Ben Jacklet of Oregon Business writes in his blog:
One company worth keeping your eye on is Shorepower, a developer of truck stop electricity systems that was launched in New York in 2005 but has transferred its operations to Portland partly because of the green-friendly business climate here. Shorepower only employs five people currently, but it recently won a $22.2 million federal grant in collaboration with Canby-based nonprofit Cascade Sierra Solutions that is expected to create 962 jobs building a national network of electrified parking slots for truckers. These plug-in areas will allow truckers who would normally keep their big diesels churning, polluting the air and wasting fuel, to shut their rigs off without losing the heat, air conditioning, video and music systems they’ve come to rely on.
If Shorepower proves itself on this huge job, it won’t be an obscure company for long. And the opportunity is there: the previous industry leader, IdleAire, recently went bankrupt, partly because it was spending 10 times as much per installation as Shorepower does. That leaves Shorepower with options. And as the man said, life is always better when you have options.