) device to be designed, developed and manufactured in India for India, giving more people in more places access to better healthcare.
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GE is playing a big part in bringing power and water to a region where water is scarce. GE's state-of-the-art gas turbines, steam turbines, and reverse-osmosis plants will form the heart of the world's largest integrated water and power plant in Marafiq, Saudi Arabia. This year GE won the first Marafiq Award for Sustainability for its environmentally responsible work on this important facility.
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Mesa Power, created by legendary oilman T. Boone Pickens, has placed an order with GE for 667 1.5 megawatt wind turbines to create the world’s largest single-site wind farm in the Texas Panhandle. Meanwhile, GE shipped its 10,000th 1.5 MW turbine, making us the number one wind turbine manufacturer in the U.S.
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This GE Mainline Locomotive is the first of 298 to be assembled in China from a kit. After putting the kit together, the 6,250-horsepower Mainline can pull the equivalent of 205 Boeing 747 airliners with up to 10% greater fuel efficiency. All this while producing up to 50% fewer emissions at a cost that is 15% lower than the typical life-cycle cost of current locomotives in China.
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Using garnet gemstones, GE engineers developed the first new detector material in 20 years and put it to work in the LightSpeed CT750, the world's first High-Definition CT scanner, providing high-definition images at 100 times the speed of previous medical scanners — another big step forward in the early detection of cancer and part of GE Healthcare's effort to help doctors save nearly 3,000 lives every day.
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When Richard Branson's Virgin Atlantic used biofuel to fly from London Heathrow to Amsterdam, GE was there. One of the four GE CF6 engines that powered the Boeing 747's flight used a sustainable type of biofuel based on coconut and babassu oil - the first time in the world that an airline has run this biofuel in-flight.
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All around the world, GE's Jenbacher engines are providing cleaner solutions to energy needs. In the Netherlands, a group of greenhouse operators who produce 180 million pounds of vine tomatoes annually is using 28 Jenbacher cogeneration systems to provide power for assimilation lighting, heat and CO2 at various greenhouses. This year they began producing their first fruit grown with the help of Jenbacher.
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GE scientists have been looking closely at the unique nano-textured wax on the leaves on lotus plants, which can repel water, to improve our products. The results include GE superhydrophobic nano-coatings that reject water, reducing ice on a wind turbine blade, or helping parts of a gas turbine to reject grime, resulting in better efficiency.
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Our Developing Health Globally program brings the GE spirit of innovation to philanthropy, improving access to quality healthcare in the developing world by drawing on our products, expertise and employee engagement to provide a sustainable approach to local healthcare facilities. This year, the program expanded into Latin America and Asia, including upgrades to healthcare facilities at six locations in Honduras.
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Designed, developed and manufactured at GE facilities in Salzbergen, Germany, the 2.5 megawatt wind turbine is an attractive offering for the competitive European renewable energy market. About 140 2.5 MW turbines manufactured in Germany will be shipped to Fintinele, Romania, to form the largest wind farm in Europe.
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NBC Universal officially launched hulu.com, an online video service that offers hit TV shows, movies and clips, anytime, online anywhere, to critical and popular acclaim. With a focus on convenience, ease of use and first-class content that is both free and legal, Hulu is the new way to watch TV.
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GE is working with Norway’s electric car manufacturer Th!nk and A123, one of the world's leading suppliers of high-power lithium-ion batteries, to commercialize electric transportation technology making it more practical and affordable, bringing us the car of the future faster and cheaper. The eco-friendly Th!nk venture draws on many of GE’s areas of expertise and is poised to deliver tomorrow’s favorite car.
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Imagine living next to the sea, yet regularly experiencing drought. GE solved this age-old problem in Algeria by building the largest desalination plant in Africa, the Hamma Salt-Water Desalination Plant. It uses GE’s advanced ecomagination-certified reverse-osmosis membranes to provide fresh water to as many as 2 million residents of Algiers.
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GE was awarded the contract for all 12 pipeline compression stations for China's next important infrastructure project: the 4,000-kilometer West-to-East Gas Pipeline Project that will supply the coastal cities of China, like Shanghai, with essential fuel. GE has been completing the work ahead of schedule, which will make a big difference for these cities this winter.
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The GEnx aircraft engine received flight certification this year and is poised to become the next industry workhorse on the Boeing 787 Dreamliner. GE is the world’s leading producer of large and small jet engines for commercial and military aircraft. In fact, engines from GE and its partners carry 3.5 million commercial passengers – every day.
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As a top sponsor of the Olympic Games, GE efforts all over China helped bring the Games to life, including over 400 infrastructure projects in wind, water, energy, security, transportation and lighting. While GE saw record television ratings and $1.7 billion in revenues from the Games, our work there will provide an enduring legacy for all.
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Imagine a future of “printed” lighting. Using a process similar to printing newspapers, GE unveiled the world’s first demonstration of “roll-to-roll” processed OLEDs, organic light-emitting diodes. This is a significant step toward the inexpensive manufacture of these flexible, futuristic lighting devices.
image 18To learn more about GE's long tradition of life-changing innovations, please visit our Innovation Timeline.
GE Innovation TimelineTo see what GE is doing today, and every day, take a look at these important facts:
GE Print Ad (PDF, 68KB)And to learn more about the important discoveries of tomorrow and what GE scientists are working on today, please visit the blog of our Global Research Center.